Still on light bulbs. I have lots of the MR16 style halogen downlighters in my house, as well as a few of them in one of my wife's cafes. They all use
20 watt versions of the MR16 lamp. Why has everywhere stopped stocking these ? You still seem to be able to get 50 watt bulbs almost anywhere, but not 20s. You used to be able to buy them on cards of six in pound shops, but not any more. I have had to order some from an online supplier, but I even had to go through a few of those to find 20s. The thing is that there is not even any suitable replacement for them. The place that I have ordered these from of course keep the LED replacements, but they state quite clearly that they should only be considered as an 'accent light' and are not suitable as a primary light source. Well what use is that ? A few years ago, these lamps were sold in multipacks by all the sheds, and were used a lot to provide 'primary' lighting. Certainly they do in the 'well' over my stairs, and all along the upstairs corridor that goes from one end of the house to the other.It worries me a bit that with 20 watt lamps not being readily available, Joe Public will start subbing 50 watt bulbs on the basis that the wattage is not particularly critical with mains bulbs, and the fact that the fitting is the same on both 20 watt and 50 watt bulbs. Where these lamp sets are powered by a conventional iron-cored transformer, as the sets of three invariably were, this will give rise to a severe overload that the transformer will try to cope with, generating a lot of heat as it does. Given that these transformers are usually just lying loose in the loft against a joist, and covered by roof insulation, surely this is potentially a recipe for disaster ? Or am I missing something here ? Thermal fuse in the tranny, perhaps ?
Arfa