Re: Spiral fluorescent lighting - not getting anywhere near the 5 to 7 year life - anyone else?

In article <m3h613ho1v1a29age7iptgfnun2ldikj01@xxxxxxx>,
businessman@xxxxxxxxxx wrote:
On Tue, 03 Apr 2007 01:07:02 -0600, Chris Friesen
<cbf123@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Bonnie Peebles wrote:
I swapped out my incandescent lights for the spiral fluorescent
lights. They are rated for 5 years (some maybe 7years) at 4 hours
usage per day. In both my old house and in my new home, I am not
getting anywhere near that. My longest one, the one least used lasted
2 years.

Fluorescent light lifetime is affected by how often it gets switched on
and off. They're most effective when used for lights that stay on for a
long time once they're turned on.

It only takes the equivalent of about 20-30 seconds worth of electrical
power to turn on a fluorescent, but the more frequently you cycle them
the faster they die.

Excess power consumption by a fluorescent during starting is somewhere
between nonexistent and equivalent to 1 second or so of continuous
operation.

Chris

SO, if I go in the bathroom for a total of one half hour per night and
have two 60W indecesant bulbs in the fixtures, then I consume a total
of 60W per day. If these same two fixtures each have 15W CF bulbs
(equivalant to 60W), but have to leave them on 24/7, I am using 720W
per day.

You mean watt-hours, not watts.

Meanwhile, if you have them on once a day for half an hour, they will
last longer if you have them off the other 23.5 hours. A start usually
costs something like 10 minutes of life.

That is far from being a savings, particularly when you
consider the CF bulb costs $3 or so, and the indec bulb costs 25
cents. Until they come up with a CF bulb that can last as long as
advertised, and can be turned on and off as needed, I will not buy any
more of them. Besides the one that I mentioned yesterday that lasted
5 or 6 weeks, or less than 100 hours,

If that one had a limited warranty, you can make good on it. Many have
these limited warranties for home use.

I have had another one flare up causing sparks and a bathroom filled
with stinky smoke.

Was that a dollar store junker? I never had any other than dollar store
junkers do that. In my experience, most dollar store ones lack UL
listing, while most other screw base (ballast included) CFLs have that.
(Ballastless lightbulbs don't appear to me to need that.)

Additionally, this is not the first bulb that has died before its rated
time. In fact, almost all of these spiral types are dying in short time,

In my experience, spirals mostly outlast incandescents by far.

The main exceptions:

1) A Lights of America one and one bad run of GE ones - 25 watts,
purchased around 2001. (I have also experienced more than a fair share of
problems with non-spiral Lights of America CFLs.)

2) Ones overheating in small enclosed fixtures or in recessed ceiling
fixtures.

3) High wattage ones (like 42 watts) operating base-up.

whereas the original straight CFs seem to last and last and last. I dont
even see that type sold anymore.

Home centers usually have a few. Electrical/lighting supply shops of
the kind that contractors go to and the major online lightbulb sellers
have more. Just avoid the dollar store ones - I consistently found
problems, including poor color, poor color rendering, and severe shortfall
of light output from claimed light output, lack of a lumen figure for
light output, lack of signs of certification by any recognized safety
testing organization whether UL or otherwise, usually most of these, often
all of these in my experience.

- Don Klipstein (don@xxxxxxxxx)
.

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