CFL Bulbs Is this costing me money

There is no point in precision exceeding accuracy: measuring the input to a SMPSU will be dubious except with special equipment, so 30 min. running in

24h is irrelevant.
Reply to
PeterC
Loading thread data ...

hooray! Saying kW/h is on a par with 'low energy' without staing wattage (and PF) and time; also advertising primary cells as 'high power' when most users are interested in the energy stored (even if they don't know it).

Reply to
PeterC

Same as a 'low energy' 'bulb' - leave it on for long enough and it's use more than a GLS that's on for the time needed.

Reply to
PeterC

??????????? Durrrr .... Which is "near enough 1 kWh", exactly as stated ...

Arfa

Reply to
Arfa Daily

You've looking at the wrong dates - the change to "divided" was today, and was fairly swiftly corrected.

:-)

No. 80 watts for an hour is 0.08 kWh. 40 watts for two hours is 0.08 kWh. You need to include the time component.

Reply to
Clive George

Err, no 80 watts is 0.08kW.

watts are a measure of power, watthours are a measure of energy.

Reply to
Andy Burns

It will run at lower power but 'use' (waste) more energy; power is not used.

Reply to
PeterC

Well it just shows that most ecofreaks haven;t a clue about maths or energy or power at all.

No wonder they get taken in by ecobollox.

Reply to
The Natural Philosopher

Sorry, please read my post again. Who said "OCCASIONAL" flicker. This is constant flickering. If this is 0.2 watts, well I don't know. It certainly gives off a significant amount of light, and by the way is bloody annoying. If it is only consuming power that has otherwise been used and is not costing extra then fair enough. But my simple mind tells me if something emits energy then that energy must come from somewhere. Surely the 0.2 watts is consumed in the switch. How can the same energy now power up the bulb. If it does then you have hit on how to solve the world's energy problems. Use the same power twice over. If it wasn't so bloody annoying I would live with it. Who says that people don't reduce their PIR settings. Mine it minimum settings and it still comes of far too frequently and long before it is anything like dark.

Reply to
Zen83237

How often do you get a flicker? And of what duration?

Reply to
Bob Eager

is dark or dusk. The frequency, difficult to say, but certainly many flashes per second. It doesn't give off anything like enough light to read by but just switched it off now and I can make out every thing in the room and that isn't even allowing for my eyes accustomed to the dark. I should also say that although the light sensitive switches are new in two rooms the hall way has had one for several years and I never had this problem until about a year ago which suggests to me that there is something different about the newer bulbs. The kids managed to smash the bulb and damage the rose so my first thought was that I rewired the new rose incorrectly as it started when a new bulb was fitted after the accident. I wont even go into the toxicity introduced into the house by accidentilly breaking them.

Reply to
Zen83237

Well, you can if you like. It's a valid point, and yet another negative one that's glossed over by the green mist brigade ...

Arfa

Reply to
Arfa Daily

With respect this is not a PIR, a room switch with inbuild light sensor to switch the lights on a dusk for predetermined interval.

Reply to
Zen83237

More like 20 times a second. So that would put the cost as about 1200 times what you suggested. For example, I would prefer to watch tv with the light off, no glare but it is like sitting in a room with a giant stroboscope so I keep the light on. So no savings there then.

Reply to
Zen83237

1.8GHz (something or other) PC uses 4.5W when switched "off" (jeez, oh how I so loathe those ON/OFF 'switches' that aren't). Switched ON and running windows s**te it uses 72W. (LCD screen unplugged). I.e. pretty similar to what you are measuring but I tend to have the PC on only a couple of hours late evening. All to no avail of course, as my tootsies are having a whopping 2kW of expensive warm air blown across them as I type :)
Reply to
john

Tis a digital wattmeter I designed last month. Autoranging, wide bandwidth current amp, high speed digitising of instantaneous current/ voltage pairs, computation of true and apparent powers, PF, rms values for A and V, crest factor etc. I copied those numbers as over the past few years on the internet I've come across ridiculous amounts of poor quality discussion about equipment power consumption and oodles of bad measurements being quoted, based usually on inadequate measuring equipment and theory. Just getting my foot in the door and yes I agree, a few tens of watts is pretty meaningless when compared to the real cost killers. I would disagree though about the old stuff not being designed with consumption in mind. Quite the reverse. Good engineering has always been minutely concerned with these kind of details, as they invariably pay off in profit. The digital stuff about nowadays looks in many cases to be designed by second raters, who seem familiar with software and assembling power hungry boutique chips but have little concept of the effort sweat and tears or elegance and art of good electronics design.

Reply to
john

Fair point, which I'd overlooked.

One reason why PIR's and CFL's don't mix well is that PIR's invariably switch the lights on for brief periods which is a mode of use that CFL's are not suited to. Clearly this doesn't apply to dusk to dawn switches.

The other reason why CFL's are a problem with some PIR's is that the sensor requires a small current to flow through it from line to neutral, the resistance of a filament bulb is low enough to provide this but a CFL doesn't provide the right conditions for this with the result that the bulb may flicker on and off. Domestic dusk to dawn switches sold as replacements for conventional switches depend on this too and so will not be suited to use with CFL's. The manufacturers will certainly certainly be aware of it and ought to point this out.

Reply to
Mike Clarke

Mostly agreed, and good to see a meter that can really measure 'area under the curve' no matter what shape that curve is ... Is it complex, hardware wise, or all done in clever software ? Are you aiming to market it ?

As far as equipment not being designed to save power ten years ago, I was specifically referring to standby power. Most decent sized CRT TV sets were down to a running power of no more than 80 watts by then, but the switchmode power supplies of the day did not have PFC front ends, nor did the controller ICs have sophisticated burst modes implemented for standby purposes. Whilst I'm sure that the designers did their best in terms of standby power consumption, before we were all bombarded with "global warming" and "carbon footprint" and all of the endless other buzz words and phrases that we are now daily bombarded with by well-meaning but largely clueless oiks, there was no real need to minimise standby power, nor the incentive to develop the techniques to do so. Bear in mind that consumer electronics design, development and manufacturing, is totally cost driven by the company bean counters, and ever has been.

It is only very recently in the last couple of years that cheap and easily implemented techniques, using custom developed smps controller ICs, with power saving being the specific goal, have been available for the designers to incorporate. For instance, most equipment now has a specific standby supply, completely separate from the main supply circuitry, which is totally shut off when the unit *is* in standby.

FWIW, I work on consumer electronic gear of many varieties from many manufacturers, on a daily basis, and have done for more years than I want to remember, and personally, I think that this equipment has never been so well designed, considering the complexity of the functionality, and the (for the most part) stunningly good reliability - lead free solder problems aside, of course !

Now that almost all of the processing of signals is carried out digitally, I think that elegance of hardware design is no longer an issue. Of course, in some places such as in the analogue parts of power supplies, and power output stages, a degree of 'elegance' is still required, if you want to refer that to good design practice, but as far as I see, that is mostly taken care of much as it has always been. Whilst the 'boutique' chips might be somewhat power hungry, given what they do, I think for the most part, they are pretty damned good, and improving all of the time. Considering the amounts of circuitry which they are replacing, they probably don't consume any more than all of that hardware did in the first place. It's just that it becomes concentrated in one place, and shows up as spot heating, which gives the impression of power greediness.

Still, nice to see someone that has an understanding of what standby power is about, and how to measure it. You are right that there is much (eco) bollox talked about it, and I for one am sick of it !

Arfa

Reply to
Arfa Daily

The amount of mercury is minimal. The hype about this is truely dreadful. Just like all the nonsense about asbestos put about by the Elfin group and shallow minded chattering idiots.

Yes, mercury was an issue for folk who worked with it continuously such as hatters. Asbestos was an issue for those that mined it, manufactured products with it and sadly also wives of asbestos workers who washed their clothes. Solid asbestos is not an issue.

Reply to
Clot

However, that doesn't change the fact that you, along with all the other advocates of this 'replacement' technology, are missing the point. No matter how little mercury is in these things, it never-the-less is there, and is a toxic component which wasn't present in a conventional incandescent light bulb. This means that however slight, they do represent a hazard, and as a result, may not be disposed of in your regular rubbish. Also, in theory, as they are an electronic device, they should be subject to the WEEE directive, which means that they should be substantially dismantled, made safe, and the materials recycled. All of which represents a significant energy budget, and serves to further mitigate any eco advantages that they are //claimed// to have over the soon-to-be-banned plain and simple light bulb.

Arfa

Reply to
Arfa Daily

HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.