Anyone else hate the new light bulbs?

[ultrarunner]

:confused2: LEDs brighten faster than incandescents.

I have one of the costco LED bulbs in a lamp in the livingroom.

It has never come up faster than any incandesent... and this goes for all the lamps in the bubble pack I bought serveral years ago.

Now the CREE LED lamps I bought last week do not have this problem.

 

[charlz]

I stopped by Home Depot today.... that CREE 60w LED bulb is $12.97. Just down the row they had a 'Truck Load Special!' Box of (16) Phillips 60w soft white incandescents for $4.88....... Guess which one I bought

 

[k0ua]

I stopped by Home Depot today.... that CREE 60w LED bulb is $12.97. Just down the row they had a 'Truck Load Special!' Box of (16) Phillips 60w soft white incandescents for $4.88....... Guess which one I bought

I will guarantee you that box of 16 incandescent will last a heck of a lot longer than that LED.. but there is the little matter of energy consumption. I think LED's are the way we are going to go, and I just hope they are nearing perfection, and hopefully the price will soon drop to something more reasonable.

 

[sixdogs]

So if a new style bulb is a "60 watt equivalent" does that mean it puts out the same light as a 60 watt incandescent bulb? If so, who can see with that?

 

[dave1949]

So if a new style bulb is a "60 watt equivalent" does that mean it puts out the same light as a 60 watt incandescent bulb? If so, who can see with that?

People who eat their carrots. Been to the eye doc lately?

 

[k0ua]

So if a new style bulb is a "60 watt equivalent" does that mean it puts out the same light as a 60 watt incandescent bulb? If so, who can see with that?

Well you do have a point, but they typically go into fixtures with multiple sockets. Usually 3 or 4 like a ceiling lamp.

 

[sixdogs]

Well you do have a point, but they typically go into fixtures with multiple sockets. Usually 3 or 4 like a ceiling lamp.

No offense, but I didn't claw my way to the top of the food chain to live in a dim light. I understand and can accept the premise, but if I put four lights in to equal the light of one old one and the new ones use one quarter of the energy of the old ones how is this much of a savings? Tell me where I'm wrong.

 

[California]

My CREE 60w equivalent, 9.5 watt actual, is in the hall. It's just right for that location. It would also be ideal for a front or back porch light. These are not only suitable locations for its light output, these are also fixtures that will be left on for days at a time when we are out of town - so the energy cost savings is material. (Actually I have inferior Hong Kong LED's from Ebay in the outdoor locations presently, until they quit).

You need to match light output to the application. Seems to me that circular 22 watt fluorescents or 4 ft fluorescents are the next steps up in economical lighting at reasonable cost, after these 60/9.5w CREE's.

 

[k0ua]

No offense, but I didn't claw my way to the top of the food chain to live in a dim light. I understand and can accept the premise, but if I put four lights in to equal the light of one old one and the new ones use one quarter of the energy of the old ones how is this much of a savings? Tell me where I'm wrong.

The idea is that an LED lamp would use about 9.5 actual watts of power to put out an equivalent amount of light of a 60 watt incandescent bulb. So if you had a fixture with 4 of them you would have and equivalent of 240 Watts of light while only consuming 38 actual watts of power. So a considerable savings over a period of time. in energy usage. to help offset the considerable amount of money you had to come up with to purchase the things in the first place. Don't worry , I have my reservations about all of this also. Like will the dang bulbs last long enough to actually pay off in the end or "pop" they go in the first week, and you just flushed $15 each down the trash can. That is the risk you are taking.

 

[ultrarunner]

So if a new style bulb is a "60 watt equivalent" does that mean it puts out the same light as a 60 watt incandescent bulb? If so, who can see with that?

My 9.5 watt (sixty watt equivilent) Cree LED puts out 800 lumens and is rated for 8,322 hours.

My 75 watt GE Incandesent Full Spectrum bulb puts out 860 lumens and is rated for 1500 hours.

Both are dimmable.

Both are lead free.

My GE is made in China

My Cree is assembled in USA

We still have a drafting table and the drafting table lamp uses a single 60 watt incandesent bulb... no problems seeing.

My 15 watt (60 watt equivilent) CFL contains lead and is not dimmable... and from my experience does not live up to long life claims and is made in China.

If the new LED deliver I think they will take over in time.

 

[DarkBlack]

Be careful of lumen ratings, it's not apples-apples. The human eye is more sensitive to certain frequencies, that can make some lights with the same "rated lumens", appear dimmer.

 

[MotorSeven]

Be careful of lumen ratings, it's not apples-apples. The human eye is more sensitive to certain frequencies, that can make some lights with the same "rated lumens", appear dimmer.

This is true, I have 4 or 5 different brand LED's in the house and they all throw a different light. Some I'm not crazy about so they go in places like closets/porches/hallways. The one's that I like go where I want light for reading or doing some kinda task.

Another reason I went LEd is I have a long range plan of going off grid with Solar, so that is one step in that direction for us.

 

[California]

Kinda related to the government-required phase out of incandescent bulbs. Same reasoning, different application.
Industry has agreed to meet government standards for more efficient cable TV boxes in homes.

Efficient set-top boxes to save $1 billion on energy annually by 2017 (arstechnica .com/tech-policy)
DOE, satellite, telco, and cable companies forge agreement on new standards.

Although the individual savings will be small, the cumulative impact is massive: a billion dollars in electricity saved by consumers and five million fewer metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions in the atmosphere.

average monthly savings from the new agreement would be about $1.50 - not something that most consumers would care about enough to push their service providers to give them better hardware. Without the standards lots of electricity - roughly the output of three power plants - would be wasted.

 

[woodlandfarms]

Because of Incandescnents we got into this very comfortable idea of Watts and how much light we could get from that engergy (thus the 60 watt light bulb). Now what that measurement really no longer applies.

Two things you want to look at Lumens and Color Temperature

Lumens is how much light is put off a bulb, so maybe a chart like this will help

Compare: LED Lights vs CFL vs Incandescent Lighting Chart

Or like this, a better article I think

LED vs. CFL vs. Incandescent Light Bulbs | Smilodon's Retreat

As for color temp, here is a chart

Color Temperature Chart: Light Bulbs Etc, Inc.

The big problem is for me is I have bought 'warm white" and to my eyes (which I think are very well trained for this due to my work) a lot are still quite blue. My biggest fear in my investment into LED's is that in 5 years they will have all of this looking good and consistant (and be priced a lot less) and I will be sitting on the $700 in lightbulbs that last forever.

 

[dave1949]

<snip>

The big problem is for me is I have bought 'warm white" and to my eyes (which I think are very well trained for this due to my work) a lot are still quite blue. My biggest fear in my investment into LED's is that in 5 years they will have all of this looking good and consistant (and be priced a lot less) and I will be sitting on the $700 in lightbulbs that last forever.

Nice info, thx.

New market: used LED bulbs. :laughing:

 

[SPYDERLK]

Note that the 110 year lightbulb is about as bright as a candle. No surprise it lasted, it's not burning very hot.

Ways to make a bulb last long:

1) Reduce the voltage. If you run a 120v lightbulb at 100v it will last very long. I remember when you could buy little resistors that you put under the bulb and the bulb lasts 10 years. I suppose a lightbulb company buys out every resistor company and scuttles the product.
2) Design the bulb for 130v and sell it into a market where line voltage is 120v.
3) Or never turn it off, it will last longer, but not forever. But if you reduce the voltage...

I wonder if a guy could start a company to make those and sell the again, do you get bought out or forced out? Well incandescents are out?

IOW - run the bulb inefficiently. ...More waste heat, less light for a longer time. Shoot that foot right off. ... The halogen incandescents are a way around this. They can run the filaments hot because they are made to replate the tungsten that "boils" off back onto the filament as they operate. They can give a higher light/heat proportion and hang in there longer.
larry

 

[Boondox]

CFL's can take a few minutes to come up to full brightness. A poor choice for a place where you only need light for a few minutes.

When we started out with CFLs we bought the cheapest ones we could find. We got less then we paid for. Dim and did not last all that long.

CFLs are worthless. Like many in rural New England we heat with wood, and by morning the interior winter temp is around 45F. Flip the light switch and ten minutes later you have enough light to see dim shapes. LEDs are costly, but I'm tired of needing a flashlight to find things in my own house!

 

[SPIKER]

CFLs are worthless. Like many in rural New England we heat with wood, and by morning the interior winter temp is around 45F. Flip the light switch and ten minutes later you have enough light to see dim shapes. LEDs are costly, but I'm tired of needing a flashlight to find things in my own house!

UPDATE: I agree with you Boondoox... THESE NEW CFL bulbs I put into the kitchen just a few days (maybe 2 weeks now) when starting in early AM coolness take 5 min, I have COFFEE done before I can see well enough to mix them up... so I have to reach back behind the coffee maker & dish drainer to flip on the incandescent light. now if I leave these CFLs ON for 15 min I can see to eat breakfast by the time they get warm enough to shine nearly as well as the identical incandescent light fixture 4 feet away...

I may switch them out and into the Living Room ceiling Fan 4 bulbs so with 4 60watt CFLs should put out about the same as the 40watt candelabra
bulbs in there now...

Mark

 

[ultrarunner]

At work there are many plug in floresents and no screw in types.

The plug ins work really well... only take a second or two to start.

In addition, the T5 lamps also perform well.

Could it be the compact household varieties are just of low quality?

For cold applications... like the morgue... it's not the lamps that are different... it is the ballasts that are temperature rated.

I can fully understand the public frustration... if something isn't broken... it does not need fixing!

 

[aczlan]

At work there are many plug in floresents and no screw in types.
The plug ins work really well... only take a second or two to start.
In addition, the T5 lamps also perform well.
Could it be the compact household varieties are just of low quality?

We have T8 plug in fixtures out in the barn and they start pretty quick. The areas where we don't use the light for long and have enough clearance get the big 150 watt bulbs ( Shop SYLVANIA 150-Watt A19 Medium Base Soft White Incandescent Light Bulb at Lowes.com ) though. Instant start and for how long they are on (15 mins /day) its cheaper than a florescent.

Aaron Z