Sterno Home GL22720BK, Black Paradise Low Voltage Cast Aluminum 50-Watt Halogen Spot Light

Self-installed landscape lighting around entire house many yeas ago at a fraction of the cost quoted by professionals. After many hours of research decided to put the most money into the transforms and not the fixtures. The availability of LED 12v bulbs a few years reduces the watts require by 75% from the transformers; that drop in wattage demand on the circuits of the multi-tap transform allowed for the addition of more fixtures. The flaw in the strategy is that inexpensive fixtures all fail after a period of years. At first I attempted to fix them but now just put them in the trash and replace with new. I have been buying Paradise and, more recently, Sterno fixtures through Amazon . . . as well as the MR16 LED bulbs in place of the included halogen bulb. This Sterno fixture is large in size and wattage capacity since it comes with a 50w halogen bulb. The size of the body provides room for a hand to install and remove bulbs much easier than other spot lights using MR16 bulbs. The other great feature is the fixture comes prewired with a connector, thus there is no need to purchase connectors. The connector is easy to squeeze onto the supply wire as well as to remove it, especially compared to those on the old Malibu fixtures and some other brands.Update: The 3rd light that was shipped separately from the other 2 lights was ONLY in the product box not also inside a shipping box. The product box was obviously damaged and likely opened, with the light placed back inside. That belief is based on the fact the body of the light was unscrewed from the post, which is not how every light is assembled and boxed by the manufacturer. The replacement sent by Amazon was also shipped ONLY in the product box., not inside a protective shipping box.

Bought a few of these plus a pair of the 20-watt GL22724RC (in bronze) for a starter set of lights for the front of the house and some tall pine trees.Very impressed with the light output and the build of the lights. The 50-watt black ones are very bright (and get hot with the halogen bulbs) and fit together very tightly - the same can be said of the smaller, copper ones. The cases are very tight when assembled, although I think the lead wire that goes from the light to the connector for the main line could be a little longer.However, I had no trouble getting the transformer setup and the 14 gauge wiring run through the garden in the front of the house so I could get four of these light setup to light the front of the house.Testing both of these lights inside before paying them out - on my living room wall from about 20' away, the 50-watt light puts out a beam that's about twice the size of the 2--watt light, and a bit whiter, in my opinion. The light from the 50-watt light is pretty white outside with the included halogen bulbs, but I have LEDs bulbs for them which I just haven't installed yet. I would say the 50-watt bulb could light up a good portion of the front of the house from at least 20' away, although I have mine much closer and at a steeper angle pointing up at the house. From a short distance, the black 50-watt lights put out a wide beam and really border on being a flood light.I'm going to use 20-watt lights to accent some mature 50' pine tress around the yard - the beam is much tighter and does a good job of throwing some modest light up the side of the trees.Also using the Paradise GL22730BK Plastic Transformer with 14-gauge wiring. So far so good, although it's only been a couple of weeks.

These are nice fixtures and can fit the new LED bulbs whereas other fixtures don't have the clearance.Size:- The light housing has plenty of space between the internal plug and the glass lens.- The extra space inside allowed me to use my LED lights made by Torchstar since they were too big to fit in my Malibu metal spot fixtures.Water Resistance:- The seal around the glass was not water tight. Due to the angle of my light, facing virtually straight up, I had to drill a small drain hole as water was pooling in the bottom of the inside of the fixture.- I could probably use a bit of silicon around the edge of the glass and rubber gasket to make the unit more water resistant.Spike:- The spike that the unit uses to hold it in place in dirt looks like painted steel with holes in it. I'm sure the spike will last a few years, but I'm not sure how long it will be until the spike eventually begins to rust and eventually rusts out.Mounting:- The nice thing about the fixture is the threaded section of the black pipe that screws into the spike- The threads on the black pipe thread perfectly on an exterior electrical box. Same thread as the light fixtures on a set of exterior spot light. I threaded one of my boxes to an electrical box and used a locking nut inside the box on the threads to lock the shaft in place when mounting one of these spots on an exterior wall of my garage.Fixture:- The fixture is made of metal, possibly cast. Appears strong and durable. Adjusting the fixture is really easy with the thumb turn plastic lockElectrical Connection:- The unit comes with a clamp-down piercing electrical connection box. You simply unscrew the 3 screws and insert the wire in the correct channel and then tighten the screws to pierce the wire.- I liked the fact that the wire was copper instead of the cheap aluminum wire in some unit today. I prefer soldered connections so I spliced the wire to the circuit wire, soldered the connections and then used the rubber dip stuff that you can make handles for tools with to seal my connections. I re-coated my connections 3 times to make tough rubber seals over my soldered connections. I use to use the piercing connections on landscape lighting but they start getting temperamental after a few years as corrosion or loose clips come into play. Soldered and sealed connections never fail.Overall these are nice exterior lighting fixtures and I'm glad I made the purchase.