OT: CFL Bulbs

Meanie wrote in news:n618du$5p5$ snipped-for-privacy@dont-email.me:

You should've done the math first. LED lamps are still expensive enough that it's not cost- effective to replace *working* CFLs with LEDs. The payback period is about 20% longer than the expected life of the LED.

It *is* cost-effective to replace *dead* CFLs, or incandescents whether working or not, with LEDs.

In his case he probably did do the math right, for him, his second post to Casper indicated that he gets his bulbs for "free". ;~) IIRC from a sales rep from work.

Amen to that. CFL's sucked right from the beginning. LED's are great, other than price which is comming down fast.

I replaced two of 3 75w incandescents over my pool table with 60 or 65w LED's and you cannot tell them apart from the 75w incandescent. The CFL's NEVER gave the same light as = wattage incandescents. If they last 1/2 as long as rated, they will be awesome. I don't like the white daylight ones though, they are really harsh.

Also, in my kitchen I replaced all the canister spotlights with led's and now instead of 600 watts I use only a few watts at full brightness, which is brighter than the originals and only use a few watts.

This can only get better and cheaper as time goes on, and you don't need no stinkin' government hacks mandating their use.

Pity we can't line up all the stinking government hacks in question and shove CF bulbs up their butts until we've exhaust the whole supply (of bulbs that is).

I'm guessing he missed that part. That's the most simplest math anyone can perform and get an A+.

Casper, we owe you a big thank you. Went and checked some bulbs we'd gotten from our utility (a long way from Duke) and they were the same ones! They now reside in the dead bulb bag :-).

I hope others are checking as well.

Keith Nuttle wrote in news:n61i1b$p8j$ snipped-for-privacy@speranza.aioe.org:

By which time you will have spent five to ten times as much on electricity to operate those lamps as you would spend to replace them all with LEDs now.

Such lights already exists. They're called LEDs.

Not here. They are still about $7 ..

And the good ones are useable on dimmers.

I got a work lamp - double flood - dual arrays of LED's. Each head plugs into a wall socket like plug. The lamps are very bright and NO HEAT! - I hated the high intensity bulb that all but melts glass. High heat. Have one close and you get UV sunburn. Now with the LED's they work nicely. Same pole/tripod... each head swivels....

Mart> Keith Nuttle wrote in news:n61i1b$p8j$ snipped-for-privacy@speranza.aioe.org: >

CFL's were a scam from the first. Never delivered the light wanted or needed. I have some high wattage flood lamps and they are useful after the warm up and turn on. I mix a Real and a CFL and soon an LED CFL.

I switch on the corner lights and spot something. The other light finally comes on if I leave the switch longer.

Mart> Meanie wrote in news:n618du$5p5$ snipped-for-privacy@dont-email.me: > >

Hmm.. good point. I guess that means we can use higher-rated bulbs. For instance, I have a glass fixture that burns out 100W, incandescent bulbs, so went to 60W. But it's not as bright as I would like. So I guess maybe I should try 100W, LED. I mainly mention this in case in case it helps someone else. But while I am posting , what is the rating of the brightest LED bulb that would generate the same heat as a 60W bulb? Is the answer as simple as the bulb which actually uses 60W?

Bill

Hmm. Maybe the answer isn't simple as that. Are LED bulbs any more "vulnerable" to heat the incandescent bulbs?

Bill wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@news4.newsguy.com:

You'll have to look hard to find an LED that generates as much heat as even a 25W incandescent. The LEDs convert nearly all of the power they consume into light, and emit very very little heat.

The "100W" LEDs are actually 100W-equivalent -- that is, they emit about the same amount of light as a 100W incandescent bulb, but since they emit almost no heat the power consumption will be more like 15 watts.

Since Watts are a measure of power and is related to Joules and calories, I would suspect that a 60 watt LED would produce the same heat as a 60 watt tungsten. (For give me if it is no quite right but it has been 50 years since I did this sort of thing)

However I believe LEDs are compared to Tungsten by the lumens they produce (amount of light) and a when you are talking LED you are actually saying they produce the light equivalent to a 60 watt tungsten bulb, not the LED is 60 watts.

Don't count on it. LEDs (and CFLs, for that matter) need to be kept much cooler than incandescent bulbs. Overheating the bulb will

Absolutely! They're semiconductor devices, after all.

The only LED I will not use any more are the ones for the night light. C9 bulb they get a bit to hot for the cheap plastic fixture. YMMV

Yes and no. Since the LED is more efficient, more of the power will go into light (thus less into heat). The light is eventually turned into heat, so yes, in the long run, the heat output is the same but less heat will be dissipated in the fixture.

Yes, the LED would be "60 watt equivalent", or some such. It'll also state the actual wattage but it will be significantly less. Depending on the particular LED, this can vary a lot.

The problem is that LEDs are semiconductor devices so can't tolerate much heat. Every 10C rise in heat will probably reduce its life by