Electronics Forum / Electronics / February 2007

"RMD"

**  I'm sure heaps of folk will do just the same.

 **  Ditto here.

**  Two things have to happen before folk can trust CFLs to perform as
claimed and not become a pollution issue.

1.  The regulators create a mark of proven quality and conformity to
acceptable standards that all CFLs makers have to earn and then can apply to
their products.

2.  All sellers are required to accept used examples back for proper
re-cycling.

.......    Phil

Anyway, where does this quoted 1000 hour mean life for incandescents come
from? In our house there's no doubt that it's way longer for most of the
globes we use. Nearly all of our failures are with particular fittings, for
some reason, maybe heat dissipation. For the rest, we go for years without
changing a globe, even the ones that get used a lot.

I've had CFL's last for more than 8000 hours, so it's not just
marketing bullshit, they CAN achieve that.
Yes, some brands are crap, but others are excellent.
Some brands and models take ages to warm up, others are instant to
full brightness.
Some fade with time, others don't, even after 8000 hours.

I'm using some of these new Megaman 11W Halogen replacement ones and
they claim 15,000 hours.
http://www.neco.com.au/product.asp?pID=168&cID=47
http://www.megamanuk.com/technology/ingenium.php
They do take a long time to warm up though, worst than any other CFL I
have tried.

Dave :)

in recent years, We have used a large number of CFL's in our work.  In
all cases they were australian 240v CFL's being run from 120v, inside
sockets mounted in imported US made equipment (too expensive to get
120v bulbs, which had a short life anyway -  and too much hassle to
rewire dozens of sockets for 240v). Most CFLs will happily start and
run on a 120v supply without any noticeable drop in performance.

(note: one advantage no-one here has mentioned is that CFL's seem to
be really good at handling voltage drops, and I would recommend using
them in areas where you have brown-outs etc.)

We used GE brand 18W CFL's that were sold by big W at the time (2001),
and were "guaranteed  3 year life".

In all cases they would be run for about 10 hours a day, 7 days a
week, and were quite reliable.  The first round of failures occured at
about 3 years, where about 30% of the CFL's had died and since then
about 40% of the original units are still running, though brightness
has reduced.

Have replaced them recently with Philips units that are stocked at
Haymans, however the "Fairway" brand units that are sold dirt cheap at
our local Bunnings also work fine, but dont seem to give out as much
light in my opinion.  Too early yet to give an opinion on their usable
life though.

------------------------------------------------
out of interest:
The first I can remember of "CFL's" was in the mid 1980's when a
collegue obtained a couple of them.  In those days they cost about $25
to buy, (which is probably close to $50 in today's $) and the entire
tube was encased in what looked like a big glass "jar" and probably
sealed ?   They took several minutes from power-on to come up to full
brightness, but after that they worked well, and produced plenty of
usable light.

At the time, I can remember thinking they were a bit of a waste of
time - mainly because of the cost, because a 40w batten could be
bought for less than that, the tube could be replaced for about $2,
and probably did the job as well or better, as well as starting within
seconds at normal room temperature.

Imagine my surprise when visiting there about a year ago, and seeing
that he had one of them still in use as an outside light ! He claimed
that the light had not failed in that time, but it was only being used
for about 2 hours 2 nights a week  (usually only used on weekends when
they were using the outdoor area).

The time it takes to get to any usable brightness is annoying though.