# Incandescent light bulbs in special applications, or in communist countries
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [February 21, 2022, 11:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870 "2022-02-21T11:04:38Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@YamatoTwinkie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YamatoTwinkie)
#### Post date: [February 22, 2022, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/21 "2022-02-22T18:26:02Z")
> [@engineer\_comp\_geek](#):
>
> The cost was higher than a standard bulb, but probably saved you money in the long term since it would outlast several boxes of el-cheapo bulbs. They were probably a bit less efficient, but not enough to make a significant difference in your electric bill.
I find this part doubtful. If the cost-per-year overall was less for the “forever” bulbs, when accounting for purchase price, failure/replacement rate, and efficiency, the market would have moved over to them long ago, especially considering that people don’t want to spend time buying or replacing light bulbs. All it would take is one startup to completely disrupt the entire market with a lower cost, less hassle product.
I suspect that the “a bit less efficient” part was actually substantial enough to result in a net negative overall savings relative to the “standard” bulb product offering.
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### Author:  [@md-2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md-2000)
#### Post date: [February 22, 2022, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/22 "2022-02-22T18:53:29Z")
Way back when a company I worked for had us on a Japanese Quality Management kick because Japan was so good at manufacturing it would eventually be the dominant economy in the world.
One article discussed quality and obsolescence. Remember the good old days of Detroit, when replacing an alternator was a fairly common thing? The winding burned out or the diodes died or the bearings went. Someone examined the alternators for a Honda or Toyota (I forget which) and discussed the difference. Basically, everything was bigger. They said this was the alternator for a car twice its size- heftier diodes, better bearings, thicker wire. The Japanese system just prided itself on not producing fast-failing crap. As we can see, that has both helped their auto success and galvanized US companies to do much better.
(Remember those analog electric clocks in the dashboard of Detroit cars in the 1960’s and 1970’s? That pretty much died after about 2 years? I don’t remember ever seeing one in an older car that was actually keeping time. They were just dashboard filler…)
Consumers will buy quality if its cost effective and worthwhile. The problem with “long life” bulbs I suppose is knowing whether they really are or if you’re being fed a line of BS. It takes too long to find out.
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### Author:  [@Heracles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Heracles)
#### Post date: [February 22, 2022, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/23 "2022-02-22T22:26:40Z")
> [@DPRK](#):
>
> That, and how much, as in the UAE (or hypothetical “communist” countries) is the government willing to make it illegal for cartels to flood the market with cheap crap.
My OP was about the past, as incandescent light bulbs aren’t exactly a hot issue today. The “communist” part was about the light-bulb situation in non-hypothetical countries, such as the U.S.S.R., where factory production and quality had a loose relationship with “profit” and market demand, and companies like Osram and General Electric presumably didn’t have any influence.
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### Author:  [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)
#### Post date: [February 22, 2022, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/24 "2022-02-22T22:27:59Z")
> [@engineer\_comp\_geek](#):
>
> This wasn’t rocket science. The bulbs had thick glass and heavy duty elements. The cost was higher than a standard bulb, but probably saved you money in the long term since it would outlast several boxes of el-cheapo bulbs. They were probably a bit less efficient, but not enough to make a significant difference in your electric bill.
Assuming that the fixture isn’t in some very inconvenient place, the cost of replacing a light bulb is negligible compared to the cost of the electricity to run it, so even small differences in efficiency trump cost of replacement.
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### Author:  [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marvin_the_Martian)
#### Post date: [February 22, 2022, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/25 "2022-02-22T23:05:26Z")
Heavy duty bulbs were also usually rated for 130V, so when run at 115V the filaments would last much longer but give off a yellower light that many find unpleasant.
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### Author:  [@Crafter\_Man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crafter_Man)
#### Post date: [February 22, 2022, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/26 "2022-02-22T23:54:32Z")
That’s the thing: I can produce an incandescent light bulb that easily lasts 20 years. But you’re not going to like the color and intensity of light it puts out…
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### Author:  [@Francis\_Vaughan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Francis_Vaughan)
#### Post date: [February 23, 2022, 12:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/27 "2022-02-23T00:42:18Z")
The issue with LED lights has been covered by Big Clive in various videos. This video on the Dubai LED was a counterpoint. Modern cheap LED lights would appear to be following the incandescent model. The designs provide insufficient heat sinking for the LEDs, drive them too hard and often seem deliberately designed to run any electrolytic capacitors too hot. The word “baking” is appropriate.
Big Clive has a set of videos where he shows how to trivially modify a cheap LED light to a lower power output, one which will then last nearly forever. Just replace the single resistor that sets the current through the LEDs on the controller IC. Unlike incandescent lights, the colour is the same and the efficiency is the same. Just dimmer and runs much cooler.
It isn’t suggested that this should be a common household mod. But it underlines the problem that there is still designed in failure.
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### Author:  [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)
#### Post date: [February 23, 2022, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/28 "2022-02-23T00:49:10Z")
> [@Francis\_Vaughan](#):
>
> Modern cheap LED lights would appear to be following the incandescent model. The designs provide insufficient heat sinking for the LEDs, drive them too hard and often seem deliberately designed to run any electrolytic capacitors too hot. The word “baking” is appropriate.
I can’t help but wonder if this is responsible for the phenomenon I’ve noticed lately and mentioned in another thread – the unusually high incidence of “one-eyed” new cars equipped with LED headlights I’ve been seeing, where one is inoperative. I’ve seen too many of those to be explained by a mere random wiring problem.
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### Author:  [@Francis\_Vaughan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Francis_Vaughan)
#### Post date: [February 23, 2022, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/29 "2022-02-23T01:28:00Z")
You would hope car headlights would be built to a much more stringent standard than cheap no-name household lights. But it is probable that manufacturers are still having problems cooling the headlamps. We think of LEDs as being very efficient, and they are, but a bright lamp still creates a lot of heat, and LEDs are a lot less tolerant than a length of tungsten wire. I see aftermarket LED lamp systems with inbuilt fans. In a car this isn’t going to end well.
In an integrated car system one might hope that the LED headlamps get connected to a CAN bus and are directly controlled. But expediency may rule over nice design.
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### Author:  [@Duckster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duckster)
#### Post date: [February 23, 2022, 5:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/30 "2022-02-23T05:33:33Z")
So are bulbs rated with average consumer use? If so, what is average consumer use? If you live where your power has power surges, is that taken into account into average consumer use?
My unscientific home study over many years finds incandescent bulbs that are left on for long periods last far longer than those bulbs that are regularly turned on and off. Does LED longevity parallel here between long periods of use vs constantly being turned on and off?
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### Author:  [@Francis\_Vaughan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Francis_Vaughan)
#### Post date: [February 23, 2022, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/31 "2022-02-23T12:58:41Z")
Most electrical and electronic devices don’t like thermal cycling. All manner of latent weaknesses can be exposed. An incandescent lamp is probably one of the worst. Cycling fatigues the filament and the envelope seals for a start. So power cycling does indeed result in significant reduction in lifetime. Traffic light controllers for incandescent lamps keep the lamps warm with a continuous low voltage and perform a soft ramp up of voltage when turning the lamp on. This makes a big difference.
For LED lamps there isn’t the clear thermal shock. There will be turn on stresses, there always are. But I doubt they matter compared to thermal degradation of the lamp components when it is on.
Overt abuse power cycling might shorten the life of the mains voltage input power capacitor. Much depends on the design of the lamp circuit.
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### Author:  [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)
#### Post date: [February 24, 2022, 7:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/32 "2022-02-24T07:31:20Z")
> [@running\_coach](#):
>
> > [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](#):
> >
> > When I was younger and a fan of trivia and world’s records books I learned that there were incandescent bulbs that had been continuously illuminated for nearly 100 years. They were all located in fire stations.
>
> The current (chortle) record holder-120 years.
> [http://www.centennialbulb.org/](http://www.centennialbulb.org/)
Yes, but look at that light bulb. It produces an ugly, yellowish color of light that most consumers wouldn’t tolerate in their home. Plus it produces way less light (lumens) than a regular bulb did. So it’s inefficient in 2 ways – both in using more current, and producing less light output.
(Plus it has to burn continuously (no on-off thermal shock) to last that long – most consumers wouldn’t tolerate that, either.)
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### Author:  [@md-2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md-2000)
#### Post date: [February 24, 2022, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/33 "2022-02-24T22:18:43Z")
> [@Heracles](#):
>
> My OP was about the past, as incandescent light bulbs aren’t exactly a hot issue today. The “communist” part was about the light-bulb situation in non-hypothetical countries, such as the U.S.S.R., where factory production and quality had a loose relationship with “profit” and market demand, and companies like Osram and General Electric presumably didn’t have any influence.
I often said the same thing about automobiles. Back in the day (60’s and 70’s) urban legend had it that Detroit had 200mpg carburetors (remember carburetors?) but the oil industry paid them to bury this tech. My view was, if it was simple tech, then why wouldn’t some country like China or the USSR have used that tech? They don’t give a crap what Exxon wants, and they certainly had the spies to figure this stuff out if their own scientists couldn’t…
As for consumer quality in Russia - I remember an article about central planning n the USSR. An example was plate glass - the factory quota was set in square meters of glass, so logically - the factory made quota by making the plate glass thinner. As a result a lot of it broke before it reached the construction site. It would not surprise me to learn their light bulb production met the same goals - quantity over quality.
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### Author:  [@DavidNRockies](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DavidNRockies)
#### Post date: [February 24, 2022, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/34 "2022-02-24T22:21:02Z")
I think those of you making reference to an under-voltaged incandescent bulb giving off an unpleasant kind of light are taking a rather dim and jaundiced view of this issue.
I’ll show myself out
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### Author:  [@DavidNRockies](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DavidNRockies)
#### Post date: [February 24, 2022, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/35 "2022-02-24T22:25:15Z")
> [@md-2000](#):
>
> Back in the day (60’s and 70’s) urban legend had it that Detroit had 200mpg carburetors (remember carburetors?) but the oil industry paid them to bury this tech.
While one doesn’t validate any other, I recall a fairly glaring example of the auto industry being _convicted_ for some Grade A conspiratorial crap:
> **[General Motors streetcar conspiracy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspiracy)**
>
> The General Motors streetcar conspiracy refers to the convictions of General Motors (GM) and related companies that were involved in the monopolizing of the sale of buses and supplies to National City Lines (NCL) and subsidiaries, as well as to the allegations that the defendants conspired to own or control transit systems, in violation of Section 1 of the Sherman Antitrust Act. This suit created lingering suspicions that the defendants had in fact plotted to dismantle streetcar systems in many...
> [@](#):
>
> Between 1938 and 1950, National City Lines and its subsidiaries, American City Lines and [Pacific City Lines](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_City_Lines)—with investment from GM, [Firestone Tire](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firestone_Tire), [Standard Oil of California](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Oil_of_California) (through a subsidiary), Federal Engineering, [Phillips Petroleum](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phillips_Petroleum), and [Mack Trucks](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mack_Trucks)—gained control of additional transit systems in about 25 cities.[[a]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspiracy#cite_note-3) Systems included [St. Louis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streetcars_in_St._Louis), [Baltimore](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baltimore_Streetcar_System), [Los Angeles](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Angeles), and [Oakland](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oakland,_California). NCL often converted streetcars to [bus](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bus) operations in that period, although electric traction was preserved or expanded in some locations. Other systems, such as [San Diego](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Diego)’s, were converted by outgrowths of the City Lines. **Most of the companies involved were convicted in 1949 of [conspiracy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conspiracy_(crime)) to [monopolize](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly) interstate commerce in the sale of buses, fuel, and supplies to NCL subsidiaries**, but were acquitted of conspiring to monopolize the transit industry.
[bolding mine]
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### Author:  [@Mk\_VII](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mk_VII)
#### Post date: [February 24, 2022, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/36 "2022-02-24T22:45:06Z")
Somewhere in Orwell’s essays is a story about the everlasting gramophone [phonograph] needle “but big business bought it up and suppressed it.” We still haven’t got that everlasting needle - and we don’t miss it.
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### Author:  [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)
#### Post date: [February 24, 2022, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/37 "2022-02-24T23:47:49Z")
ANd let’s not forget the special carbeurator which was suppressed because of its 100 mpg rating.
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### Author:  [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marvin_the_Martian)
#### Post date: [February 24, 2022, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/38 "2022-02-24T23:59:59Z")
Remember the good old days when that was the worst the conspiracy theorists could come up with? Good times, good times…
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### Author:  [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2022, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/39 "2022-02-25T00:08:45Z")
Huh. I just googled “100 mpg carbeurator” (I konw, I can’t type goood), and came up iwth an article from Jalopnik in 2014:
> **[The MPG Conspiracy Theory Is Crap, And Here's Why](https://jalopnik.com/the-mpg-conspiracy-theory-is-crap-and-heres-why-1562574926)**
>
> A conspiracy theory has floated around the Internet for years. There is a car technology, or, in some cases, a whole car, that has been suppressed in the name of oil profits. Big Oil, working with Big Car, is holding us back from our efficient...
Guess who they quote?
> [@](#):
>
> For the record, those magic carburetors are crap, too. I’ll let the always-brilliant [_Straight Dope_](http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/712/has-a-200-mpg-carburetor-been-suppressed-by-the-oil-industry) explain it:
>
> > [@](#):
> >
> > While I don’t want to belittle blue-collar ingenuity, the vapor carb’s inventors are trying to solve a nonexistent problem. According to John Heywood, a professor of mechanical engineering at MIT and an authority on internal-combustion engines, incomplete burning of fuel is insignificant in modern cars. Fuel combustion today typically exceeds 97 percent. While it’s true cars aren’t very efficient — only 20-35 percent of the fuel energy is converted to useful work — that’s mostly due to heat loss (through the engine block, out the exhaust pipe) and unavoidable energy loss during burning itself.
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### Author:  [@filmstar-en](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/filmstar-en)
#### Post date: [February 25, 2022, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/incandescent-light-bulbs-in-special-applications-or-in-communist-countries/959870/40 "2022-02-25T00:43:12Z")
Following the dismantling of the Los Angles transit system in order to sell more cars the city became famous for its petro-chemical smog and congested roads.
GM showed off a zero-emission concept car in 1990. The California Air Resources Board passed a mandate that seven car makers in California create zero emission vehicles.
General Motors subsequently became a pioneer of the Electric Vehicles with their mass produced EV1 in 1996. But, fearful that other states would be inspired to pass similar legislation and threaten their regular car sales they successfully lobbied for a cancellation of the mandate, cancelled production and trashed the leased cars.
Tesla CEO Elon\_Musk claimed in 2017 that Tesla was started in response to GM’s cancellation of the EV1 program.
Last quarter of 2021 GM made 440,745 vehicles and 26 of them were EVs. Tesla made 308,000 in that quarter. All of them EVs.
It is a fact that many large corporations are content to sit on the markets they dominate by hook or by crook. They engage in regulatory capture to avoid laws and trash their own technologies that that may affect their profit margin. The health of the public means little to them.
More recently the VW Diesel-gate scandal. European car companies convinced law makers that Diesel engines were the technology to achieve low carbon targets because of their superior efficiency. They won tax brakes and diesels became engine of choice. Later it was revealed that they programmed their cars to detect when they were on an exhaust test rig and then retune to get a good low emission score.
VW and GM made huge mistakes by trying the ‘game the system’ and now paying the price.
Competitive markets need to be nurtured and protected by just enough regulation to ensure there is level playing field and fair competition for the public good.
Sadly there is a tendency for cosy cartels to form in many businesses.
Adam Smith recognised this, way back in 1776.
"People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices…. "
The economy is bedeviled by corporations who prefer to sit on markets and reach into their box dirty tricks when threatened rather than engage in fair competition and innovate.
While there are sharp practices like this that do conspire to defraud the public, it does not do to get carried away and imagine there is an ever lasting lightbulb, miracle engines that run on water or perpetual motion machines,the wonders of which, are deliberately hidden from us in some secretive chocolate factory or skunk works.
Well maybe…on an episode of the Simpsons.
> **[Volkswagen emissions scandal](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_emissions_scandal)**
>
> Pages for logged out editors learn more
>
>
>
> The Volkswagen emissions scandal, sometimes known as Dieselgate or Emissionsgate, began in September 2015, when the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued a notice of violation of the Clean Air Act to German automaker Volkswagen Group. The agency had found that Volkswagen had intentionally programmed turbocharged direct injection (TDI) diesel engines to activate their emissions controls only during laboratory emissions testi...
> **[General Motors EV1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_EV1)**
>
> Pages for logged out editors learn more
>
>
> The General Motors EV1 was an electric car produced and leased by General Motors from 1996 to 1999. It was the first mass-produced and purpose-designed electric vehicle of the modern era from a major automaker and the first GM car designed to be an electric vehicle from the outset.
> The decision to mass-produce an electric car came after GM received a favorable reception for its 1990 Impact electric concept car, upon which the design of the EV1 ...
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