Luminaire with over-maxed wattage

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smallfish

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In my mother-in-law's kitchen there is a ceiling fan with luminaire attached below the fan. It is a large glass fishbowl enclosing the two lampholders with rather large openings above the lamps for heat dissipation. The openings are below the fan and a foot away from the ceiling. The fixture is marked for use with 60 watt maximum bulbs. I would like to replace these two incandescent bulbs with two of 100 watts each. She's old and has trouble seeing. I think it would be safe but is there a reason that it would not be?
Thanks
 
smallfish said:
The fixture is marked for use with 60 watt maximum bulbs.

I think it would be safe but is there a reason that it would not be?
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That answers your question, unless you don't like her.

J/K

I recommend installing CFL's. You can get 4 times the brightness for the same wattage.
 
LarryFine said:
That answers your question, unless you don't like her.

J/K

I recommend installing CFL's. You can get 4 times the brightness for the same wattage.
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Can you do that safely? I thought you still had to be careful with that as CFL's put off a good amount of heat as well, it's not a straight conversion as far as heat production is concerned.

Smallfish, as a consumer you are allowed to do whatever you want to do, just can't go back on anybody if the place burns down because of your failure to follow what the instructions say.
Is the fishbowl frosted? If so you could probably get a clear replacement to allow more light through.
 
alfiesauce said:
Can you do that safely? I thought you still had to be careful with that as CFL's put off a good amount of heat as well, it's not a straight conversion as far as heat production is concerned.
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Yeah it been done more than I care to see either side of pond And keep in your mind the CFL useally not that hot as indensecent bulbs are useally 1/3 to 1/2 of total heat rejecton of it so you can have big as 42 watts screw in CFL bulb as long it have room in there { but a nice gotcha is watch the burning oradtion some of the CFL don't like to run in inverted postion }

Merci,Marc
 
alfiesauce said:
Can you do that safely? I thought you still had to be careful with that as CFL's put off a good amount of heat as well, it's not a straight conversion as far as heat production is concerned.
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Well, say incandescent bulbs are 5% efficient, so a 100 Watt incandescent makes 5 Watts of light and 95 Watts of heat. CFLs are often quoted as being 4 times as efficient, so the equivalent CFL would be 25 Watts. It would be making 5 Watts of light and 20 Watts of heat. So the heat reduction is more than 4:1.

However, I expect the CFL electronics are lot more sensitive to heat than an incandescent bulb is. So you'll fry the CFL before you exceed the rating of the fixture itself.

Cheers, Wayne
 
In my experience, when a person needs more light, they get a larger wattage bulb, then the light fixture begins to fail due to the lampholder arcing and pitting at the riveted connections inside the lampholder because of excessive heat, the first sign is frequent lamp failure, then total fixture failure. I have always wondered why the NEC states its purpose is to safeguard persons and property from the hazards arising from the use of electricity but somehow the untrained and unsuspecting person (ie.-your grandma) can still go to a store and purchase a lamp that has the potential to burn her house down, why are lamps/lampholders not rated and mated in such a manner that this would be impossible just like receptacles that are designed with specific purpose in mind. What homeowner would ever suspect that a trained and licensed electrician is required to change a bulb. IMHO, Having your grandmother invest in some task lighting would be the safest and most feasible solution.
 
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