I heard about this on the news today.

http://www.centennialbulb.org/

 

"You don't understand what happens, do you? They make ten thousand cars, they make them exactly the same way, and one of 'em turns out to be something special. Nobody knows why."
-Jim Douglas

Guess this applies to lightbulbs also...

 

If you read the details its a carbon filament globe rated at 60 Watt but run at 4 Watts and never turned off so its not really surprising that it has lasted so long.

 

They have never had a power outage in that firestation?

Not even a power flicker during a thunderstorm? I would find that fact more remarkable than the lightbulb itself. An electric company distribution network that has never, ever, gone down for even a short second or two?

 

The article says that there have been power outages but the bulb left connected to the mains and is never connected to the emergency power so as to protect it from surges. Sound like they have an emergency power system like we had at work, that caused more faults and computer outages than the regular mains supply ever did.

 

Behold the power of derating components!

 

The article says that there have been power outages but the bulb left connected to the mains and is never connected to the emergency power so as to protect it from surges.

So it didn't burn for 110 years. It might not have been replaced in 110 years. Nice MTBF for that bulb.

 

MTBF?
(and some random chars to complete the message: !@#$%^)

 

MTBF= Mean Time Between Failure

 

It is an extremely common engineering acronym.

 

To any acronym (XXXX), in any language, your useful reaction should / could be typing XXXX acronym in the Google's search text-box.

Chances are that you will get the meaning suitable to your context.

 

And slow down the AAC post growth? NEVER!

 

WTF MTBF? or MTBF WTFO?

Sounds like something someone would type on a TTY Circuit ... damm, I must be getting old. LOL.

 

Me and my teenage mind can think of a lot of things that acronym could mean that aren't suitable for this forum...

 

I'm sure you're correct on the assessment of the acronym.

 

Hey.....WTF ? IDNTBLVIT !!

 

So, it's still burning? I remember reading about it in Ripley's back when I was just a youth. I thought it was the 75-year point, but calculations show it must have been 50- or 60- years.

--Rich