Realcent.org

Few people realize just what a pain in the neck this is going to be. We will see if they wake up, or if the news media and left (pardon the redundancy) are able to hang on to this sillyness.

If the conservatives were as irresponsible as the so-called "liberals", we would see boxes of broken CFLs being sent to various people.

My outside bulbs need to light up at -20F. You think a fluorescent bulb will do that?

IdahoCopper wrote:My outside bulbs need to light up at -20F. You think a fluorescent bulb will do that?

My CFLs would barely light at 40F. I have two left, neither get much use, and I'm going to toss one to the back of the closet shortly. The other is on my computer battery back up and is for power failures only.

We talked about this eariler....

viewtopic.php?f=19&t=990&p=15136&hilit=100+watt+bulbs#p15136

How many people are going to go out and buy more? I don't use that many but I am sure tempted to buy a few more...What say you?

Copper Catcher wrote:How many people are going to go out and buy more? I don't use that many but I am sure tempted to buy a few more...What say you?

I have a couple cases in storage...

Big Wally has a bargain 4 pack of 100 watt bulbs for $1.

Now this is interesting. Those $1 bulbs are made in the USA by Osram/Sylvania.

GE 100 watt 4 packs are $1.58 and come from Mexico, GE Long Life 100 watt 4 packs are $2.24 and come on the slow boat from China.

Might want to get some cheapies while you can, but I think manufacturers will just go to a 90 watt bulb to beat the letter of the law.

Hope they do. "99 Watts".

Mossy wrote:Hope they do. "99 Watts".

+1

Well.... ahem! I bought into the CFL light a couple of years ago. I did it to save money. As my old Edison light bulbs burned out, I replaced them with CFL's. They last longer and cost less to operate, so, what is not to like???

Sheikh_yer_Bu'Tay wrote:Well.... ahem! I bought into the CFL light a couple of years ago. I did it to save money. As my old Edison light bulbs burned out, I replaced them with CFL's. They last longer and cost less to operate, so, what is not to like???

I use them also, where they make sense. But a) I don't want to be told I have to use them, b) claims for them are overstated, especially their supposed positive environmental impact, and c) (especially) there are uses (dimmers, timers) for which CFL don't (at this time) currently work properly. So I stocked up on incandescent to bridge the time period (which may be a decade or more) until all is hopefully straightened out.

Don't break one in your home, it's a haz-mat clean up, although you could do it yourself. And, as others have mentioned, they do not work well in cold areas.

http://www.epa.gov/cfl/cflcleanup.html

My living quarters are too small to allow following the recommendations, I'd have to remove everything from the boat and lay it out on the dock, where it would promptly get soaked or blown into the bay, or advertise stealable stuff to the teen agers, drunks, and druggies in the area. Then I'd have to find another place to live for a week or so.

People who use CFLs in their bedrooms and in their childrens' (and infants') rooms have similar problems.

Okay, I have heard about the mercury in the lights. I guess I need to stock up on incandescent lights while I still can.

On a side note: If you guys are really concerned about mercury polluting the environment, don't buy any more gold. Gold mining is the absolute worst cause of mercury pollution in the world.

I'm already phasing out of CFLs to LEDs the same way I phased out of incadecent to CFL,
one by one as they burn out. This is because I found out about the mercury/breakage
problem _after_ I'd almost finished the change over. -_- Also I've found hauling the old
CFLs back to the store to drop off in the recycling bin a bit of a pain as I don't like
keeping the old ones around any longer than I have to, but...don't like polluting if I
can avoid it...

My original reason for changing away from incadecent was not power cost or environment,
I just wanted brighter light without exceeding the rating of my fixtures. Hmmm, this socket
is rated for 40W but this CFL bulb puts out as much light as a 60W and only draws 13W.
Problem solved!

So far I've found 2 good types of LED bulbs, everything else is too dim for most applications.

Phillips 60W equivalent (800 lumins) burns 12.5W, standard form factor so it fits everywhere
and is dimmable. These are made in China:

http://www.homedepot.ca/product/12w-led ... ite/926038

I put 2 of these in my living room to try them out after figuring out that the power savings
would cover the cost compared to incadecents over a period of about 2 years. These were
the last 2 places I _had_ to use incadecents because the previous owner of the house
thought a dimmer in the living room was a good idea and I can't be bothered to remove
it. ^_- More recently once I got down to no spare CFLs I bought annother 2 of these to
replace the CFLs in my laundry room (where due to position there is a higher than average
risk of breakage) and put the 2 CFLs I took out into my "spare" supply to use up as other
CFLs wear out in low risk of breakage spots.

Sylvania 75W equivalent (900 lumins) burns 18W, kinda big and heavy spotlight, good in
some applications but won't fit a lot of fixtures, even too heavy for some, and spotlight
style doesn't work in certain applications. These are "assembled in US from domestic
and foriegn components":

http://www.rona.ca/shop/~led-bulb-sylva ... a-led_shop

I have 2 of these in my bedroom in fixtures with a flexible neck that I have pointed
near the top of one wall, the reflected light lights up the room well. I actually have 4
of these fixtures that I used when dabbling with various lights, this is my test set up
for comparing bulbs. (I can turn off one fixture as I'm turning on annother to get a
side by side comparison of the light.) The 3rd has a less bright bulb from earlier
testing and the 4th is off right now. These 2 bulbs account for most of the light in
that room though.

As for the not so bright bulbs before I found these 2 types I had bought 3 "Lights of
America" brand LEDs from Wal-Mart that were all dissapointingly dim, they were all
close to 30W equivalent. One is in that 3rd spot in the bedroom I mentioned, one in
the front porch where I don't need quite as much light, and the other is in my shed
where it's better than nothing. Basically the lesson I've learned is you want a lumin
rating of 800 or more, you can almost ignore what they say it's equivanlent of as
some manufacturers tend to fudge that number, the lumens is harder to get away
with fudging because it's a actual specific defined measurement. ^_-

If you really want one of these dim Wal-Mart bulbs and are in Winnipeg don't buy
it from Wal-Mart, I'd be willing to sell you my test bulbs much cheaper than their
retail. ^_- But I really don't recommend them.

I'm hoping that somebody gets something in the standard form factor like the Phillips
bulb but equivalent to 100W (apx. 1333 lumens) by the time I run out of spare CFLs.
Then I can get some real brightness in here. For this reason I'm not stocking up on
the current models beyond what's in use, don't want too much legacy inventory if/when
100W equivalents become available. Though I don't want to wait too long because I
suspect at some point LEDs will go through the same cycle as CFLs did where they
start making crappier ones that don't last as long. I'm finding I'm replacing my
newer CFLs while older ones are still going. (Same thing happened with FRS radios,
the first ones worked great then they slowly made them further and further out of
spec. to crank them out cheaper.)

I have a few 40W incadecents left over and a whole bunch of 60W incadecents so if
anyone I know (like my parents) needs them I can supply them for a while. (Also
covers me if I can't afford a LED right when needed as they are pricy and I refuse to
shell out for any more CFLs. ^_-) I haven't had any 100W incadecents in a long
time because so few fixtures are rated for that much so a few places I have CFLs
100W equivalents...which need to be replaced with something at some point.

The subsidizing of CFLs (my local utility has really been pushing them) and banning of incadecents is really stupid because it will force a lot of poor people into buying dollar
store CFLs that will mostly end up in the trash one day because few people can be
bothered to recycle them. LEDs are not at a price that is universally accessable and
CFLs are problem prone in the long run so incadecents still fill an important role.

As for the 90W incadecent bulb, it's been out for a long time from GE:

http://www.galesburgelectric.com/GE-100 ... scent.html

I remember that line up from GE way back in the early 90s. ^_^

Also CFLs will work at -40 but just won't start up at that temperature very easily, so my
deck light which is left on all the time seems to work fine.

Apparently rough service incandescent bulbs are not subject to the ban. And although they cost a little more, and put out slightly less light, they have as much as 5-10x's the lifespan of a standard incandescent.

http://www.survivalblog.com/2011/12/letter_re_an_exception_to_the.html

Thanks fansubs_ca for the detailed report! I had no idea you could get LED's that way. I really like the more lumins for significantly less wattage concept. That will work very well for me once I get the solar panels installed.

Same goes for you, too, Jack! Good info!

by Sheikh_yer_Bu'Tay » Thu Dec 01, 2011 11:46 pm

Okay, I have heard about the mercury in the lights. I guess I need to stock up on incandescent lights while I still can.

On a side note: If you guys are really concerned about mercury polluting the environment, don't buy any more gold. Gold mining is the absolute worst cause of mercury pollution in the world

Not concerned about mercury pollution as much as mecury pollution in my house. Light bulbs break and don't want to have to call the EPA if the wrong bulb breaks.

Tourney64 wrote: Not concerned about mercury pollution as much as mecury pollution in my house. Light bulbs break and don't want to have to call the EPA if the wrong bulb breaks.

Me too. General pollution is lower than the spot pollution that would result from breakage.

Sheikh_yer_Bu'Tay wrote:Thanks fansubs_ca for the detailed report! I had no idea you could get LED's that way. I really like the more lumins for significantly less wattage concept. That will work very well for me once I get the solar panels installed.

You're welcome, I figured somebody other than me should benifit from the hours of web
searching and trying out bulbs that I did. ^_- I also read (don't rem where) that at least
part of the "energy savings" on CFLs is actually a myth because they work in a way that
"tricks" some less sophisticated power meters to make it look like they are using less
power than they actually do. I do not have sufficient electronics knowledge to actually
test and verify that claim though. Just a possibility to consider.

Do you live in the desert? I keep seeing wind give better result per $ invested than solar
most places. That and I seem to remember it staying cloudy for a month straight numerous
times where I live. ^_-

The one thing I would like to find though is LEDs equivalent in quality to the ones I listed
that work directly off 12V. Because:

#1: Most "off grid" systems essentially work by charging up a bank of 12V batteries
#2: I understand that internally these bulbs convert down the power and change it to DC
for use anyways so it should take fewer parts and cost _less_ to make!

This would be much more efficient than running inverter power that just gets converted
back down inside the bulb anyways. Avoid power loss both ways. Of course this requires
the manufacturers to be prepared to cater to a niche and not just the "mass market".
(Or as massive as it gets at $30 a bulb. ^_-)

fansubs_ca wrote:[
Do you live in the desert? I keep seeing wind give better result per $ invested than solar
most places. That and I seem to remember it staying cloudy for a month straight numerous
times where I live. ^_-

The one thing I would like to find though is LEDs equivalent in quality to the ones I listed
that work directly off 12V. Because:

#1: Most "off grid" systems essentially work by charging up a bank of 12V batteries
#2: I understand that internally these bulbs convert down the power and change it to DC
for use anyways so it should take fewer parts and cost _less_ to make!

This would be much more efficient than running inverter power that just gets converted
back down inside the bulb anyways. Avoid power loss both ways. Of course this requires
the manufacturers to be prepared to cater to a niche and not just the "mass market".
(Or as massive as it gets at $30 a bulb. ^_-)

I live in a southwestern prarie / plains state. We have mostly sunny days and our wind farms are growing exponentially right now. We also have abundant natural gas and I almost bought land with two gas wells on it. Nat. gas can satisfy all primary energy needs and if it's coming off your land ... it's free!

More good info!! Thanks!

Thanks for the info, Jack. I need to keep my eyes open. (Any bets that "loophole" will get closed soon?)

Loads of 12V appliances and lights in the RV and Boating catalogs. Check there. I suspect the long term savings will pay for the price differences.

All this is enough to make Thomas Edison's ghost puke.

The light bulb ban was overturned. Hope you guys had your retirement funds spread out and that no one was too heavy on 100W bulbs. Let freedom ring!

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/201 ... -bulb-ban/