energy saving lamps (short life)

[MdB]

Replace inductance with electro-magnetic induction and you are correct. Different effect to the capacitive effect I was talking about above.

 

[Penners]

At 10p each, it doesn't matter if they don't last long

Well, it does actually.

Each lamp has taken a considerable amount of energy to manufacture, and contains - among other things - mercury. So if the lamp fails quickly, most of that manufacturing energy is wasted and there's a more frequent risk of a highly polluting substance being released into the environment.

 

[philpjuk100]

Sorry Penners but Ive just returned from morrisons with my £1.00 worth(10) 11w lamps,I figure that they are unlikely to have a shorter life than the ones I paid £2.49 each for after Christmas.It says on the shelf at morrisons that incandescant lamps will not be sold after september so maybe I ought to stock up with them!I asked at boyes where I purchased my original ones from if there was a problem with them as they have now dropped from £2.49 at Christmas to 50p now and was assured that its just because they were not selling well,they also gave me an address 20 miles away for me to recycle the duff ones.Just checked my new ones and they all work!phil.

 

[Sue Wilkinson]

Oh boy, I resonate with this one. I "hate" energy efficient bulbs. Their weird, dim and dull light can bring me to tears or nearly at least. They are one of the most depressing things to have to live with. I'd rather not bother and use candles. I have tried a few really expensive ones that have better colour cast, but they tend to be dinosaur egg size and look terrible. I did find a type that were really good. I had 2 of them. They were large spirals. They had reasonable colour and were bright. Originally they were in 2 enclosed kitchen lights. One failed for good and I couldn't get a replacement that matched. I put the other one in the bedroom where I tend to have lamps on most of the time. It hasn't lasted more than a year or so. If I take it down and let it rest a bit, then rehang it it may work for a bit. Then it goes out. I have tried this in other fittings, so it's not the connection, neither does wiggling it help. It just doesn't like hanging.

I put another type in a ceramic lamp, the sort that looks like a vase that's glowing. Obviously this must have suffered the heat problem because that didn't last long at all. I then changed the kitchen light fittings to a modern type thinking it would be easier to find the bulbs for it, and none of the spirals fit it so I'm currently running the last energy efficient bulb that will fit in one of them and a traditional bulb in the other. The difference in colour is terrible!

They are certainly energy efficient. They don't use any. But I do, running around looking for bulbs that fit and work and last... Long life they are not.

I hate them. If I had my way they'd be outlawed and I'd ban something else instead, like TV standby.

 

[philpjuk100]

Hi,they do not do what it says on the "tin"The box on the latest ones I have bought says"10 years lifetime based on 10,000 hours.that is 417 days constant use,I have had three fail out of eight fitted in eight months.It also says"11 watt equals 60 watt convential bulb,even if given an hour to warm up if then changed for a 60 watt filament bulb the increase in light is quite noticable.I have not noticed it being a "dull" light but have had some that were blue.There are some worries that the light from CFLs can cause or agravate migrane but I have no experience of this.They seemed a great idea,long life and less energy used but in my experience this does not seem to the case.Lets hope they can improve these lamps when we no longer have the choice of filament units,phil.

 

[still_adrianth]

Thanks MdB and Mr M, for input on my partial hijack of phil's thread. Old wiring practices are relevant, though. Our circa 1916 house has evidence of 3 generations of wiring: thin lead-enclosed stuff, the crumbly-when-old rubberish stuff, and old but sound PCV stuff. (Only the later is connected.)

You're right, MdB: capacitance, not inductance. It's all about voltage change on the primary side, not current change, so you must be right. And indeed the note here:
http://www.planetanalog.com/features/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=215800707 says that the first thing that happens in the CFL electronic ballast is full-wave rectification with a smoothing capacitor afterwards. Good point to check that the switch wire earth is connected - think I did that, but I'll do it again.

I worry about another aspect of these 10p CFLs, aside from lifecycle energy use. This must be way below the cost of production - is the supermarket bearing this as a loss-leader, or is the supplier (somewhere with v. cheap labour) under pressure with an impact on working conditions & pay? How do we find out?

A.

 

[skier-hughes]

As a maigraine sufferer I've not noticed a problem with cfls.
From the signs I've seen in shops the discount is from energy manufacturers/suppliers subsidising them.

 

[FamilyWiggs]

OK - dumb question alert...

Why are we banning filament bulbs? (OK, I know this wretched government likes to ban, outlaw, control, record, regulate, prescribe and proscibe anything and everything, but that isn't the dumb question!)

I presume it is on the grounds of suggested energy efficiency? Notwithstanding this thread's arguments against that, why can't we find alternative reductions and keep our nice bright lamps? How about turning off most streetlights overnight - especially the mile after mile along our main roads and motorways? Seem largely pointless, and surely wasteful of megawatts of electrickery?

Or is our generating capability so inflexible that we can't vary output just like that?

 

[philpjuk100]

Yes the grid was inflexible hence white meters,pumped storage schemes,cheap power for motorway lamps etc but this was based on the use of large coal fired base load steam stations.With renewable energy plant and the small quick to sync gas fired stations this should not be as bad.Im sure that you cannot make CFLs in China ship them to the UK and sell them for 10p and still make a profit.There is Im sure a lot of old wiring still in use,lead and what we used to call "cabtyre" my dad noticed his meter still ran with everything turned off(he used to take meter readings daily and take the outside temp,drawing graphs and things) oh dear I seem to have inherited this from him! He traced this to a length of warm lead covered cable in his garage,the only bit of old cable left after a pvc rewire in the 80s.phil.

 

[JoceAndChris]

I presume it is on the grounds of suggested energy efficiency? Notwithstanding this thread's arguments against that, why can't we find alternative reductions and keep our nice bright lamps? How about turning off most streetlights overnight - especially the mile after mile along our main roads and motorways? Seem largely pointless, and surely wasteful of megawatts of electrickery?

I completely agree, it makes no sense at all. In the evenings of the future I'll have to look at both my own repulsive dim lighting and the hideous illuminated signs of Currys and Carpet World down in the town.

I'd actually sooner not have a light fitting than have to ruin one with these foul bulbs. Electricity only came here in 1984. I almost wish it hadn't. When you turn all the electric lights off, light candles, and a fire, the house suddenly makes sense.

 

[FamilyWiggs]

Joce, I like the idea of just turning everything off. We often do when we have guests - dozens of candles everywhere is just so beautiful; particularly so in older houses where there are no flat surfaces or right-angles!

One of the most striking things about Ethiopia last year was the almost total darkness at night. Eerie at first, but actually it made the scale and "rhythm" of the place so much more human - everything was contained largely within daylight hours. But I guess is saying that I am betraying my Western, middle-class paternalism :roll:

 

[Flyfisher]

How about turning off most streetlights overnight - especially the mile after mile along our main roads and motorways? Seem largely pointless, and surely wasteful of megawatts of electrickery?

I agree with the sentiment but unintended consequences will be lurking in the shadows. For example, I would guess that unlit roads result in more accidents and imagine how much energy is used to clear up the aftermath - police, fire, ambulance vehicles, long queues of idling traffic, medical helicopter, hospital intervention, repair/replacement of damaged vehicles, roadway repairs, etc etc.

 

[skier-hughes]

I wonder if there are more accidents on our unlit stretches, or if people take more care and in fact it could be a double whammy by reducing accidents?

 

[Ushy M]

Mr M again - in my job in the theatre/presentation industries, we're using a lot of LED light sources. These have been around for some time and are developing very fast in terms of cost, light output, efficiency and lamp life. Some very sophisticated units are on the market at the moment and are being developed. I think this technology, when it filters down to the domestic level will be the real revolution. We have very sophisticated dimming and colour matching control systems available in the theatre - simplified versions for domestic use are quite posible even now and the versatility and miniaturisation of LED "clusters" means that they will be useful in all sorts of applications. Of course they suffer from the same problems as CFLs in that the manufacture of LEDs and the control systems require energy and rare metals, but their very, very long life, proper levels of light output, low heat and lack of maintenance really will make a difference.

Of course, as a contribution to energy saving, none of this makes any difference to the hunger for power that we see everywhere. Just consider the number of 13amp sockets in a modern house and kitchen compared to an installation of the 1970s for instance. As to street lighting, an apalling waste in my opinion, it's encouraging to see some temporary switch-off schemes like the one on the A421 at Buckingham becoming more widespread.

As I don't restart my lecturing to students till October, I'll apologise to you all now!

 

[Flyfisher]

If unlit roads really do have fewer accidents then what is the rationale for lighting them in the first place?

But, even ignoring any unintended consequences, how much energy is really saved by switching off road lights? Would we really be able to decommission a power station or would we still need to have it ticking over all night ready for the daytime surge?

Regarding LED lighting, yes, this seems to have come on leaps and bounds recently and my understanding is that LEDs really do last forever (OK, not quite, but certainly a very long time). I've read it was difficulties with blue LEDs that had held things back but they seem to have solved this now. New cars and traffic lights all seem to use LEDs these days so they must be cost-effective. How long before they creep into domestic use I wonder?

 

[philpjuk100]

Just a thought,could you use a pir device or similar to turn on the lights ahead on the motorway as I have noticed many miles of well lit but unused motorway in the early hours of the morning.We had a great night with friends around during a power cut,jazz on a clockwork gramaphone,candles and oil lamps and cooking on the open fire(they said they had to stay until the power came back on so their car headlamps would work!)phil.

 

[MdB]

Regarding LED lighting, yes, this seems to have come on leaps and bounds recently and my understanding is that LEDs really do last forever (OK, not quite, but certainly a very long time).

Low power LEDs such as on the front of your video recorder do last effectively forever, however the high power LEDs suitable for lighting have a lot shorter life (10,000hrs to 100,000hrs) depending on operating temperature though this is improving all of the time (they used to be 1,000hrs to 10,000hrs). The important thing to note is that high temperatures will reduced the life significantly.

 

[Cloudscape]

You can do a lot with the current "colour" of energy-saving bulbs. Some already give a warmer colour than others. And the optimum for keeping a home-y feel seems to be a more yellowy - the colour of the filament bulbs they are phasing out. I've collected quite a lot of old light fittings and lampshades, and some tint the light and create a better 'vibe'. Can't see a bloomin' thing though, and we have to make sure there's no clutter to trip you up. We have a dark-brown cat, and the only reason she doesn't get trodden on more often is because I can just make out her white boots in the gloom.

I do struggle with the dimness of some of energy-saving bulbs. The warm-up period can render them useless. You go to a room, turn on the main lights to search for something, and the lighting is inadequate for the first few minutes.

I also wonder about the energy-saving bulbs that glow after you've switched them off.

I also have bulbs that take a minute or so to actually light up. But I discovered that if you switch the light on, and then touch the glass, the bulb lights at once. :?

Here's a demonstration: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9EsDTtRI58