Was it common for advertising to claim lifespans on much of anything back then? I don't know. But given the claims made in print advertisements by snake oil salesmen even back well into the 1800's, if they had thought of it they would have made outrageous claims about lifespan, too.
Flourescent light bulbs
- Thread starter Duane P Wetick
- Start date
djsfantasi
- Joined Apr 11, 2010
- 9,163
A CFL almost burned my house down. My wife came running in an screaming that there was fire shooting out of the bathroom light. I went in there and the fire was already out, but there was a hole blown out of the side of the plastic base of the bulb (where the tubes enter). I dissected it and it was beyond CSI-solvable. All that was left inside was carbon and what used to be a PCB, and molten plastic.
DON'T LEAVE THESE THINGS ON WHEN YOU LEAVE THE HOUSE.
DON'T LEAVE THESE THINGS ON WHEN YOU LEAVE THE HOUSE.
I consider this about the most important statement you have ever made here. I want to see a post from anybody that has a similar experience. We need to get a feel for the probability of a CFL (curly fluorescent light) bursting into flames.
Thank you.
That aspect depends heavily on the quality of the units in question. I have four CFl's (13, 28, 65, 85 watts) that run an average of 12 hours a day 365 days a year working as small yard lights around my place. I have yet to ever have one burst into flames yet.
On top of those I have at least 25 others around my house and shop of assorted wattages that put in all sorts of run time and high cyclic use and have yet to ever have one of them burn up either.
I have 3 CFL's right now, that run a few hundred hours per year, and none of them has ever failed. I have zero personal evidence to say they are dangerous.
One of my customers has been using CFL's for a very long time and I think I remember one of them had a hole in the base when I replaced it. It was an outdoor light so nobody will ever know if it died violently.
That's my 2 cents.
One of my customers has been using CFL's for a very long time and I think I remember one of them had a hole in the base when I replaced it. It was an outdoor light so nobody will ever know if it died violently.
That's my 2 cents.
My guess is that it is a rare event -- if it weren't there would have been a big push to "do something about it" some time ago. Some of the ones that I have had fail behaved erraticly -- working and then not working and then flickering -- but I haven't seen any indication that the genie ever escaped the bottle. I did see some YouTube videos a year or so ago dealing with fires that people had that were traced back to CFLs. One was a guy that had a CFL fail in a bathroom and it caught some towels on fire and did quite a bit of damage, but didn't escape the bathroom.
It's not rare here! I've had the caps go regularly, they stink and smoke up and release who-knows what nasty toxins into
the air.
A lot depends on ambient and operating temperatures, and your mains voltage. Here it is HOT (even at night) and the mains voltage tends to be a bit high.
If you have cold nights (when the lights are on) and your mains voltage is lowish they might run for years before failing.
the air.
A lot depends on ambient and operating temperatures, and your mains voltage. Here it is HOT (even at night) and the mains voltage tends to be a bit high.
If you have cold nights (when the lights are on) and your mains voltage is lowish they might run for years before failing.
I agree. I don't know anybody else whose CFL shot fire out of it, and I don't hear much about it. It may be as common as a refrigerator shooting fire out the back. So my advise to not leave the house with a CFL on may be equivalent to advising not to leave the house with the fridge plugged in.
But, maybe if my fridge had ever shot fire out the back, I would unplug it before I leave the house. First hand experience is always more compelling than good advice. So I don't leave the lights on. Doesn't hurt anything to turn them off anyways.
Could be worse. A older friend of mine had their house burn down due to an electrical fire 40 some years ago so to this day he refuses to have propane heat in their house or any out buildings.
Yea I don't get the connection either.
Especially since all of his home DIY wiring is terrible and that doesn't bother him at all.
One day I was sitting on my bed during a thunderstorm and a duplex receptacle jumped out of the wall and landed, smoking, next to me. Now I don't allow electricity in my house!
No. That's a joke. Now I always have at lease one surge protector on my main breakers. Odd coincidence, I quit finding the terminals blown off my air conditioner compressor after I took up that habit.
Then, some years later, I learned that the home owners insurance companies were cutting open compressors that had their terminals blown off, looking inside to find that the fire ball stopped at the hermetically sealed steel container, and claimed that the compressor was not damaged by lightning. The fact that the power terminals were blown off the compressor apparently not being an insured loss? Just another scam by those with lots of money to protect.
No. That's a joke. Now I always have at lease one surge protector on my main breakers. Odd coincidence, I quit finding the terminals blown off my air conditioner compressor after I took up that habit.
Then, some years later, I learned that the home owners insurance companies were cutting open compressors that had their terminals blown off, looking inside to find that the fire ball stopped at the hermetically sealed steel container, and claimed that the compressor was not damaged by lightning. The fact that the power terminals were blown off the compressor apparently not being an insured loss? Just another scam by those with lots of money to protect.
Yea I run some pretty heavy surge suppression on my electrical system as well.
Some years ago I pulled a bunch of massive MOV's and low ESR line side snubber capacitors out of some huge commercial UPS units I scrapped out so a few got added to my main utility disconnect box plus my shop panel.
So far I have never had an outlet explode or a CFL burst into flames so I am assuming they are doing their jobs.
Some years ago I pulled a bunch of massive MOV's and low ESR line side snubber capacitors out of some huge commercial UPS units I scrapped out so a few got added to my main utility disconnect box plus my shop panel.
So far I have never had an outlet explode or a CFL burst into flames so I am assuming they are doing their jobs.
I remember about twenty years ago we first saw talking rubbish bins at Efteling.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5p3eO4j9890
They tried something similar here in Taunton High Street a couple of years ago, but they did not last.
I'm glad you found a safe and responsible way to dispose of fluorscent lamps. Mercury is toxic in very small concentrations, according to the EPA, levels of .002mg/liter or 2ppb of water is the limit is what is safe.
E
In my very limited experience, the dumps here are not very accommodating. They have different bins for different things, but they are only open certain hours of certain days, always in the middle of the day. The one that services my area is only open twice per month. You would have to take a half day off from work to go and recycle your CFLs. and you are "locked in" to your dedicated dump. You have to show a utility bill with your address to prove that you have a right to dump there. You can't simply drive across town to the dump that happens to be open on a convenient day for you. I refuse to use my vacation time to go to the dump. This is really a stupid thing, as it does not entice people to do the right thing. I've so far disposed of a storage building, a fence, a room full of crap that was left at my house, and several pieces of large furniture, piece by piece, in my regular biweekly trash can pickup, courtesy of the sawzall. Now I must dispose of the wall I just demolished in the same way. If I gave one less **** than I do now, I would just go throw it off on the side of the road.
