I have an outside pole lamp. The bulbs have been blowing out every 4 weeks or less. Instead of merely burning out, 2 have actually had the globe shattered and the rest have a black sooty spot at the top. Any ideas as to what it is and/or how I stop it?
There is a leak in the fixture and the lamps are getting wet while they are hot. When that happens, they often shatter. Try sealing the fixture, or replacing the lamps with CF type lamps, or replacing the fixture
What kind of bulb and fixture are we talking about? Usually water on a hot bulb will cause it to immediately burst. Is rain water getting into the fixture?
Now that you mention it, they do seem to burst more often after heavy rains. The bursting always is on the upper left hand side of the bulb, is that an indication of where the leak is getting in?
Just a regular outside light that takes a regular incandescent bulb. Like you see in front yards. I don't see any obvious signs of water (nothing running down the sides of the glass that contains the bulbs, no obvious signs of rust, etc, but the bulbs do fail at pretty much the same spot every time/
There are Teflon coated lamps available which are less prone to shattering. You might want to give one of those a try. I think they have them at Home Depot, but they call them rough service bulbs. You will see that they have a plastic coating over them. If not Home Depot try an electric supply company.
Thanks to both of you for the suggestions. I'll probably try the rough service first.
What size bulb are you using? 60W? 40W? Fixture rated for what you are using?
Was using 100 and have since I got it three years ago. The blowing out is more recent, starting in December or so. I don't recall what it is rated for anymore (and the markings seem to have gone away over the years) but I have been using 100s all along. I did do a 60 this time to see if it makes any difference.
Rough service lamps come with and without the Teflon coating. I think the ones with it are called shatter resistant or some such thing. I would first try a CF lamp as they don't get as hot so may be less likely to shatter
Nobody suggested it, so I will- turn off the breaker, and take the fixture apart (including any screw connections or accessible wire nuts), clean it all, and put it back together. I suspect the contacts in the socket are gunked up, and it is arcing at turn-on. Maybe, just for laughs, while it is apart, replace the socket- they are cheap. Most builder-grade pole lamps I have seen are pretty much junk to start with. Is this thing switch-only, or does it also have an auto sensor? If those get full of dead bugs, they can start doing flakey things.
-- aem sends....
Once you fix the water leaking in, try reducing your wattage to 60 or even
We got better use from bulbs when we switched to 40W appliance bulbs in our outdoor lights. The system is old, and we get lots of surges and outages, but lower wattage bulbs helped a lot. We also got better use from "hard use" or something like that - don't recall what the brand was.
"RBM" wrote in news:484883fd$0$25701$ snipped-for-privacy@cv.net:
Reminds me of working under car in northeast in winter. Droplight bulb heat rises enopugh to melt some ice/snow/slush, drips, hit's bulb and breaks it.
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