CFLs obsolete already?

dl324

Joined Mar 30, 2015
16,846
As far as I'm concerned, CFL's never lived up to the hype. They touted long lifetimes (longer than incandescent), but I've never had one that gave anywhere near the stated lifetime; and obtaining the stated lifetime was crucial to recovering from the high bulb cost.

On the other hand, I've had incandescent bulbs in my house that have far exceeded guaranteed lifetimes.

To their (CFL manufacturers/evangelists) credit, they likely never envisioned LED bulbs increasing light output and dropping in cost so quickly. It wasn't that long ago that I was paying $30 for a 60/75W equivalent LED; now 60W equivalents cost $5. LED bulbs tout lifetimes of 20+ years, but manufacturers will only offer a replacement guarantee for 1-5 years. I've only had 4 bad LED bulbs (all Cree FWIW). One had loose bits in the bulb, one had a broken glass enclosure (before they came up with their plastic 4-flow design), one became intermittent, and one burned out; all in less than a year after purchase/install. Three were replaced under Home Depot's 30 day return policy. The 4th burned out under warranty, but it's such a pain in the you know what to get a replacement. I'm waiting to see if more die within the next year or two before sending them off to the manufacturer for replacement.

Still, my LED experience is better than my CFL experience. I've had over a dozen CFL's fail before getting even a quarter of the guaranteed lifetime; and couldn't get a replacement for any of them.
 

Thread Starter

strantor

Joined Oct 3, 2010
6,782
I've shared my experience with CFLs before, but it's a story worth telling twice. My wife watched one literally burst into flames. She was in the bathroom and started shouting "fire!" I ran in and she said the light bulb strated shooting fire out. I assumed she was being dramatic but when I turned to remove it, I saw a big molten hole in the plastic base where it looked like someone had blown through it with an acetylene torch. Luckily she was right there when it happened and turned off the light immediately. That's when I stopped using CFLs. Hopefully these LED bulbs will be a safer alternative.
 

joeyd999

Joined Jun 6, 2011
5,237
When I was 5, I spit on a powered 100 watt incandescent. It popped, and cut my face.

I have no reason for writing this except to produce the illusion that incandescents, in general, are dangerous.
 

JohnInTX

Joined Jun 26, 2012
4,787
When I was 5, I spit on a powered 100 watt incandescent. It popped, and cut my face.

I have no reason for writing this except to produce the illusion that incandescents, in general, are dangerous.
That's nothing.. I snitched the 100W bulb out of my older sister's EZ-Bake Oven just before her 'bake brownies' party. She beat the crap out of me :confused:

CFLs have always seemed a transitional technology to me. With CFL (and now LED) I like the fact that I could turn on the lights without having to pay twice - once for the 10% efficient light and again to run the A/C to remove the heat.
Mercury issues are overblown. Besides the fact that for years we used to just drop 4' tubes in the trash, its been shown that at burning coal (for ~40% of total US generation) to power incandescent lamps over the typical lifetime of a CFL for the same lumens dumps more mercury into the environment than if you just smashed the CFL's when done.
 

JoeJester

Joined Apr 26, 2005
4,390
I have CFLs everywhere in the house since April. I also have a few LEDs. When the CFLs fail, I will move to LEDs.

Over the pool table, the CFL does take a minute or two to evenly brighten the playing surface.

I agree with Stantor, I'll know the lighting is correct when I see it. I have some LED bulbs in the house to experiment on the pool table lighting.

I'll end with ... "there's an app for that" for those with smartphones.
 
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tracecom

Joined Apr 16, 2010
3,944
When I was 5, I spit on a powered 100 watt incandescent. It popped, and cut my face.
Finally, I understand your avatar. Condolences for your loss.

Back on topic, I have always disliked the CFLs and still have a stash of tungsten 100 watts. However, I recently bought my first 120V LED bulb; it was for my wife's curio cabinet and stays on 24/7. I'll post again when it burns out. (I am 68 yoa.)

I do table top photography (primarily as part of my electronics interest) and I recently built a setup using three 65 watt halogen bulbs. They were about $8 each, and one of the three was bad out of the box, and another failed in a couple of weeks (probably less than 20 minutes of on time.) Lowe's replaced them both, but it took my time and gasoline to return them. The heat from the halogens is pronounced, and I would like to have LED bulbs, but have yet to convince myself that they are worth the price.

Oh, I do have an LED desk lamp; it seems that the light from it is very harsh. Is that just my imagination?
 
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JohnInTX

Joined Jun 26, 2012
4,787
Oh, I do have an LED desk lamp; it seems that the light from it is very harsh. Is that just my imagination?
Probably not. Some LEDs are harsher than others - it has to do with the blue-UV LED itself but also the phosphor used to make the white light. There is considerable talk in the architectural lighting circles about excessive blue emissions in 'white' LEDs and what that does to how the light is perceived, CRI etc. I tried to use one of the cheap Harbor Freight LED worklights on the bench and was surprised to have a bunch of 770Kohm resistors. They were really 220ohms but the color bands fluoresced under what presumably is a lot of blue-UV from the light.

OTOH, I've replaced a lot of 120W flood lights with 2700K LED floods in the house. Side by side you can't tell the difference - except that cobwebs have to be swept off the LEDs. They burned off the incandescent lamps...
 

gerty

Joined Aug 30, 2007
1,305
Another plus that I found for led bulbs, my droplight, I'd say it has been the death to dozens of incandescent bulbs. I even bought the "rough service' ones when I could find 'em, but the led bulb lives. Actually I'm on my second bulb, I dropped a wrench on the first one. It went between the wires on the guard and broke the globe, the light still works. I did however replace it as it was only rated at 7 watts
 

MikeML

Joined Oct 2, 2009
5,444
For those of you fond of the Law of Unintended Consequences:
The RFI generated by the SMPS power supply in the base of the lamp, be it CFL, LED, or florescent with electronic ballast is horrific. I will not use them in my ham shack, or anywhere in the building where my ham station is...

Another unintended consequence of this technology. Also applies to switch-mode power supplies of any type...
 

joeyd999

Joined Jun 6, 2011
5,237
The RFI generated by the SMPS power supply in the base of the lamp, be it CFL, LED, or florescent with electronic ballast is horrific. I will not use them in my ham shack, or anywhere in the building where my ham station is...

Another unintended consequence of this technology. Also applies to switch-mode power supplies of any type...
I'm an old-fashioned AM radio guy. I get nothin' but noise when I drive under one of these things...

@MikeML, what are you going to do when there are no more incandescents? Oil lamp?
 

tcmtech

Joined Nov 4, 2013
2,867
Some years ago I put in a two sets of LED undercabinet light and they run 24/7.

They were nice and bright for about 6 months before they started to noticeable dim. Now 4 - 5 years later I would give them maybe 10% of their original effective brightness.

Initially at 3 feet distance they were painfully bright to directly look at but now I could stare at them all day from half that distance.
 

wayneh

Joined Sep 9, 2010
17,496
Some years ago I put in a two sets of LED undercabinet light and they run 24/7.

They were nice and bright for about 6 months before they started to noticeable dim. Now 4 - 5 years later I would give them maybe 10% of their original effective brightness.

Initially at 3 feet distance they were painfully bright to directly look at but now I could stare at them all day from half that distance.
LEDS absolutely lose brightness if overpowered. I've got a bunch of them! But I usually run my 25mA LEDs at 5mA or so, and I have not seen any aging whatsoever when I do that.
 

takao21203

Joined Apr 28, 2012
3,702
Sure led lamps don't live decades because they are designed on the margin

Keeping them cool with a cheap pc fan Guess theyd last until the fan motor fails.

The noise is almost inaudible.

Phosphors degrade too after some time.

Running incandescents at 80% or less will prolong their life but at the cost of efficiency.

Cfls fail for many reasons such as filament sputtering, embrittlement, capacitor dehydration, overheating,glass breakage, voltage spikes, and marginal parts.

Leds aren't necessarily efficient or more efficient than cfls.

Some may degrade fast or not even reach specified output and the general population has no equipment to test.

All you could do is trust brands or try and see.
 

Tesla23

Joined May 10, 2009
542
My experience for what it's worth:

When CFLs came out I liked the idea of higher efficiency and longer lifetimes so I shopped at the local supermarket for the cheapest ones I could find, experienced infant failures and poor lifetime performance. Engaged brain, opened one up and saw the electronics inside, and shopped for next version like any other electrical appliance, bought recognised brands with specified decent lifetimes, cost a little more but now I am getting the reliability I wanted.

When LEDs came out, I jumped at the idea as we have a ridiculous number of 50W MR16 halogen downlights. Bought my first batch of LED replacements from a local 'green' lighting store, unbranded imported from China, but supposedly with CREE LEDs which had a 50,000 hour lifetime they claimed, the bulbs came with a 2 year warranty. Most of these scraped to 2 years, but the light output in many had dropped. This was not a LED issue but a gradual failure of an electrolytic in the drive electronics. I could rescue them by buying replacement drive electronics from China for about $1 a pop, these would survive a few months. The issue is that the 5W or so of power causes the electronics in the plug section of the bulb to get very hot and fail. This is even in well vented enclosures. Engaged brain, there is a reason why the recognised brands weren't selling these! I held off buying any replacements for nearly 2 years until recently I saw some Philips bulbs similar to these:
http://www.lighting.philips.com/mai...ms/led-lamps/mr16-led/929001123104_NA/product
A recognised brand with a specified lifetime (25000 hours), worth a try.

These have an interesting thermal design - you can see vents surrounding the LED module. The heatsink seems to be arranged to move the heat to the outside of the 'bulb' with airflow between the outer and inner. The outside gets quite hot but the base of the bulb, where the electronics is, stays quite cool. I am only about 1 year into this reliability trial but so far so good, no noticeable change in any bulb.
 

GS3

Joined Sep 21, 2007
408
When I was 5, I spit on a powered 100 watt incandescent. It popped, and cut my face.

I have no reason for writing this except to produce the illusion that incandescents, in general, are dangerous.
No, it is five-year-olds who are dangerous and should be banned from this world. ;)
 

takao21203

Joined Apr 28, 2012
3,702
Always blame individuals but blanket apologise the dystopian get.

The cheap lamps are on the margin of popping if they don't have good airflow. I had 30 sizzling in a small press

Needed a large fan to cool them.

After a few months the plastic boxes became brittle from UV.
 

joeyd999

Joined Jun 6, 2011
5,237
No, it is five-year-olds who are dangerous and should be banned from this world. ;)
Yes, I was dangerous at five, but I learned lots of thing not to do. For instance:

-- even though a light bulb socket seems like an interesting (and fitting) place to stick your finger, doing so is not wise;
-- 10 turns of 24 AWG wire wrapped around a kitchen knife and plugged into the wall socket does not make a good electromagnet (but the sparks are pretty);
-- igniting copious amounts of gasoline poured in a hole dug in your backyard, while entertaining, generally gets you a beating;
-- the bucket full of runoff from the roof during a rain storm is not distilled -- don't drink it;
-- never, ever, trust your older sister...

I am sure I could think of lots more. Somehow, I survived.
 
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