Aren’t there heavier duty filaments for these kinds of applications?
We just bought a new porch light that has several LEDs as the light source. Weird thing: the LEDs are built into the fixture, so if and when they burn out, we have to replace the entire fixture. (I expected it to have an LED bulb-type thing in it, rather like the Phillips bulb linked to. Yes, there was one on display at Lowe’s - I didn’t look up in it closely to see the lighting mechanism, I guess.) Cool thing: the box says that at 6 hours of usage a day, the fixture will last 22 years. (I take that with a grain of salt.)
The light is shaded by amber frosted panes of glass, so that the fixture is easy to look at while still giving bright light. We had it on last night - I’m a fan. It’s pretty keen.
CFL bulbs… I hate them because:
- I do not like color temperature of the CFL.
- I do not like waiting a 0.5 - 1 second for the light to “start-up”.
#2 is especially troubling whenever I enter a dark room with multiple switches. I flip several on and off looking for the correct switch only to find the original one was correct, but I hadn’t waited long enough for the light to turn on.
I found a solution to both of those problems with CFLs marketed to have a warmer colors and “instant-on” technology, but they cost more, and at that price point, I didn’t really save any money.
Also, my wife hates them, and has grown weary of my trying different CFL options. She has since banned me from further experimentation with our lighting. I have several boxes of cheap incandescent bulbs that I got for 25 cents each. I suppose these will last me a while.
Currently the price of LED is too high, and the color of light appears to pale (white/blu-ish) to fool with, IMO.
Further, lighting is such a puny part of my monthly electric bill. I live in a coal state and our electricity is already pretty cheap. If I really was interested in conserving energy or money in the long run I would look at the heating system and insulation instead of saving a couple bucks on lighting.
FYI, modern day CFL lights are close enough in color temperature to old-school tungsten filament bulbs that if you’re taking pictures inside, you can set a digital camera’s white balance to “tungsten” and have things look fine.
And, like Bosda said, LED bulbs are just too dim; I think the very brightest ones commonly available at Wal-Mart, Home Depot and the like are equivalent to something like a 25 watt bulb.
They exist, but may not be easy to find. They also will be banned unless the law is repealed. No would they solve the problem of the bulb unscrewing. I also think the halogens last longer.
I suggest you try out some of the Philips Ambient LEDs. The 12W (60W equivalent) gives a brighter light than the 60W incandescents I swapped out. They were on sale for $15 each. Here is a link.
I don’t have any issues with CFL’s, but I love LED’s. I’ve replaced all the outside spotlights at the front of my house with them and next on the agenda are the bulbs in the back of the house. I have a couple of them in fixtures inside the house but I’m just replacing those as needed.
I’d love to replace the potlights in the basement with them but I’m still searching for a bulb that’s short enough to fit into the fixtures. They currently have halogen bulbs and every time I turn on the lights in the basement the temperature rises 15 degrees.
Dude, you and me. I’ve been scouting Salvation Army and Goodwill stores for very cheap hard-shell American Tourister suitcases. For exactly this purpose. Because my Dearly Beloved™ and I detest CF bulbs and have an equal but for different reasons loathing of LED’s. We’re luddites. And we’re lighting snobs. She’s a Lighting Director / Gaffer and I’m a Cinematographer.
Light needs to look and feel enough like the light our species evolved seeing with. CF’s are a sick abomination of “light”. You can get warm, daylight, whatever. That’s just a smidgen of a nod towards what we need to be seeing. You can rack up 400 watts worth of CF ( yeah, I know, a “100w” lamp draws something like 37 watts. Nice for the environment. ) It may be a lot of footcandles but that in no way equals real illumination. Real light is light that allows the rods and cones in the back of the eye to be exited in the manner they have evolved to demand. CF illumination is not to my eyes real light at all. I don’t mean in terms of the science of light. I mean, do I like it or am I neutral or do I detest it. I detest it.
LED’s, for a different reason, suck photos. Try looking towards an led fixture. First of all, there is the blue l.e.d. problem. Then there’s the science behind the more global problems associated with l.e.d. sources.
They are very hard to look at or near. Their light is painfully harsh. IF I can find an l.e.d. source with a very good Color Rendering Index, or C.R.I., and I can bounce that bright source off of a neutral flat white wall or reflector, I might well wind up with a source of illumination that is not distressing to sit under, that is not distracting or irritating and that does not give me light too far from what my brain needs to see.
Fluorescent lights are out for many good reasons.
I want to save the environment? I won’t throw my NiCD batteries into the well. I will, however, continue to hoard every incandescent lamp I can get ahold of. Al Bundy, if you lived within driving distance, I’d give you $ 20.00 for the suitcase.
Speaking of the environment, I’d take the increased electric pull over millions of ounces of mercury that are heading to the world’s trash dumps in the next 10 years.
A few years ago I put a set of recessed low-voltage halogens in my TV room, they were inexpensive cans from Home Depot.
They were awful - of five units, I replaced at least three if not four (the actual cans, that’s not including the bulbs themselves). They’d just randomly stop working.
I finally got sick of it, pulled them out and put in new LEDs. Yes they were expensive (including trim rings and everything it cost me about $650 for five, that’s including tax) but they’re very nice. The light is very warm, nothing at all like the harsh white you get from an inexpensive LED flashlight or CFL. They produce a ton of light - those five units use 14W each and at full power the room is very brightly lit (it’s painted in all dark colors, too, so I’m not getting a lot of reflected light off the walls/ceiling), they don’t make the room hot, and they’re dimmable.
If you didn’t know upfront they were LEDs I don’t think you’d be able to tell - very natural light to my untrained eyes.
Me likey.
I hate CFLs for a reason not yet mentioned, I can hear the damn things whine. Particularly in a small room like the bathroom. Very annoying high pitched whine that would be drowned out by background noise in most places. but I can hear it and it is just noise pollution.
Ugh, I hate CF lights! The light is so weak and weird, it bothers my eyes. They’re noisy, they flicker, they take forever to come on sometimes.
The price irritates me too, I know it’s a net savings but it still irks me to plunk down more money for a product I consider ineffective.
I’ve had a couple of really bad experiences with outdoor halogens as well, they are weak and practically useless. I wish I had the space to hoard more incandescent bulbs.
I don’t understand the CFL hate. I do see a difference in the color spectrum compared to IC, but I generally prefer the softer spectrum of the CFL. And for the complaints about them taking a while to start up, I haven’t had that issue with any I’ve bought in the last couple years or so, though ones I bought a few years ago definitely have a startup delay. I just bought some new CFLs last week and they light up just as quickly as the ICs they replaced. The issue I have with LEDs is the price.
[quote=“Senegoid, post:5, topic:600404”]
(1) Yes, I’m concerned about the mercury, should one break.QUOTE]According to the EPA, you are actually releasing more mercury into the atmosphere using incandescent bulbs than CFLs, even if you break every CFL you use and allow the mercury to go wherever.
Here is the EPA site:
http://www.epa.gov/cfl/cfl-hg.html
They have another document that I haven’t found yet that gives more specifics. Essentially, if you are using power from a coal-fired power plant, you will cause roughly 4 times as much mercury to be released into the atmosphere (as a result of burning coal) than the mercury content of one CFL bulb over the CFL’s lifespan.
And unlike burning coal, the mercury is contained in the bulb instead of immediately released into the atmosphere, so not only does the CFL risk releasing less mercury into the environment, you are better able to prevent that release.
Not all of them. CFL haters simply have not tried other variations. If you’re only incandescent bulb you had used was a clear glass 15 watt, you’d likely think incandescent lites were crap.
There are various spectrums of CFL lighting.
And some light up nearly as fast as incandescent.
I do have a few LED’s around, to answer the OP. They are too damn expensive in the brighter end. However, I have a Eveready LED reading lamp which is very nice, and I have a 25w equiv hallway lite we leave on mots of the time.
I have had mixed experience. I have two CF torchieres in my LR and they’re great. I bought a CF bulb for my BR reading lamp, only it didn’t fit under the harp. So I put it into my wife’s reading lamp where it did. She complained it wasn’t very bright so I used an oiled paper to compare the light to a 100 W incandescent. The CF bulb claimed to be equivalent to a 100 W bulb, but it wasn’t even close. In fact, it was about 2/5 as bright, rough measurement but clearly much dimmer. Maybe more modern ones are better. But the fact that I would have to throw out most of my lamps certainly gives me pause.
As far as I can tell, there are no CF bulbs that are equivalent, say, to 200W bulbs. The older I get, the more light I need. And I was under the impression that LED lights do not come in bulbs at all. Is this wrong?
Dude, don’t talk about those in public!
I don’t hate CFL…in fact I don’t even remember which rooms in my house have them and which don’t. Well, except my office because they’ve blown twice now. Scary!
You should be able to recycle them at any Lowes store.
Anyway, I’m being contrary to the thread! I just wanted to post a link tothis feature article from Wired about the race to create the best LED bulb. It’s really eye-opening all the challenges they face. I’m definitely looking forward to them becoming the standard, tho.
Does anyone know why LED’s have such large fins?
I saw some at the store and they said they were not suitable for use in closed light fixtures. I’m assuming they are more sensitive to the heat.
the LED and its circuitry produce heat which has to be allowed to go somewhere.
semiconductors handling large amounts of power need to be cooled or else they’ll burn out. even really bright LEDs are only about 2mmx2mm.