Congress to consider banning incandescent article ---

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brantmacga

brantmacga

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http://realestate.msn.com/Improve/green/Article_mw.aspx?cp-documentid=5647379

This article was on MSN when I logged on today. It talks about a bill introduced in congress to ban the incandescent light bulb. It had an interesting quote:

Other legislators think compact fluorescent technology hasn't come far enough and that it fails to provide the same quality of light as incandescent bulbs. Rep. John Peterson, R-Pa., has compact fluorescent bulbs in his home but says they are not the equivalent of incandescent bulbs.

"They are not very bright. They are not good for reading," Peterson said on the House floor. "They buzz sometimes; they just buzz like a transformer."
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Have any of you had this buzzing problem? I just replaced my bathroom lights w/ the CFL's that look like regular light bulbs (they have a cover around the bulb). They take a minute to warm up, but they're just as bright as the 100w incandescents that were in there, and they put off little to no heat. The color is almost identical; i think that has something to do w/ the cover around the flourescent tube. Your thoughts?
 
andinator said:
They will pry my incandescent bulbs out of my cold, dead fingers.:smile:
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Well said, me too. When they can make a $2 CFL that will work on a dimmer and come up to full brilliance instantly, I will start buying them.
 
i'm not for the bill either, but i am using cfl's in certain areas of my home now. i swore i'd never have one, but i must say i'm really impressed w/ these i got.
 
infinity said:
Well said, me too. When they can make a $2 CFL that will work on a dimmer and come up to full brilliance instantly, I will start buying them.
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The full brilliance issue is the only one that kills it for me. I have several of these around my house, including 5 in my bathroom over the sink, now usually it does't bother me to wait a minute or two for full brightness, but sometimes you need full brightness immediately (say you got something in your eye for example and you run into the bathroom to get it out) . Willing to wait two minutes? I don't think so.

Congress is premature till this issue is addressed.
 
I have found that burning newly-installed fluorescents, especially CFL's, for 24 continuous hours or more helps in both start-up brightness speed and life.
 
What they need is for CFL technology to equal that of modern T8s with electronic ballasts. Just compare those with T12s and mag ballasts. For $18 I can buy a complete wrap-around fixture which is instant on and damn near full intensity.

IMO they're trying to make CFLs cheaper, not better. You can't make an electronic ballast that's got decent performance yet is disposable/economical.

Rather than banning the incandecent, how about standardizing on ballasted fixtures for new residential construction, and a generic, standardized socket, so John Q Public can blindly buy any brand of tube, just as they would an edison-base incandescent.
 
For what it's worth, I replace an awful lot of electronic ballasts, most which are less than 10 years old. Electronic ballasts have a pretty high failure rate, at least from basic field observation.

I'm not advocating that we continue to use magnetic ballasts, because the whole industry is moving away from them. But they have electronic ballasts beat hands down on reliability.
 
Here Is How To Beat Congress

Here Is How To Beat Congress

We can disquise an incandescent lamp like this to fool Congress.



Funny-Alt_Emer_Backup.jpg
 
Rampage_Rick said:
What they need is for CFL technology to equal that of modern T8s with electronic ballasts. Just compare those with T12s and mag ballasts. For $18 I can buy a complete wrap-around fixture which is instant on and damn near full intensity.

IMO they're trying to make CFLs cheaper, not better. You can't make an electronic ballast that's got decent performance yet is disposable/economical.

Rather than banning the incandecent, how about standardizing on ballasted fixtures for new residential construction, and a generic, standardized socket, so John Q Public can blindly buy any brand of tube, just as they would an edison-base incandescent.
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I whole heartedly agree. Banning the incandesant bulb is just a stupid and ill-informed idea. Screw in CFL's are like peddles on mopeds. Nor do i buy the idea that they are "good" for the environment. Sure less power - more mercury chemical by-products from cheap dispoable subtitute lamps. Light quality on the ones most will buy - the least expensive - are just crap, and will burn out the ballast much earier than it's rating in most cases, if not shatter in your hand as you install it.

While ballasts have gotten so much better in the way of flicker, light color and dimming - they are way too expensive for most consumers. As I often am the guy who has to force feed people flouro lighting due to title-24 here in CA - they aften balk at the cost of quality fixtures that would give acceptable results, and opt for the cheapest crap they can get. Which for this type of lighting is some knock-off brand, with a knock-off lamp.

A good fixture/ballast, and a quality lamp of say the DTT 26w variety are close to a T-8 IMO and since I am often forced to suggest - that is what I recommend.

As for ballast and bulb life - I believe this is a "Planned Obsolesence" thing - not just the technology change. I am sure some of us in the last few years have changed out mag ballasts and lamps from the 60's sure the light quality sucked, they buzzed and hummed.... But they provided light for 30 years solid in some cases! Now I get lamps that crap out in thier "burn in period" - and some types of ballasts that seem to last for a week. (T-5 HO's) Much of this I believe to be poorly timed engineed-in self-destruct circuits. ;)

I picture mad GE or Sylvania sceintist in his lab now.....
"Hmmm.... The amount of heat generated by this circuit minutaturized to this scale should blow just after the warantee - Oooo Hah, hah hah!!!!"
 
And for the record: (This is what I would tell Congress) A bare 100w incabdecent bulb in a table lamp or suface ceiling mounted porcilin is far superior in energy efficiency than a dozen recessed cans with CFL's in them - solely due to beam spead - ban recessed cans! :D
 
As for ballast and bulb life - I believe this is a "Planned Obsolesence" thing - not just the technology change.
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i can agree with that! most ballasts i have to replace are either 2 years old or 20 years old. just seems like they're made to fail now.
 
designed to fail?

designed to fail?

brantmacga said:
i can agree with that! most ballasts i have to replace are either 2 years old or 20 years old. just seems like they're made to fail now.
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Is it me? Or have you noticed that you can't get a good so called quality incandescent lamp that will last an entire month? Paul Harvey once spoke of a light bulb (lamp) company that built a bulb with a true lifetime warranty! And he finished up by saying,"needless to say,the company went out of business"!The good news is when we are forced to go all cfls we will have a ton of high quality Chinesse bulbs, uh lamps! Kinda like those counterfeit square D ocpds out there waiting to burn a lotta property down!!
 
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ItsHot said:
The good news is when we are forced to go all cfls we will have a ton of high quality Chinesse bulbs, uh lamps!
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My POCO gives them away, as required by legislation/law. And rebates too - but seemingly on only the cheapest....
 
they can outlaw colored clothing next, I am sure it takes more energy to make that as opposed to grey slacks for everyone. Then they can outlaw steak and only make hamburger. less energy to cook thin, frozen pucks than to cook a prime rib. lets outlaw 6 burner stoves while we are at it. then they can outlaw 6 and 8 cylinder cars. and all guns except .22's. small bullets take less energy to make and transport.
 
e57 said:
My POCO gives them away, as required by legislation/law. And rebates too - but seemingly on only the cheapest....
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I just bought 3 four packs of 100w CFL's for .99 a pack. Part of the cost was being paid for by one of the POCO's.

I have them all over my house now and don't really have a problem with them. The one problem I have is that they don't fit in some of the fixtures because they're too big.

I also agree with itshot, that my incandesents don't last worth a darn. I have had some of my CFL's in for more than two years and have yet to change one. The difference between 100,000 hrs and 10,000 hours plus the energy savings just makes sense to me.

I will be changing out some of the more specilized bulbs, like my vanity light and exterior spots, now that they are starting to make those in CFL too.
 
I know that I'm repeating myself, but I add this to each CFL thread:

Write the installation date on the CFL ballast, so that you can track if you are getting reasonable life on them.

Take the time to demand warranty replacement for bulbs that don't last. They have gotten so cheap that it isn't worth the time from a direct dollars point of view, but the companies won't fix reliability issues if there are no complaints.

Learn where CFLs make sense in your house and use them, but keep other lamps where they make better sense. Lamp efficiency is only part of the equation. Lamp life, number of starts, reliability at reduced temperature, lamp toxins, etc. all should be part of the equation.

IMHO less efficient lamps should be 'pre charged' for a fraction of their future energy use (possibly in the form of a voucher that you have to buy with the lamp that can be used to pay your electric bill). Lamps with toxins should be charged a deposit to ensure proper disposal, etc. IMHO it is reasonable to level the playing field a bit so that people think about the best lamp for a particular application, rather than just getting the cheapest lamp.

-Jon
 
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