LED lighting is the essential tech in new RV's. Your RV, new or old, can benefit from massive improvements with the addition of these driving, back-up, hitch and mood lighting. The result is a safer, stress-free RV experience. We interview Justin Perrette, Oracle Lighting's master installer and product instructor, who tells us how to choose, what is possible and where to go for expert advice on the ultimate lighting enhancements to your RV, whether it's your motorcoach or the tow vehicle for your trailer.
Perry Mack: Good morning everyone, we're here today with Justin Perrette, who's from Oracle Lighting and he's got over 12 years of experience, including a 10-year tenure at Oracle Lighting and he started with Oracle as an installer and over the years has grown with the company into doing many things ranging from product development, shooting product video content and traveling across the country educating dealers about the brand and its products. Justin, I think... Last time we actually spoke face to face might have been in Saudi Arabia. Does that sound right? Were you at that show?
JP: I actually was hoping you brought that up. That was a really crazy experience. It was actually my first time out of the country. So a bit of a doozy for a first time.
JP: It was a really, really good event. It was very crazy. A lot of logistics involved, really astonishing that they pulled that off in such a short amount of time.
Perry Mack: It was just within a few months they pulled this massive event off. Did you guys manage to do any business there? How did that work out for you?
JP: We did. Okay. We didn't bring a ton of product back. You know, we did sell some stuff out there. We acquired a few relationships. That was really the, the, the big part of that for us was trying to establish some, uh, lines out, uh, you know, in that region.
Perry Mack: So we should get on to actually the reason why we're here, which is driving lights for RVs and probably the trucks that tow them. So I know Oracle, I think, typically does a lot of work with LEDs. And I guess my question is, from your perspective, a little bit more educated in the science and technology than mine, why are LEDs better than the incandescence that we've had in vehicles for? decades like why is the energy consumption so much lower? How is it that you can change colours? Why is it brighter?
JP: so, you know, without getting too much in the weeds, LEDs are essentially better, mainly because you really, in layman's terms, you can make them brighter. You can drive them harder. You know, with halogen bulbs, you're really fixed. to a specific brightness, you really can't do much more without drastically increasing the ambient heat inside of the lamp. Whereas LEDs, you can do that a lot more safely. And in terms of... Heat, you know, you can do things passively to mitigate that with heat sinks, fans. We've done, you know, all of those types. We've tried different things with managing heat just from integrated circuits that just monitor and throttle the current based on the temperature of the bulb. There's so much technology, and it's just, it's growing year by year.
Perry Mack: It's actually spectacular the results that I've seen, especially with some of your products. But I'm going to ask you too, what about halogens? I mean, they're pretty bright, they can be astounding as well. Do you guys do any work with halogen lights? And again, what's the better way, are LEDs better than the halogens?
JP: So halogen for the longest time was Original Equipment standard. That's just the OE equipment. The transition for the aftermarket really started, you know, when halogen went to High Intensity Discharge, which might be what you're referring to.
Perry Mack: I am.
JP: We still offer HID kits to this day. The difference between an HID bulb and an LED bulb, you know, they're really night and day in terms of how they work. The HID bulbs rely on a very low pressure pocket of gas being ignited in the bulb. And that's what discharge is like. Whereas, you know, more of a solid state a piece of tech like LED, you're not really relying on that gas which does dissipate over time. And that's why you see colour and things maybe not seeming the same as when they were first installed over the span of like five years. But again, it is still something that we offer, not something that we really push as hard as the LED. Especially when you're talking about driving lights, headlights, you know, we have three different lines of high powered LED bulbs that fit pretty much any budget or install need. And we offer those in virtually every size.
Perry Mack: You're right, there are, as you've alluded to, a lot of choices out there so how does a person go about choosing a set of driving lights like what are we looking for?
JP: You know that's very dependent on the actual headlamps. If we're talking about you know replacing headlamps or fog lamps you know that's going to be the main driving lights on most vehicles. It really depends on the lamp, the lamp type, whether it's a reflector housing or a projector. There are a lot of vehicles that use a halogen bulb inside of a projector lamp, which all the projector does is basically just focuses the light in a more tightly controlled manner. Some LED bulbs might not be, you know, very suitable for that just depending on the construction of the projector. LEDs usually perform extremely well better than halogen in any reflector type headlight. So, you know, dependent on you would you would really want to go me personally I'd like to go as bright as possible so I might gravitate more towards like our premium line of bulbs which roughly about 4 000 lumen. The I guess I could say the main spec that people will usually look at when shopping for an LED bulb, for example, is lumens. That's going to be, you know, the effective light that will actually be visible.
Perry Mack: Yeah, because you know again on an RV, whether it's a class a motor coach or I'm in my one ton truck Don't towing my 14,000 pound fifth wheel you know driving down the highway A lot of times the stock lamps like in the Chevy. They're not good Dodge Ram the older trucks An easy bake oven has a brighter light in it So what you know typically I think our viewers would be looking for is what do we choose? in order to get something that points farther down the road, brighter, and maybe a little bit out to the sides as well. I guess like, what do you call it, a flood pattern? In order to pick up, you know, if you're driving rurally, cattle, horses, whatever, crossing the road. In Canada here, it could be moose or elk that we don't get. So how do we find that lamp? Like what specs are we looking for in order, or do we need more than one set of lights? Do we need one that run? beams down the road and another one that lights up the sides.
JP: In terms of forward lighting, we usually split things. So if you're talking about peripheral visibility, an additional set of lights, auxiliary lights, would probably be the best bet for that. something with more of a flood pattern. You know, understanding the different beam angles is really key to picking which lights work best for your application. You know, headlights and fog lights are usually gonna take care of the straightforward light bars added in the front with like a combo driving beam angle could also work to add to the forward lighting. As far as peripheral visibility, seeing out to the sides, ditch lights, you know, LED cubes can be mounted to the side of the vehicles using some sort of bracket. As far as a lot of the popular, not really something that we offer too much for RVs, but you know, we do have some really cool integrated mirror products that have ditch lights built into them. But in terms of an RV, You'd really, you'd do really well with some auxiliary mounted ditch lights. If you're looking to see wider out to the sides. Um, and yeah, spots usually only are really good for seeing things at a very close distance, um, usually traveling at faster speeds. Uh, it's not very, you know, I don't see spotlights being very usable for actual driving on an RV. I'd use spotlights more for scene lighting, you know, setting up under an awning or some type of work area that you might be using at night. That might be, you know, the more beneficial use of a spotlight.
Perry Mack: Right, and since you talk about it, I think that is a good idea. For instance, my fifth wheel has that, LED string light under the awning. But I can't do anything with it, so if it's too bright or too blue, I mean, that's it. I gotta suck it up, that's what I've got. Does Oracle offer something for that kind of a spot lighting for ambiance, that maybe I could change the colour from a lighter light to something that's a little warmer? And even... I think I saw it on somebody else's RV and of course I had, you know, envy. They had lights that were underneath the RV that kind of lit things up from the bottom which looked fantastic. Does Oracle have something like that or do you know what can they do?
JP: Yeah, absolutely.
Perry Mack: How can they do that?
JP: When you're talking about what string lighting, quote unquote, is we're referring to LED strip usually. And LED strip, you know, we typically use that for more of accent lighting, you know, mood lighting, something that's a little softer that you could, you know, perhaps want to change to any color, whether it just be different shades of white or blue or purple or whatever fits your your mood or theme or whatever you're trying to do at that point in time. Underbody lighting as well, you know for the underside we offer tons of different LED strip solutions for that as well as different controller options that you can use to change colours, to change temperature, you know to set the mood. As far as work lights go and like actual utility lights. a really cool product that a lot of people don't know about is our LED scene light. So our LED scene light is a, you know, it's a, it's a, about a five, about a five inch light that has an angled base and it can be mounted high up. It can be mounted low. It's got so many different versatile options for mounting and it's a spotlight. It's a white spotlight. It, it, you know, true white. It's extremely bright. You could put three or four of those up right at the base of an awning, for example, on an RV, and it would light that entire area up almost like lights would in a living room in your house.
Perry Mack: The other thing I think of then is, are these the kind of lights that I could use backing up? Cause that's the other thing for RVers, right? There's, they're almost, it seems like there's never enough light, especially if you're in a more of a rural or a campsite that's a little bit more rustic. You know, is that the same kind of light I would hook up on the back bumper of my RV in order to flood the area with light so I could back up without hitting trees and picnic tables and my wife.
JP: Yeah, you know, you could use those same scene lights for that. That would actually look very good on an RV as well, just because, you know, it can be mounted. It can also be recess mounted if you have the spaces for it. Also, our, like our 7D LED cube lights would be great for that.
Perry Mack: I just want to circle around because there's another question that popped into my head. You know, as far as mounting auxiliary driving lights in the front, how do you choose where to put them? Like with the placement? How high from the ground or, you know, how does that work?
JP: In terms of ditch lighting, most of the, in a typical vehicle scenario, they would be mounted on the sides of the hood, like on the fenders up by the windshield. Being that it's an RV, you know, that whole geometry has changed that part. You know, usually the RVs have a flat face where there isn't really a protruding engine compartment or anything like that. So. In my opinion, the best spot to mount something for peripheral visibility would probably be somewhere up on the mirror arms, the side mirrors.
Perry Mack: So quite high.
JP: Yeah, and height isn't really going to make a ton of difference in a scenario like that. Again, it's very situation dependent. It depends on the height of the overall vehicle. You do want to take into consideration if you're going to be driving on the road with other traffic and you're going to have those lights on. You want to position those in a way where they're not going to be in everyone's mirrors, or especially if they're oncoming, if it's not going to be in direct line of sight. I do know. You know, in terms of the US, you can't, it's not very legal to drive with auxiliary lights on on public roads. And I think I think in Canada, you guys have to have covers on those auxiliary lights, right.
Perry Mack: It all depends on the height. This is my understanding, but people should actually look it up for their own state or provincial regulations. But my understanding here in BC is as long as the lights are mounted below or at the level of the headlights, you're all good, you don't need anything else. If you go above that, yes, you're right. You can't be driving on public roads unless you have covers on, and you certainly can't be driving around with them on because it would absolutely blind oncoming traffic.
JP: And that makes a lot of sense because, you know, typically if they're higher than the headlights and you turn them on with oncoming traffic, you're gonna be in a situation where you're putting the light right in someone's eyes while they're driving and that could be a safety hazard.
Perry Mack: So here's a good one, maybe a little bit of a sensitive topic for you, maybe not. There are a vast difference in the prices of LED lights. You can go to your big box retailer and an LED light bar is going to be 100 bucks, or you can buy the same size and it appears the same specs for 400 bucks. So why spend the $400? Do you get the value out of that?
JP: Usually from what I've been able to see is, you know, most of the things that you see on like your Amazon and your, and your other marketplaces that are, you know, just factory direct from Chinese, China pieces that are, you know, that they go, the QC on those are usually, you know, poor, close to none. Um, And yeah, you're buying a cheap product, but you're usually not getting a warranty with it. That may not matter to some people because, you know, hey, it's so cheap, I just buy another one, right? But, you know, when you start getting into that higher price point, you're usually gonna find those being offered from companies like us who... We put a lot of resources into our customer support, warranty periods, we do a lot. We have a very comprehensive warranty policy on off-road products specifically because you're going to use a light bar in an off-road situation. It might get beat up. It might get, you might be in an off-roading situation where you sink that thing underwater. And we have a lot of different coverage options that can really help someone in that situation. Whereas, you buy a $100 light bar and try to reach one of the several manufacturers that produce those, and you're probably not gonna get any support on that.
Perry Mack: Right, so warranty is a big thing.
JP: We use Cree and Bridge Lux LEDs for the most of our products. We do use some higher quality Phillips LED chips for other products as well. It just depends on the category.
Perry Mack: Yeah, you know, my experience has been that, you know, QC, by the way, quality control for the people that didn't pick up on that. You know, the bulbs, the LEDs are not necessarily as bright because there's some variance in the manufacturing. These things don't come out like two by fours, which even those are all different. But my understanding is that all LEDs are not created equal either, notjust the housings.
JP: Correct. And there's a really comprehensive process that goes into choosing what LEDs can be used for production, what LEDs can't. There's different bending processes and different procedures when you're talking about the actual colour, choosing the colour temperature of a particular LED.
Perry Mack: So these aren't Lego blocks, for instance. That every piece is the same. It all snaps together. It all lasts just as long. Right.
JP: No, there's going to be different LED sizes, LED types. There's going to be different driver components. There's going to be different drive capacities for different LEDs, depending on the application. You can't just jam a super bright LED in everything, and it be suitable.
Perry Mack: Right. OK, good to know. I think. Oh, so yeah, here's one I was gonna ask you about. A lot of trucks now will have some kind of a backup camera, a backup assist. It lights up the hitch. Do you guys have a light? I mean, it doesn't have to be now super bright, but do you have a light that I can mount that will shine down on the hitch so I can use my backup camera and nail that hitch component? So, yeah, I'm gonna go ahead and turn this off. I'm gonna turn this off.
JP: Yeah, so that LED scene light that I was talking about is actually really great for that. And again, I know I've plugged that product a few times here, but it's such a versatile piece just due to the way that it can be mounted. It's just, you can put it pretty much anywhere.
Perry Mack: So here's another question, because we're talking about lights here, lights there. You were an installer. Is this a do-it-yourself thing? Like, can I buy my list of scene lighting and driving lights and wire this all up and hook it up into my cab? And do I need a set of switches, for instance, to select all my different lights? Is it a do-it-yourself project?
JP: It very much is. And, you know, touching back to your point on different price points for different products, you know, that's another thing that a company like us would offer, you know, as opposed to your other generic box brands. You know, we have a staff, we have a tech support staff who you can call into during business hours if you're having any type of trouble. installing these products yourself, nine out of 10 times, we can walk you through how to do it over the phone or through email, we can provide diagrams. Part of what I do with the company is that, you know, for each new product that we offer, I'll usually shoot a how-to video, how to do the install from start to finish. So there's a lot that goes into these products.,
Perry Mack: Right. Yeah, I hadn't thought of that. Yeah, I know that sounds really good. So where would I go, for instance, to have a look at your products and see what works for me?
JP: Yeah, so you can visit www.oraclelights.com. You can also give our sales staff a call at 800-407-5776. If you're looking for a little bit more personalized help, all of our sales team is highly trained in giving the right types of product recommendations. They'll ask you a few simple questions about your vehicle. They'll do a little bit of research on their end and they'll figure out what's best for you. And you can go ahead and sort it out that way.
Perry Mack: Yeah, I know. I mean, that was sort of my next question is, you know, is there somebody there? You know, I tell them that I have a Class C, which is basically, maybe it's like a Ford E450, and I want it to do this, this, and this. And rather than me try to do all that research on websites and stuff, can I call your guys and say, hey, I need to do this, this is my truck. What do you recommend?
JP: Yeah, 100%. And you know, typically if one of our sales staff can't answer the question, they'll usually, they'll run it by me or one of my team and we can usually make the right, we can do the right research, we can make the right recommendations.
Perry Mack: Nice, awesome. You know, that was super, just before I close off, is there something else that you thought, you know, hey, this would be really good for RVers or people that are towing. Is there another product that you haven't mentioned? Something you're keeping in secret? Something that's coming out that I should be aware of? I'm gonna go ahead and do a quick review of the new RV. I'm gonna go ahead and do a quick review of the new RV. I'm gonna go ahead and do a quick review of the new RV. I'm gonna go ahead and do a quick review of the new RV. I'm gonna go ahead and do a quick review of the new RV. I'm gonna go ahead and do a quick review of the new RV.
JP: You know, truth be told, we're just starting to navigate the RV market. It's not really been something that we've done a ton of in the past, but that is something that we're looking to shift our focus to, you know, a little more as time goes by. So yeah, just stay tuned and we may be coming out with some new products. I don't have anything on my list as of yet, but it is something we're looking into.
Perry Mack: Awesome, good to hear. Justin, thank you so much for your time today. I learned a lot. And let's chat again soon.