I suspect the so-called information age creates as many problems though compelling fear as it resolves via enlightened sharing of factual information...
and
People are less and less in a position to sort out things and decide for themselves....
and
I just think the market place should drive ...
You see the contradiction here I hope. Out of ignorance the consumer is somehow supposed to arrive at the best solution?
Let's do some simple math. Here is a 10.5W (60W equivalent) LED bulb with an expected service life of 20_000 hours. So the energy it saves during its service life over its incandescent equivalant is
20_000 * (60 - 10.5) = 990 kWh
almost one megawatt-hour. It seems highly unlikely that it takes that much energy to produce one of these lamps, so it appears that the net energy savings are indeed real.
Regarding the so-called politics behind the imposed incandescent moratorium, I think it's possible -- indeed permissible -- to discuss matters of public policy here without resorting to libertarian vs. socialist rants. As long as the dicsussion remains civil, includes scientific references, and remains free of irrelevent asides or strawman arguments, we should be able to engage in a positive discourse.
I also think that CFLs should not be a part of the conversation, since LED lamps are already proving to be far superior in energy savings, longevity, and illumination quality. IOW, it's too convenient to damn public policy by raising CFLs as the boogieman, when we're already all aware of their obvious shortcomings compared with LEDs.
Supermarkets are supposed to be more cost effective for groceries, but meat and fish were fresher and safer when purchased from a butcher. Now items are mass processed, frozen and set out under plastic wrap so that one cannot easily tell how fresh (except for the date stamp).
I used to look for fish fillets in my local grocery store - they don't have the fish available every day. Fresh fish (supposedly), but in plastic wrapping. So one day about four years ago I noticed they had fish again, the date on the plastic wrap indicated that it was packed the same day. Good. So I bought it, brought it home, and cooked it - turned out it was not fresh. Must have been several days old. It hadn't turned _bad_, but it was not good. Around here we like _fresh_ fish (frozen fresh is also OK, but unfrozen fish must be _fresh_, and that means same-day catch).
The result? I have not bought fish from the shop since then. The date label was faked, and every time I see plastic-wrapped fish there I remember my previous experience and the idea of buying again is repulsive. Won't happen, ever.
How can that possibly be cost-effective for the shop? On the radio I heard a woman from a big grocery chain arguing that it was right to re-define 'fresh' to mean 'several days old', and to use the date when it arrived in the shop as 'origin date'. Again: How can that possibly be cost-effective? One bad experience for a customer is enough to counter a thousand good ones. I know that the shop has lost me as a fish customer. No money from me. And I'm not alone I'm sure.
@Tor
My local supermarket is a Carrefour, a French hypermart that is global. In the USA, the general rule of thumb is any supermarket is only as good as its meat and fish. After all, just about everything else that counts is in a box, bottle, or frozen. Fresh produce is not as sensitive about freshness.
Nonetheless, I have entirely given up on eating beef because there is so much red dye in it that I've no idea how fresh it is.
Big supermarkets are some of the lowest profit margin retail outlets on the planet; so they are very cost sensitive in their buying and management of freshness. But the reality is that cost sensitivity is winning out over quality. I see this as a general trend in big retailers, where they demand the low wholesale prices possible. Quality producers either are driven out of busniess or find a different channel for distribution.
Big retail is an evolution out of military commisary retail that got started at the end of WWII. Slowly it has driven the small retail shop keeper out of business except in places like German and Japan where the government demands that these retail channels have an opportunity to survive. Amazon and EBay have pretty much even bypassed a lot of those measures.
I am just deeply concerned that efficency in the market place has completely ignored that all the complexity of retail distribution was a major provider of occupations for independent people that did not rely on their government to provide a social welfare safety net.
In the 19 years of living in Taiwan, I have watched the transistion occur here from lots of small interesting vendors to a few big retailers. Costco and Ikea have been the most recent entries. Everyone loves the shopping, but wonders what has happened to the economy.
I just keep wondering when economist are going to accept that economist is indeed a social science and its biggest concern should be shaping markets to provide people with opportunities to take care of themselves. It seems that shifting the light bulb market to a new technology has next to nothing to do with that kind of thinking. It just seems to be big enterprise pushing out another older established big enterprise by a public relations campaign of saving the energy and environment. These promises may or may not be kept.
I also think that CFLs should not be a part of the conversation, since LED lamps are already proving to be far superior in energy savings, longevity, and illumination quality. IOW, it's too convenient to damn public policy by raising CFLs as the boogieman, when we're already all aware of their obvious shortcomings compared with LEDs.
-Phil
exactly .. CFLs are a total joke , I was at ace yesterday and they have nice LED systems . Ya you pay 15 bucks a bulb . but you get what amounts to Light for life .
I
I did a paper in college for my capstone class on the merits of CFL vs LEDs Vs normal FLs and incandescent.
What I found is that glass bulbs incan an halogen have a MUCH better disposal profile then LEDs and CFLs .... bare tube FLs were in the middle ........... you can recycle glass all day long . the small PCBs in a CFL can not .
LEDs with there uber long lifespan Does ! offset the disposal issues ....... If you use 2-3 of them ( per place to put a bulb ) over your life then you have had less impact then a non recycled incan .
I also look at the way it loads the grid ....
The power factor of a CFL is VERY bad . I have seen as bad as .5 ......
high power LEDs with a proper power supply are in the .85-.9 range .
Incan are 1 as we expect from a over volted heater .
power saveing the LEDs ,CFLs and the FLs smoke incans .
Who was the winner? ......... LEDs
and that was in 2010 market price .......
Dont buy cheap LED systems ...Pay 15-20 bucks a bulb .The results are VERY noticeable to a bad LED or CFL
I skipped CFLs ...
you know why I have LEDs ........ Its casue when I was in Iowa with no car .
a Taxi fare to get a set of bulbs over the life of a year was gonna cost me more then the cost of getting a nice LED set ...... menards had them for 9 bucks a pop for 800 Lumens .
I live just a couple of stones throws shy of the polar circle(well, a couple hundred Km), and I've been using CFLs exclusively since I moved into my new apartment in 2007...
So far, I've only had to replace a few of them, so I guess I got the ones that pulls the average lifespan up to 8000hours...
The 15W with built-in light sensor I bought for my outdoor light, though...
(Good luck finding an 11 or 13W CFL with sensor... )
Only ever switched off in direct sunlight, which can only ever happen for about half an hour at about 11am...
I've bought 1 LED bulb so far(used in a reading lamp) and I may swap out some others, too, as they fail. We'll see...
Heating in the winter...
It's a well-known fact that heat rises...
So having a 60 or 100W heater up there is not all that practical, really.
And even if it was useful, I think that my air-to-air heat-pump with an efficiency rating of up to 3.7 is somewhat better at heating my apartment.
My apartment is about 65square meters, and my average usage is less than 6000KWh/Year.
The only times I heat with anything but electricity is when the temperature drops below -10 degrees(Celsius) and then I use a clean-burning wood stove. (Here in Norway it's no longer allowed to install older 'non-clean' stoves unless it's for historical restoration purposes or similar. Yes, you can build open fireplaces, but they're not exactly a good option for heating a building.)
So I went to Lowe's today to get some hardware and spacers to mount my BS2 board to the HexCrawler that I am building. I passed a display of 60 Watt eq LED reflector bulbs from a no-name manufacturer, for 60 bucks! I do not know about anyone else, but I have a lot better things to spend 60 bucks on than an LED light that will despite all of the glowing commentary will not last a lifetime and does not make a nice color spectrum. Glad I got my stash of bulbs.
Hmm, I've been buying the Cree 60 watt equivalent bulbs from the local Home Depot. $12 each, 25,000 hr estimated lifetime (if I only get 1/4 that life I'll be more than happy). One fixture I use them in used to burn through 4 G.E. incandescents a year. I really have no problem with the color. I have two identical table lamps and for a while I had a regular bulb in one and one of the Cree LEDs in the other, having people try to guess which was which was fun.
So I went to Lowe's today to get some hardware and spacers to mount my BS2 board to the HexCrawler that I am building. I passed a display of 60 Watt eq LED reflector bulbs from a no-name manufacturer, for 60 bucks! I do not know about anyone else, but I have a lot better things to spend 60 bucks on than an LED light that will despite all of the glowing commentary will not last a lifetime and does not make a nice color spectrum. Glad I got my stash of bulbs.
Best,
Joe
Based on the typical prices on their website those were likely packs of 4 bulbs for $60.00.
No, that was for one reflector light bulb... the LED version of what one would put in a can fixture, where there is a reflective coating on the rear inside glass envelope behind the filament. 60 bucks and some change.
Not for me. I just recently bought an EPROM from the E-mac company with embedded FOURTH programmed in it for my Primer Trainer. It cost 60 bucks even plus some change for shipping. Methinks that I would far rather spend 60 bucks for an EPROM for something that I use on a daily basis (and enjoy using) rather than a bit of plastic consumer replacement technology that like most consumer products has built in degeneration so that said consumer will have to go buy another one. Talk about a shameful use of petroleum... plastic is made from petroleum.
Now I can program my 8085 SBC in FOURTH using a RS-232 Terminal in the nice light of a good old fashioned glass and metal incandescent lamp on my desk with a kitty asleep underneath of it because it is a warm spot and kitties like warmth, just like me.
My last LED bulb cost $8 and I got it on a promo of some kind, in the grocery store of all places, either two or three years ago. It has been doing very well, nearly almost always on in it's current location.
This year, I'm seeing comparable LED bulbs for somewhere around $10. The one back then was probably $30 off promo.
Right at this moment, I can get the best overall light amount and profile from CFL bulbs in most cases. The LED ones I'm seeing now compare increasingly favorably. I have no doubt that will improve quickly.
So then, the end result will be bulbs that cost more, but last considerably longer and perform on less overall power. I'm OK with that. I will likely pick up a few old style bulbs, just in case, but I don't really expect to use them.
I'm liking the alternatives presented here, particularly the automotive brake light bulbs. I may have a sort of "track" type light use for that setup.
Back in the olden days, if you wanted something cool, like a stereo sound system, it was often better to make it yourself. I wonder if this situation applies to LED lights?
Consider - hundreds of 'corn led' bulbs on ebay - I've got a few and they work fine but they flicker, and they are very light, and I bet they save costs by not having proper drivers.
So - quick search on ebay for led constant current 240V and there are lots of hits, with little boards down to only $3-$4.
but do a search for led constant current globe 240V and I get zero hits. Adding globe, or bulb seems to greatly decrease the options.
I think the trend is to use downlights and to replace the halogen downlights with led downlights, and put the constant current transformer supply up in the roof.
There seems to be lots of space inside a corn led globe. Maybe there is too much heat from the mains powered constant current regulator (shouldn't be if it is switchmode?)
Also, the led drivers seem to be 300mA to 900mA and I wonder what current a corn globe runs at - are these 20mA white leds?
Seems it might be a fun little hack - replace the cheap driver components in a corn led with a proper constant current driver.
Addit - I'm sitting in my study and I have one globe - it is a corn led globe and it replaced a 100W incandescent and it has been running for several years now with no problems. But I just looked up at the light to check all the panels are still lit, and noticed it is covered with cobwebs. An incandescent would have died by now, and then you replace it and get clean glass in the process. When LEDs take over, will we all remember to clean them?!
I wonder if a properly designed 100W-equivalent LED globe (like Dr.A just described) will ever cost $3 or less?
Is it even the right idea to use LEDs to make isotropic radiators? It seems more likely that 20 years from now a typical living room or study will have a number of strategically placed (and aimed) LED flood lamps. They may even respond to voice commands to meet changing illumination needs.
Not saying this is what I hope for. I'm just wondering if the isotropic light source is an artifact from a simpler past.
Is it even the right idea to use LEDs to make isotropic radiators?
I think it can be done, using a combination of molded optics and diffusers. Some of the existing lamps, one of which I have, already do a pretty good job.
Interior lighting is one of the less demanding uses of electricity.
After all, if you leave a 100 watt lightbulb on all day, you may have more than enough light to do whatever you want.
On the other hand, the computer monitor is likely a 300watt item. And a desktop computer with a hard disk is running another 300 watts. The wifi routter nibbles away maybe 10 watts. Not sure what a new laser printer does in standby mode. But the internet itself is a very big consumer of electrical power.
The vast majority of my electric bill is the Air Conditioner for cooling and an electric heater (900 watts) for heating, with a fan that run in the room about 24/7.
And if you are laptop user, the average laptop actually is reported to consume TWICE the power that a desktop PC and monitor does. ... a lot of waste heat in generated in the charge and recharge cycle. I am not sure where an iPad stands in energy harmony.
But the bottom line is that lighting is a minor player in energy conservation, unless you are talking outdoor lighting inclusive of street lights, freeway sign light, and traffic lights. Taiwan switched all its traffic lights to LED about 5 or so years ago.
I think you need to recheck some of those numbers...
My laptop (Acer Timeline U) has a 65W PSU, and that's supposed to be enough to both run the laptop and charge the battery at the same time.
The rather brutish HP EliteBook 8740w 'laptops' used by some of the designers at the office(those not already upgraded to DELL M6700) comes with a 120W PSU. (Those series comes with lots of RAM, 17" screens, powerful CPUs, CAD-optimised craphics cards... )
A Dell 27" LCD UltraSharp U2713HM draws a maximum of 100W
Maybe an old Cathode Death Ray type draws 300W, but nothing made this century. Not and still qualify as a monitor used at home...
While a HP P3015dn can draw as much as 780W while printing, its down to 14.5W in 'ready' mode, 8.5W while in 'sleep, and up to 0.6W while 'off'. http://www8.hp.com/us/en/products/printers/product-detail.html?oid=3815809#!tab=specs
(A bit of overkill for the average home user, but yeah, kind of the thing I'd want if my ancient LJ2100 died)
Back in the olden days, if you wanted something cool, ...it was often better to make it yourself. I wonder if this situation applies to LED lights?
Remember that LED can cook themselves to death, and sometimes we need to derate them. Something along the liines of running LED 20% above its rated current only produces a slight increase in light output, but reduces the life by half. Reducing the the current (by 20%?) cuases a noticeable decrease in light output, but increases the life by a factor of ten. I came to this rule of thumb a couple yearrs ago, but the arguement could be made that a manufacturer would crank up the juice slightly to sell brihter unit NOW, and not care that they die prematurely.
I get the 12volt super bright modules, and run them 9-10 volts, or at least on a dimmer circuit. These are 900 lumen max, and several do just fine at replacing an equal number of 60 watt incandescent bulbs. The can easily be dimmed to a pleasant level and cranked up when extra bright is needed.
All that work... lowering voltage, dimmer circuits etc. & etc. I just screw in an incandescent and spend my time/money on other things. Again, if you like them, use them. I simply find the light to harsh. They might be great for displays and commercial use, but not my home.
I just screw in an incandescent and spend my time/money on other things.
Here in Australia you simply can't buy them. I suppose you could try importing them but I don't know what customs might do. Before the ban came in some years back my wife stocked up several shelves in the cupboard but those are all gone now.
So Heater says that Europe is doing the same thing, and as he says in the first post, maybe the USA will as well?
We are stuck with a choice of CFs or LEDs. Oh for the luxury of being able to go down the store and buy a simple light bulb
If only the LED really were a 'light for life', this would be a wonderful thing.
But have you ever pondered how these useful life projects are created for devices that have been in existences for less than their projected life. It is just an estimate, nothing more. And a very optimistic one if my friend's neice is really seeing 90% return rate for failure under warranty. Most are NOT lasting long enough to get past a free replacement period.
Here is a simple question.
If you buy an LED light that claims a useful life of 50 years, AND provides a free replacement warranty if it fails in less than 1 year; how long do you expect this to last?
(Clue -- I have bought 3 new airconditioners in Taiwan and each one has failed beyond repair within two weeks after the end of the warranty period.)
I think you need to recheck some of those numbers...
My laptop (Acer Timeline U) has a 65W PSU, and that's supposed to be enough to both run the laptop and charge the battery at the same time.
The rather brutish HP EliteBook 8740w 'laptops' used by some of the designers at the office(those not already upgraded to DELL M6700) comes with a 120W PSU. (Those series comes with lots of RAM, 17" screens, powerful CPUs, CAD-optimised craphics cards... )
A Dell 27" LCD UltraSharp U2713HM draws a maximum of 100W
Maybe an old Cathode Death Ray type draws 300W, but nothing made this century. Not and still qualify as a monitor used at home...
While a HP P3015dn can draw as much as 780W while printing, its down to 14.5W in 'ready' mode, 8.5W while in 'sleep, and up to 0.6W while 'off'. http://www8.hp.com/us/en/products/printers/product-detail.html?oid=3815809#!tab=specs
(A bit of overkill for the average home user, but yeah, kind of the thing I'd want if my ancient LJ2100 died)
Well my desktop is a 64 bit Quad, Intel Core 2 with a 350 watt power supply and 3 hard disks inside. The monitor is a Benq that is rated at 1.5 amps for 100-240VAC.
The laptop power rating may be excluding the charge cycle power consumption. I have read claims that they use 200% of the power as desktops.
This thread inspired me to buy three boxes of four bulbs. I may buy two more boxes today. This should hold off led bulbs for a year or so and we'll see how dust settles.
So we have these LED lamps that are expensive but going to last 100 years. Do I have to carry my crate of LED lamps around with me my entire life? For sure every new house and apartment I move into won't have any lamps as they previous occupant will have taken them away.
Or do I buy a new set of lamps for every new house thus costing me a fortune.
So we have these LED lamps that are expensive but going to last 100 years. Do I have to carry my crate of LED lamps around with me my entire life? For sure every new house and apartment I move into won't have any lamps as they previous occupant will have taken them away.
Or do I buy a new set of lamps for every new house thus costing me a fortune.
Will kids inherit their grandfather's LED lamps?
Its what I do ! . I took my LEDs to oregon ..I dont see the big deal . The lamps they are in are more of a issue then the LEDs
Infact If ( done right ) the LEDs will be part of the house in fixtures perm mounted .
Its not gonna be a Issue unless you light your entire home with these. ROFL ..
So we have these LED lamps that are expensive but going to last 100 years. Do I have to carry my crate of LED lamps around with me my entire life? For sure every new house and apartment I move into won't have any lamps as they previous occupant will have taken them away.
Or do I buy a new set of lamps for every new house thus costing me a fortune.
Will kids inherit their grandfather's LED lamps?
Just what I need, grimy old LED lamps. The average life of a residential house is considered 40 years in America. ... and then it is reduced to rubble. I know... in merry old England, yew wood timbers and stone walled castles last much longer. But for the advertising trade, a life-time warranty is a bit dodgey. They really mean that they hope that people will eventually forget to ask for replacements or that the company will go out of business before anyone does ask.
How long will the plastic remain clear and not crack?
FYI, my mom taught me to wash and clean the light fixture every time I replaced the bulb. So what happens now?
OK, just one question. Does anyone really think that the manufacturers are going to build anything that lasts a life time? This whole light bulb issue has been a huge windfall for lighting manufactures. Due to legislation that was passed at the behest of those very same manufacturers, they now no longer produce light sources that cost the consumer around 90 cents each and now get to make the same number of light sources that cost the consumer anywhere from 15 to 60 dollars apiece. As I said before, follow the money, and there you will find the truth.
The average life of a residential house is considered 40 years in America. ... and then it is reduced to rubble.
Where did you get that figure? Can you point to a reliable reference? My house was built in 1949 and is not considered old by local standards. In fact, a few years aglo, I invested in a new "50-year" roof.
Same here... my split ranch was built in 1969 and I have no intention of tearing it down. :-) New insulation, new continuous water heater (propane) and I just re-graveled the driveway. I don't think that I will be leaving any time soon. My eldest son has expressed interest in the farm, and none of my other kids want it, so eventually when my wife and I are pushing up daisies he will have the house to either live in or rent to a tenant. My mother's house (she is still living at 88) is over a hundred years old.
Also, I just wanted to clarify something... even though I squawk a lot about this 'eco-lighting' nonsense being forced upon us, I am not a wastrel. I do believe in taking care of my environment, my home, my family, my animals and fields (where my livelihood comes from) etc. & etc. Heck, I even still drive a 1979 Ford Maverick that I bought when I was a kid. Still has the same straight six (darn those things would rev high and still run like velvet) and paint. The old Ford interiors decayed quickly, so I did have the interior redone. This light bulb thing is not only about my freedom of choice of having acceptable to me light in my house, but also about how much more petroleum in the plastics, energy in the manufacturing and labor to make them vs. how long they live and how much more dangerous materials you have to bring into your abode than compared to a plain old tin-plated brass, glass and Wolfram incandescent light bulb.
Comments
Seems we cannot get off the politics here.
almost one megawatt-hour. It seems highly unlikely that it takes that much energy to produce one of these lamps, so it appears that the net energy savings are indeed real.
Regarding the so-called politics behind the imposed incandescent moratorium, I think it's possible -- indeed permissible -- to discuss matters of public policy here without resorting to libertarian vs. socialist rants. As long as the dicsussion remains civil, includes scientific references, and remains free of irrelevent asides or strawman arguments, we should be able to engage in a positive discourse.
I also think that CFLs should not be a part of the conversation, since LED lamps are already proving to be far superior in energy savings, longevity, and illumination quality. IOW, it's too convenient to damn public policy by raising CFLs as the boogieman, when we're already all aware of their obvious shortcomings compared with LEDs.
-Phil
The result? I have not bought fish from the shop since then. The date label was faked, and every time I see plastic-wrapped fish there I remember my previous experience and the idea of buying again is repulsive. Won't happen, ever.
How can that possibly be cost-effective for the shop? On the radio I heard a woman from a big grocery chain arguing that it was right to re-define 'fresh' to mean 'several days old', and to use the date when it arrived in the shop as 'origin date'. Again: How can that possibly be cost-effective? One bad experience for a customer is enough to counter a thousand good ones. I know that the shop has lost me as a fish customer. No money from me. And I'm not alone I'm sure.
-Tor
My local supermarket is a Carrefour, a French hypermart that is global. In the USA, the general rule of thumb is any supermarket is only as good as its meat and fish. After all, just about everything else that counts is in a box, bottle, or frozen. Fresh produce is not as sensitive about freshness.
Nonetheless, I have entirely given up on eating beef because there is so much red dye in it that I've no idea how fresh it is.
Big supermarkets are some of the lowest profit margin retail outlets on the planet; so they are very cost sensitive in their buying and management of freshness. But the reality is that cost sensitivity is winning out over quality. I see this as a general trend in big retailers, where they demand the low wholesale prices possible. Quality producers either are driven out of busniess or find a different channel for distribution.
Big retail is an evolution out of military commisary retail that got started at the end of WWII. Slowly it has driven the small retail shop keeper out of business except in places like German and Japan where the government demands that these retail channels have an opportunity to survive. Amazon and EBay have pretty much even bypassed a lot of those measures.
I am just deeply concerned that efficency in the market place has completely ignored that all the complexity of retail distribution was a major provider of occupations for independent people that did not rely on their government to provide a social welfare safety net.
In the 19 years of living in Taiwan, I have watched the transistion occur here from lots of small interesting vendors to a few big retailers. Costco and Ikea have been the most recent entries. Everyone loves the shopping, but wonders what has happened to the economy.
I just keep wondering when economist are going to accept that economist is indeed a social science and its biggest concern should be shaping markets to provide people with opportunities to take care of themselves. It seems that shifting the light bulb market to a new technology has next to nothing to do with that kind of thinking. It just seems to be big enterprise pushing out another older established big enterprise by a public relations campaign of saving the energy and environment. These promises may or may not be kept.
exactly .. CFLs are a total joke , I was at ace yesterday and they have nice LED systems . Ya you pay 15 bucks a bulb . but you get what amounts to Light for life .
I
I did a paper in college for my capstone class on the merits of CFL vs LEDs Vs normal FLs and incandescent.
What I found is that glass bulbs incan an halogen have a MUCH better disposal profile then LEDs and CFLs .... bare tube FLs were in the middle ........... you can recycle glass all day long . the small PCBs in a CFL can not .
LEDs with there uber long lifespan Does ! offset the disposal issues ....... If you use 2-3 of them ( per place to put a bulb ) over your life then you have had less impact then a non recycled incan .
I also look at the way it loads the grid ....
The power factor of a CFL is VERY bad . I have seen as bad as .5 ......
high power LEDs with a proper power supply are in the .85-.9 range .
Incan are 1 as we expect from a over volted heater .
power saveing the LEDs ,CFLs and the FLs smoke incans .
Who was the winner? ......... LEDs
and that was in 2010 market price .......
Dont buy cheap LED systems ...Pay 15-20 bucks a bulb .The results are VERY noticeable to a bad LED or CFL
I skipped CFLs ...
you know why I have LEDs ........ Its casue when I was in Iowa with no car .
a Taxi fare to get a set of bulbs over the life of a year was gonna cost me more then the cost of getting a nice LED set ...... menards had them for 9 bucks a pop for 800 Lumens .
So far, I've only had to replace a few of them, so I guess I got the ones that pulls the average lifespan up to 8000hours...
The 15W with built-in light sensor I bought for my outdoor light, though...
(Good luck finding an 11 or 13W CFL with sensor... )
Only ever switched off in direct sunlight, which can only ever happen for about half an hour at about 11am...
I've bought 1 LED bulb so far(used in a reading lamp) and I may swap out some others, too, as they fail. We'll see...
Heating in the winter...
It's a well-known fact that heat rises...
So having a 60 or 100W heater up there is not all that practical, really.
And even if it was useful, I think that my air-to-air heat-pump with an efficiency rating of up to 3.7 is somewhat better at heating my apartment.
My apartment is about 65square meters, and my average usage is less than 6000KWh/Year.
The only times I heat with anything but electricity is when the temperature drops below -10 degrees(Celsius) and then I use a clean-burning wood stove. (Here in Norway it's no longer allowed to install older 'non-clean' stoves unless it's for historical restoration purposes or similar. Yes, you can build open fireplaces, but they're not exactly a good option for heating a building.)
Best,
Joe
Based on the typical prices on their website those were likely packs of 4 bulbs for $60.00.
C.W.
Not for me. I just recently bought an EPROM from the E-mac company with embedded FOURTH programmed in it for my Primer Trainer. It cost 60 bucks even plus some change for shipping. Methinks that I would far rather spend 60 bucks for an EPROM for something that I use on a daily basis (and enjoy using) rather than a bit of plastic consumer replacement technology that like most consumer products has built in degeneration so that said consumer will have to go buy another one. Talk about a shameful use of petroleum... plastic is made from petroleum.
Now I can program my 8085 SBC in FOURTH using a RS-232 Terminal in the nice light of a good old fashioned glass and metal incandescent lamp on my desk with a kitty asleep underneath of it because it is a warm spot and kitties like warmth, just like me.
Best,
Joe
My last LED bulb cost $8 and I got it on a promo of some kind, in the grocery store of all places, either two or three years ago. It has been doing very well, nearly almost always on in it's current location.
This year, I'm seeing comparable LED bulbs for somewhere around $10. The one back then was probably $30 off promo.
Right at this moment, I can get the best overall light amount and profile from CFL bulbs in most cases. The LED ones I'm seeing now compare increasingly favorably. I have no doubt that will improve quickly.
So then, the end result will be bulbs that cost more, but last considerably longer and perform on less overall power. I'm OK with that. I will likely pick up a few old style bulbs, just in case, but I don't really expect to use them.
I'm liking the alternatives presented here, particularly the automotive brake light bulbs. I may have a sort of "track" type light use for that setup.
Consider - hundreds of 'corn led' bulbs on ebay - I've got a few and they work fine but they flicker, and they are very light, and I bet they save costs by not having proper drivers.
So - quick search on ebay for led constant current 240V and there are lots of hits, with little boards down to only $3-$4.
but do a search for led constant current globe 240V and I get zero hits. Adding globe, or bulb seems to greatly decrease the options.
I think the trend is to use downlights and to replace the halogen downlights with led downlights, and put the constant current transformer supply up in the roof.
There seems to be lots of space inside a corn led globe. Maybe there is too much heat from the mains powered constant current regulator (shouldn't be if it is switchmode?)
Also, the led drivers seem to be 300mA to 900mA and I wonder what current a corn globe runs at - are these 20mA white leds?
Seems it might be a fun little hack - replace the cheap driver components in a corn led with a proper constant current driver.
Addit - I'm sitting in my study and I have one globe - it is a corn led globe and it replaced a 100W incandescent and it has been running for several years now with no problems. But I just looked up at the light to check all the panels are still lit, and noticed it is covered with cobwebs. An incandescent would have died by now, and then you replace it and get clean glass in the process. When LEDs take over, will we all remember to clean them?!
Is it even the right idea to use LEDs to make isotropic radiators? It seems more likely that 20 years from now a typical living room or study will have a number of strategically placed (and aimed) LED flood lamps. They may even respond to voice commands to meet changing illumination needs.
Not saying this is what I hope for. I'm just wondering if the isotropic light source is an artifact from a simpler past.
-Phil
After all, if you leave a 100 watt lightbulb on all day, you may have more than enough light to do whatever you want.
On the other hand, the computer monitor is likely a 300watt item. And a desktop computer with a hard disk is running another 300 watts. The wifi routter nibbles away maybe 10 watts. Not sure what a new laser printer does in standby mode. But the internet itself is a very big consumer of electrical power.
The vast majority of my electric bill is the Air Conditioner for cooling and an electric heater (900 watts) for heating, with a fan that run in the room about 24/7.
And if you are laptop user, the average laptop actually is reported to consume TWICE the power that a desktop PC and monitor does. ... a lot of waste heat in generated in the charge and recharge cycle. I am not sure where an iPad stands in energy harmony.
But the bottom line is that lighting is a minor player in energy conservation, unless you are talking outdoor lighting inclusive of street lights, freeway sign light, and traffic lights. Taiwan switched all its traffic lights to LED about 5 or so years ago.
My laptop (Acer Timeline U) has a 65W PSU, and that's supposed to be enough to both run the laptop and charge the battery at the same time.
The rather brutish HP EliteBook 8740w 'laptops' used by some of the designers at the office(those not already upgraded to DELL M6700) comes with a 120W PSU. (Those series comes with lots of RAM, 17" screens, powerful CPUs, CAD-optimised craphics cards... )
A Dell 27" LCD UltraSharp U2713HM draws a maximum of 100W
Maybe an old Cathode Death Ray type draws 300W, but nothing made this century. Not and still qualify as a monitor used at home...
While a HP P3015dn can draw as much as 780W while printing, its down to 14.5W in 'ready' mode, 8.5W while in 'sleep, and up to 0.6W while 'off'.
http://www8.hp.com/us/en/products/printers/product-detail.html?oid=3815809#!tab=specs
(A bit of overkill for the average home user, but yeah, kind of the thing I'd want if my ancient LJ2100 died)
Remember that LED can cook themselves to death, and sometimes we need to derate them. Something along the liines of running LED 20% above its rated current only produces a slight increase in light output, but reduces the life by half. Reducing the the current (by 20%?) cuases a noticeable decrease in light output, but increases the life by a factor of ten. I came to this rule of thumb a couple yearrs ago, but the arguement could be made that a manufacturer would crank up the juice slightly to sell brihter unit NOW, and not care that they die prematurely.
I get the 12volt super bright modules, and run them 9-10 volts, or at least on a dimmer circuit. These are 900 lumen max, and several do just fine at replacing an equal number of 60 watt incandescent bulbs. The can easily be dimmed to a pleasant level and cranked up when extra bright is needed.
Best,
Joe
Here in Australia you simply can't buy them. I suppose you could try importing them but I don't know what customs might do. Before the ban came in some years back my wife stocked up several shelves in the cupboard but those are all gone now.
So Heater says that Europe is doing the same thing, and as he says in the first post, maybe the USA will as well?
We are stuck with a choice of CFs or LEDs. Oh for the luxury of being able to go down the store and buy a simple light bulb
But have you ever pondered how these useful life projects are created for devices that have been in existences for less than their projected life. It is just an estimate, nothing more. And a very optimistic one if my friend's neice is really seeing 90% return rate for failure under warranty. Most are NOT lasting long enough to get past a free replacement period.
Here is a simple question.
If you buy an LED light that claims a useful life of 50 years, AND provides a free replacement warranty if it fails in less than 1 year; how long do you expect this to last?
(Clue -- I have bought 3 new airconditioners in Taiwan and each one has failed beyond repair within two weeks after the end of the warranty period.)
Well my desktop is a 64 bit Quad, Intel Core 2 with a 350 watt power supply and 3 hard disks inside. The monitor is a Benq that is rated at 1.5 amps for 100-240VAC.
The laptop power rating may be excluding the charge cycle power consumption. I have read claims that they use 200% of the power as desktops.
So we have these LED lamps that are expensive but going to last 100 years. Do I have to carry my crate of LED lamps around with me my entire life? For sure every new house and apartment I move into won't have any lamps as they previous occupant will have taken them away.
Or do I buy a new set of lamps for every new house thus costing me a fortune.
Will kids inherit their grandfather's LED lamps?
Its what I do ! . I took my LEDs to oregon ..I dont see the big deal . The lamps they are in are more of a issue then the LEDs
Infact If ( done right ) the LEDs will be part of the house in fixtures perm mounted .
Its not gonna be a Issue unless you light your entire home with these. ROFL ..
Just what I need, grimy old LED lamps. The average life of a residential house is considered 40 years in America. ... and then it is reduced to rubble. I know... in merry old England, yew wood timbers and stone walled castles last much longer. But for the advertising trade, a life-time warranty is a bit dodgey. They really mean that they hope that people will eventually forget to ask for replacements or that the company will go out of business before anyone does ask.
How long will the plastic remain clear and not crack?
FYI, my mom taught me to wash and clean the light fixture every time I replaced the bulb. So what happens now?
Best,
Joe
-Phil
Also, I just wanted to clarify something... even though I squawk a lot about this 'eco-lighting' nonsense being forced upon us, I am not a wastrel. I do believe in taking care of my environment, my home, my family, my animals and fields (where my livelihood comes from) etc. & etc. Heck, I even still drive a 1979 Ford Maverick that I bought when I was a kid. Still has the same straight six (darn those things would rev high and still run like velvet) and paint. The old Ford interiors decayed quickly, so I did have the interior redone. This light bulb thing is not only about my freedom of choice of having acceptable to me light in my house, but also about how much more petroleum in the plastics, energy in the manufacturing and labor to make them vs. how long they live and how much more dangerous materials you have to bring into your abode than compared to a plain old tin-plated brass, glass and Wolfram incandescent light bulb.
Best,
Joe