Energy saving lamps

[Grumps]

This is my first experience of using these little (not!) fellows.

My daughter (part of a school trip) visited our local wind turbine, for some eco-education. As a 'reward', the organisers gave all of the studnets 2 low energy lamps. They are made by Philips, rated at 20W, have a 12 year lifetime, and are about 5 1/2" long with a bayonet fitting. They are supposedly equivalent to 100W.

Well, I thought this would kick-start out household into becoming a little more energy concious. I replaced our 100W hall lamp with this new fangled unit. Too dim! I moved it to the landing, replacing a 60W lamp, too dim! I now believe this

20W (100W) equivalent, is really about the same as a 40W filament bulb. I stuck it in the anglepoise. Sticks out too far so all you see is the glaring tubes.

Is this just a bad make, or are all units the same? And can you get ones that are equivalent to 200W, that might be acceptable.

[Malcolm H]

My house is full of them and, in general, I find them very satisfactory - and they do deliver about 4/5 times the light of equivalent tungsten lamps. I do, however, try to use only reputable brands. Most of them need up to about 60 seconds to achieve full brightness.

[The Real Doctor]

They take a while to come up to speed, but yes, I reckon they grossly overestimate the equivalent powers.

Ian

[Malcolm H]

One excellent new development is dimmable low energy lamps see:

bit expensive but worth it in my opinion

[nightjar]

How long did you leave it on for? They take time to come up to full brightness. Earlier ones simply didn't come on at all at first.

Colin Bignell

[Andrew Gabriel]

For the bare tube ones, there's about a 4:1 ratio so your lamp is equivalent to an 80W filament lamp. For reflector lamps, that drops down to 3:1 at best, and most are worse than that. Give it a minute to warm up though -- you don't get the full output at switch-on, and the first time it's switched on having not been used for a long time it can start off very dim if the mercury needs to diffuse the length of the tube.

The other thing which can affect the light output of a fitting is that the light is generated in a different position than in a GLS (standard) filament lamp. That can mean the fitting loses some of the light, e.g. if reflectors or openings don't line up with the position of the light source.

It's hard to find higher powered ones in the UK, particularly in standard retail outlets. 23W is about it, and Homebase did a 30W ES one. You can find higher power ones mail-order. Higher powered ones generally can't be operated base-up or in enclosed fittings because the heat from the tube cooks the electronics in the base, leading to reduced life.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Rather like dribble, they search the world to find the most inefficient tungsten lamp to use as a base for comparison. Just why they're allowed to quote *possible* energy savings as a norm defeats me. All this achieves is to put suspicious punters off even more. The basis of comparison should be a GLS lamp that they are most likely be used as a replacement for.

[Mary Fisher]

That surprises me - they've been around for many years. Have you been eplacing bulbs with tungsten ones during that time, thus spending much more than necessary on electricity?

I agree that what I call the quality of the light isn't the same as that from a tungsten lamp but I'm curious about what you think is too dim. How bright do you want your lights?

We bought some LED lamps with conventional fittings from Lidle or Aldo - can't remember which - and put them into the three lamp fitting on the landing. We could do with more because the light isn't as bright as it was with the previous halogen lights (which glared) but I do like the quality of the light, it's like daylight.

I think we've all become accustomed to the light given by tungsten (and before that gas, oil and candles) which is very different from daylight. I'm looking forward to the time when domestic led lighting is standard, extending the day into night.

Mary

[Mary Fisher]

...

We've had two very small ones in a picture lamp for years. They're bright enough to light the (large) painting and have survived so far. They'll be replaced with something similar when necessary.

Mary

[Grumps]

Yes, I know that.

Yep. I can't remember the last time I replaced a bulb. Probably a year ago.

I like it bright when I want to see what I['m doing. As I say, the 20W (100W equiv) 'energy saver' looks, to me, like a 40W tungsten. Two of these in our lounge would be insufficient, and they don't fit our light fittings either.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

You must have strange daylight in your part of the world if domestic LED lamps emulate it.

[Derek Geldard]

They are far too dim, at best a brand new one fully warmed up will be about 35 % less bright than the Tungsten lamp it claims to replace.

This is my experience of how they perform at switch on.

IKEA 11W "Bulb" Feit 13W Spiral GE Genura

5 Sec. 16.6% 47.5% 20.0%

3 Mins. 80.5% 95.8% 80.0%

All the above in current production.

In general the light output appeared to increase linearly with time from the 5 second point when all lamps had actually started to the 80% output point and then approached the maximum asymptotically.

after Ca 1 years service the light output will fall by a *further 48%*

They take about 3 minutes to get to 80 - 90% of their full output, so after 1 year at 10 seconds after switch on the light output will be about 25% of it's rated light output.

You can of course take it as read that they don't last 12 years. I typically get 15 months +/- 6 months.

It's not a bad make, others might / might not be better. Your experience is typical.

No. I've seen in the USA table lamps that could take 2 x 100 watt equivalents, typically in hotels. That might work, and you'd have a bit of diversity for when one fails.

DG

[Dave]

Why the hell would you want to dim them when they are dimmer than *normal* lamps anyway? I'm more than willing to accept that it's my eyesight that's the problem but I won't give these darn things houseroom - they are just far too dim for me.

Dave

[Malcolm H]

I have a 20w dimmable lamp over the dining table, far too bright for normal dining, seems to be similar to 100w tungsten. Dimming works fine. Just the job!

[Andy Burns]

Errr, when you want it dimmed further?

I have a 20W dimmable flourescent in the bedroom, I like the slow-warmup which prevents shock to the back of the eyeballs, in the morning I use it on full brightness, at night I dim it, it can be dimmed from the pull-switch.

[David in Normandy]

I went throuht a phase of buying low energy bulbs for everywhere in the house and frankly have been very disappointed with them. As you say they are not as bright as the filament lamps they are supposed to be as bright as, no matter how long they are left to warm up.

Secondly I find the lifetime figures quoted rubbish, especially for the higher wattage ones. I've found they only last as long as filament lamps but cost a lot more to buy in the first place, so any savings in running costs are more than outweighted by the extra cost of buying - despite all the marketing hype!!!

My experience of them has been so bad, that as they fail I am now replacing them with filament bulbs. It's nice to have bright rooms again!

[John Rumm]

Most of them lie about the equivalent output anyway, but I think it may also have been a poor choice of make. My mum used to have a Philips CFL in her lounge - it seemed to take a good five mins or more to achieve its full output, and even when fully lit had a strange discontinuous spectra that would give very odd colour rendition.

[Mary Fisher]

That's not been our experience - with one exception. We mark new bulbs with the date they were installed. One low energy bulb failed after a few months so we returned it and it was replaced along with a full refund. That was about two years ago, the 'new' one is still going. .

Perhaps French ones aren't as durable as ours ... :-)

Mary

[Andy Dingley]

Pioneering, but now looking dated.

Go to Lidl, buy some Osrams. Much brighter, and _far_ better performance from a cold switch-on.

[Mary Fisher]

Yes, that's an interesting point.

When No 3 son was doing CDT A levels he designed a lamp which used a very early low energy bulb. We had to trawl round a lot of suppliers before we could find a fitting - Goggle was unknow then. We put so much energy (!) into the search that we can't forget it.

He went on toe do a BA and MA in furniture design and now earns a good living - 21 years later.

All new appliances are difficult and expensive at first, they all need some support to encourage development and improvement.

Mary