How many 100W Incandescent light bulbs do you have stocked up? Just curious if others are stocking up? I have 224 bulbs (56 four packs) so far, and plan to get at least 124 more bulbs. They were leaving the stores so fast, I just told a local store to order me forty packs of them, which they did about a month ago.
You must be a mad bugger. When the latest generation CFLs first came out, they were selling them for $0.15 to promote them. So I bought about twenty.
So I have a stock of latest technology lamps and you are stockpiling shit?
Wonder when they'll be selling decent LED lamps cheap?
You Yanks are weird.
No doubt about that. Now, with the DOE ordered not to enforce the bulb phase-out, there will likely be illegal 100 watt bulbs available on line and at retailers too.
One pack that has been around for ages. Now that CFL lights have progressed in quality of light, I see no reason to use the old bulbs. Nor is the incandescent going away. There will be more efficient bulb available that have a new design filament. Given the number of bulbs you have, I'd have to say you may be a little nuts. I doubt I used
No stock of incandescents other than a few hanging around in closets or that were replaced with CFLs. Now that I have found an LED lamp that is "ready for prime time" (LG 7.5W 40W equiv "A" type), I'm in the process of converting to LED. I have 8 of the LG LED lamps deployed so far and all are performing quite well.
What's wrong with the equivalent CFL, beside being more reliable/lasting many times longer, producing much less heat, and being much more energy efficient?
CFL's are simply not suited to all applications, despite what you may think, that's what's wrong with them. Some of the obvious issues and where they don't work:
A - The light is not even close to the same color quality
Areas used for reading or fine work where you need to focus. Some decorative fixtures that simply don't look good with a CFL.
B - They take a significant amount of time to warm up to even a reasonable brightness and it's worse at low temps.
Light outside the door. Think I want to wait 3 mins to see who's there in winter? Or my kitchen, where I want to turn the light on, grab something and leave in 20 secs. Put in a CFL and then what do you do to fix that: Leave them on for hours.
C - You can't tell before buying them how long any particular one takes when turned on to put out a reasonable amount of light because the skunk manufacturers don't spec it.
D - In my experience, they don't last very long.
E - They can't be dimmed much, they are not dimmable along a wide range like regular bulbs. And the ones that are partially dimmable cost a lot more. See D above.
CFLs are fine for many general lighting areas, but that doesn't mean they fit all applications.
Per earlier discussion re: bulbs for outdoor use, I have stockpiled several dozen; I forget just how many 8-packs I bought for the barn. I figure by the time they're gone either I will be too, or there will be a suitable replacement (it's the warmup time that is the primary culprit as discussed in the thread a month or so ago).
I still like the incandescent better for many purposes in the house as well despite the better-than-used-to-be color of current CFLs so haven't switched over entirely. In particular, the house is an early 1900s farm house w/ period ceiling fixtures that the CFLs simply do not look right in and aesthetics _are_ important, too.
I have several 40 watt bulbs stashed away for the ceiling fans in my house and the bathroom fixtures that take them. CFLs are ugly and any fixture that actually exposes the bulb to view gets incandescents.
The price is coming down as well. I have about a dozen PAR30s in my kitchen. When I first did them with CFLs, they cost about $6/ea. I bought a replacement the other day - it was about $1.25/ea in a pack of 4. Not much more than what an incandescent used to cost.
Hopefully the reliability is a little better. The first gens did not get the
10,000 hour lifetimes promised. Color temps are better now - used to be hard to find 2700' CFLs. Now they are all over. LEDs aren't available that warm and are far more expensive.
i just bought another 48 one-hundred watt real bulbs. $1.58 for FOUR (4). Seems to me that's about a THIRD of your "not much more".... I'll keep using the real ones. No government control for me, thank you.
I've never seen an LG-branded lamp in town. There are no COSTCO or their ilk within 200 miles...
I don't recall what the couple of LEDs I did see were on a shelf; they were more like the $18/ea though it seems and I have a hard time thinking a light bulb should cost a twenty... :)
We're giving out Niagara-branded CFLs from the co-op to convert folks as we can; they're not too bad for most applications but still look kinda' funky in old fixtures; new and old just don't mix well.
They're better in cold-start than the old ones but still take quite a time to reach brightness in really cold weather. It was 3F this AM; the one in the car garage was just bright enough could tell it was trying when I went out early when flipped it on.
There's nothing wrong w/ adding a little heat in the barn on cold mornings or late nights, either, as far as I'm concerned... :) Doesn't help much overall, but can be noticed in a closed area after a little while if the wind isn't too bad.
You would think it wouldn't work well in something like a table lamp with an upward facing socket, but it actually works just fine in one that has the typical tapered shade. Enough light gets reflected down that you don't really see a difference vs. an incandescent.
Yes, I can't find them on the COSTCO site either. I got them at a Dallas COSTCO (east Plano). The Costco item number is 593259 so you could call and check.
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