I've used 4 footers in my garage for longer than I can remember. Now that it is a WW shop, I've got 9 of them. No matter if they have electronic ballasts or the older types, the bulbs don't last long. I'd venture a guess that I replace about 10 to 12 of them in a year. In the past it seemed that one or two of the fixtures had more failures than others, so I replaced the fixtures with electronic ballast. The temperature at which they are turned on at seldom is below 50 degrees. Half of them turn on automatically with a motion sensor, each time someone enters the shop. BUT, the others are only turned on with a pull switch when needed and they have had failures also, so I don't think that it is the frequency of switching them on/off that's the problem. I've used GE Residential bulbs and Phillips bulbs that HD carries now. I've had 2 or 3 immediate failures of the Phillips bulbs (flickering) so I returned them for refund and switched back to GE, which always work when new.
My question is: do you guys have frequent bulb failures with the 4 footers? I'm thinking of replacing them with eights if that will solve the problem.
Incandescent bulbs in my home last for ages, except for those little night lights.
dave