Energy efficient home lighting

[benh]

My electrical bills are getting worse and worse, so I'm getting more interested in using more energy efficient forms of lighting in my house.

What's the real skinny on CF bulbs vs regular incandescents in terms of energy savings and increased bulb life? Doesn't look like LED replacements are quite there yet in terms of direct replacement, as they still tend to be directional and not have much throw.

Related to that, anyone know of a good source for bulk pack (10+) CF bulbs of a decent quality?

[Lynx_Arc]

You can catch the CF bulbs on sale at home improvement centers like Home Depot for about $10 for 4 100w equiv or 6 60watt equiv. I would get the 100watt ones for areas you stay in a lot and the 60s for areas you walk through and don't need to read or look at anything like hall lights. CFLs take about 1/4 to 1/5 as much power to get approx the same light output. If you have a room that needs a LOT of light the T8 straight tube based lights are said to be even more efficient but I haven't read the statistices.

Note: CFLs take a few minutes to *warm up* so if you absolutely need instant brightness either use a lot larger *wattage* value than you think you need or go with an incan. A 1.6-4watt fluoro nightlight is also useful for lighting rooms at night you occasionally walk though as they can run all night for nothing compared to turning on/off an incan for 15 minutes.

[turbodog]

bulk packaging

http://www.lightbulbsdirect.com/


I have bought about $150 worth of cf 4100k bulbs from them.

They require no warm-up time.

call them, they have unadvertised specials

[benh]

Thanks. I generally buy 75 watt incan bulbs, might give the 65 watt equiv CF's a try. There are certain lights I just tend to leave on all the time, and I think this will help a lot, combined with trying to remember to turn some lights off.

How do they work in ceiling fans?

While I'm on the subject, how efficient are those 12VDC lighting systems? Are the transformers those use particularly efficient?

[turbodog]

I have used the CF bulbs in ceiling fans with no problems. The only problems I have seen are with enclosed fixtures. The heat builds up and can SOMETIMES can failure of the lamp. But this is very seldom.

I use them with very good results in my garage door light also. They are about the only thing that will stand up to the vibration.

[James S]

keep the receipts. The CF's I'm buying still have a high rate of infant mortality. Out of the last 10 that I've bought 1 was dead out of the package and 2 have died after only a few hours use. even with the prices coming down y ou'll want to return bad ones.

Read up on the internet about the specific brands. I personally do not buy light of america branded bulbs as their quality control has been abysmal. I've opened 3 failed lamps of theirs that I had in a row and in every case they had failed to actually finish constructing them inside, not all the connections were soldered! i've also had some of them actually smoke as the ballast went out.

Inspect, clean and repair any loose or corroded lamp sockets! If there is one thing that can kill a Cf bulb in the short term it's a loose or bad socket. You do NOT want to put a $7 or more bulb into an old socket and have it fail over and over on you which they will do.

I really recommend that you dont buy a whole lot of them at once until you've had a chance to experiment and see which ones you like the best. They all have slightly different color and startup speed and warm up speed. Buy a couple of the brands that are available near you and use them for a while to see which ones you like and which ones die 10 minutes after you turn them on the first time.

An additional benefit to CF bulbs is that they dont produce the heat of a regular bulb. For example, in my kitchen with 9 recessed cans with 75 watt bulbs in them the AC could not keep the temperature below about 79 if you were running them in the afternoon. But with 100 watt equivalent CF bulbs in there it has no problem and cycles the same as before when I left the lights off. This makes an even bigger impact on my electric bill than just the electric savings from the lights themselves.

Another good reason to use them is that you can put a brighter than usual one in a lamp and get more light. A lamp that might be only able to handle a 60 watt bulb can handle an adaptor and 2 30 watt CF's giving as much as 300 watts of light output! The family room here has 8 recessed cans in it, when we moved in they were hot nasty 65 watt floods. Now they are 85 and 95 watt equivalent CF floods and the room is great.

[Ken_McE]

A minor point to remember is that the CF packaging will sometimes stretch the truth a bit. You buy something that claims to equal a 75 watt bulb, you get it home, and it's more like a 60 watt bulb.

A 100 watt incandescent is 1,700 lumens. You can use this number to work out how bright the CF bulb really is if they have lumens listed on the packaging. If the package doesn't actually say how many lumens the bulb produces, they probably have something to hide.

LEDs are OK for small point lighting and nightlights. EL panels are good for nightlights.

[turbodog]

The bulbs I bought:

1. don't have to warm up like some CF bulbs I've had in the past
2. are 4100k color temp (cool white, looks like daylight)
3. are 14w, roughly equal to a 60w incan
4. are 800 lumens
5. had only 1 die out of 50+ that I bought

[brickbat]

I've used 4 different types of CFLs in the past few years: Commercial Electric (from Home Depot), Sylvania, GE, and Philips. All require about a minute to reach max output and stable operating color temp, with the Philips Earth Light being the worst in this aspect. I've had very good life from them, with no 'infant' failures yet. I attribute this to the fixtures in which I use them (never enclosed, and only a few are base up) and the fact that I've stuck with the smaller sizes - 14W mostly, but some as large as 23W.

In a few cases where I needed more light, I installed a two-fer (the Y shaped thingys that allow 2 bulbs to be installed)

I have read that manufacturer's rated life is usually based on a 70F ambient. Even a small lamp, like the 14W ones will run 150F or so in a base-up enclosed fixture. Some estimates would indicate a 50% life reduction in the electronic ballast components for every 10C increase. The ballast components are what has failed in reports I've seen of very short life.

My experience so far puts the Home Depot Commercial Electric lamps at the top of the 'best value' list. I happen to like Incandescent-like color rendering, and the CE 3000K lamps are pretty good. They also have some 4100K lamps, for those that like cooler color temps.

[cue003]

Originally Posted by turbodog

bulk packaging

http://www.lightbulbsdirect.com/


I have bought about $150 worth of cf 4100k bulbs from them.

They require no warm-up time.

call them, they have unadvertised specials

Nice. I have been looking into these myself. I am very interested inthe no warm-up time.

Curtis

[VidPro]

try a COMBO of things

Motion sencors:
15$ motion sencors can replace wall switches that that people kinda want to have on ALL the time, and dont really NEED them all the time. they can be set for 2-30 minutes, and adjusted for how much light is already there, for it not being needed at ALL. they can be sub calibrated for movement, with electical tape blocking areas.
fast on-off motion sencors do NOT work well on florescents, because florescents dont like to be yo-yoed on off.

Dimmer wall plates:
wherever your STUCk with incadescent, a dimmer can cut your consumption in half or more, and STILL you can crank it up when you need it. the ones that are light up are easy to find in your now much darker home

Auto off bulbs:
there are bulbs that will turn themselves off, they are not efficient, but great for kids that forget things.

florescent long tubes:
wherever lots of light is needed, florescnet 4' tubes last a good time, and put out a lot of light and are efficient, they will on-off more than small florescents depending on the type of balast.

LED desk lamps:
there are few really bright desk lamps in LED , but amondoteck has a 1w one for a darn reasonable price.

Spiral, and u-tube and circly lights:
as discussed, adding, circle lights with the LARGE tube, are very good efficiency, and have lasted much longer than spirals here. they are size wise as big in diameter as a long tube, just round so the fit in lamps and stuff.

Chuck the stupid shades:
how many homes have 1, million lumens , and 750,000 of them are being blown out in some stupid dark shades. go update your shades, by getting ones that are white, and thin at least.

HALOGEN:
stuck with incadescent lights can be replaced with awesome halogen versions of the same thing, they are 30% more efficient, and they are MUCH longer lived, cost me a bit to stick them things in, but now i am smiling cause i dont have to change them.

Clear Bulbs:
soft white bulbs waste power difusing it to death, if nobody is ever going to look at the filament, then WHY is it frosted? if its in a frosted container (like the bathroom) why is it a frosted bulb.
often you can replace a soft 100 with a clear 60 in a bathroom fixture.
one problem, some clear bulbs have very poor life.

Track, or POINT lighting:
track halogen, might not use any less power per lumen, but if you can get the lumens in the PLACE you really wanted them, without hitting people in the eyes with it, then they are much more efficient, even with the transformer, most are dimmable.
track lighting can also be done for florescent spirals, and 110V type track trios are cheap as heck.

Drop the chandelier, reflect the light where its needed:
in places with crasy high ceilings, lower stuff, or set reflections or point light so it doesnt go up in the sky where the humans arent. no use lighting the cobwebs

101 ways to save about 50% on your lighting bills, and not one usually approved by weird talking designers

[Lynx_Arc]

I like the small fluoro ~1.5watt sensor nightlights. You put them in areas you walk by occasionally at night and leave lights on for awhile and they can run for perhaps 12 days off the power used by a 100 watt incan bulb for just one hour as they shut off in the daytime. I have one now in the kitchen because my roommate likes to leave a 20watt fluoro tube on half the night and forgets to turn it off when he goes to sleep.

[yuandrew]

For me, fluorscent is my choice when it comes to lighting up a large area of my room.

Halogen is great for task lighting, spot lighting, and where fluorscent dosen't have enought "throw" to reach such as in my living room where the track fixtures are located up very high. No, you don't need big 300watt torchier lamps (common halogen fixture) Just 50 watt reflector spot bulbs. For task lighting in my own room, I have a 35 watt GE edison "micro reflector" in a desk lamp that I use as a reading light and for studying or homework. The rest of my room is lit with a 20 watt "Sunshine" (GE Chroma 50 Full spectrum) Fluorscent tube in an old modified undercabinet light which I have stripped out the original magnetic ballast and preheat starter and replaced it with an electronic ballast from a compact fluorescent bulb.

Recently, I found some overstocked Philips Dimmable Earthlights CFLs at my Big Lots. I bought some for 3.99$ each (New, they would have costed over 20.00$ each) For those interested, I canablized one for the ballast and it now runs the fluorescent lamp in my room.

Lamp placement is also one other thing. Putting my fluorscent light on the ceiling near the middle of the room means all the light is directed downward where I want it and it makes the room seem very bright. Put the same light on the floor or prop it up against the wall and the room does not seem as bright as it is with the light comming down from the ceiling. Since I have a dimmable ballast, I have the fluorscent light on a dimmer switch and I can dim the light to about 75% brightness (that will save some energy) and still have enough to go by. I only turn it to full brightness if I need a lot of light for certain tasks. Maybe later, I'll upgrade my fluorscent lighting to T8 small diameter tubes. I have T12 tubes now.

[HarryN]

Going along with Vidpro's comment about the color of shades, it is also useful to consider the colors of your walls, ceilings, and carpet. Changing some of these is an expensive ordeal, but others are fairly cheap.

My wife happens to like to have the walls "very white", as in 1 drop of L pigment per gallon of paint (also known as an L1 / gallon mix). L is a brown pigment.

For those not familiar with the effect, this paint makes "ceiling white" paint look brownish. We paint all of the walls and ceiling this one color, which also saves me from the need to do edging work at the wall / ceiling interface. Couping this with a similarly painted wooden shutters, light colored flooring, etc. and the amount of lighting needed for each room goes way down.

Perhaps consider getting rid of spot lights in your kitchen and install long fluorescent tube types. These are much more efficient and provide very even lighting.

Your wife may not like to hear it, but blow driers pulling 1500 watts inside of an A/ C house are also "double trouble". Consider buying her a hair drying stand - for in the garage use.

In our house, A/C is by far our largest electricity consumer. I have had some success using water drip lines to keep the roof cool - turn them on in the morning to keep the heat from ever entering the attic. Continuous flow is not needed, just enough to keep the roof moist. Strangely priced water supplies in CA are a deterent to using this as widely, even though it has the potential to dramatically cut electricity usage.

We cook extensively on our outdoor gas grill, especially in the summer. Cooking puts a large heat load on a home, especially bad as this also tends to occur during peak power load times.

Just some ideas to consider.

[benh]

These are all great ideas, thanks. I'm going to troll Big Lots for some cheap flouro bulbs, and failing that, get some from Turbodog's online source.

I also found two different cheap ($4.00) "Eternalite" LED nightlights at Walgreens last night. They're made by Feit Electric, both have photo sensors on them. One has a Nicad rechargeable in it that is purported to give light via the LED for 3 hours in the event of a power outage.

I got one of each, and will post photos, etc in another thread when I get an opportunity.

[Zelandeth]

For directional lighting, here's something which seems to be appearing more and more commonly these days. First saw one of these things last year.



Osram have an R80 type lamp in their Dulux EL range as I recall as well.

My advice where CFL's are concerned: Stick to the companies with a good name. Osram are absolute top of my book. I've yet to have a single one of their lamps fail prematurely.

[Minjin]

When is someone going to make a luxeon based bulb replacement?!? I just picked up a 5mm LED based replacement bulb for my porch light and its pathetic. I'm sure that one or two amber 3w's would be all I need. I'm looking for about half to three quarters of the light from a 40w bug bulb. I need an LED bulb because CFLs don't like the freezing winter temps.

Mark

[Lynx_Arc]

If you are wanting about 20-30watts of light you would need about 10-15 watts of LEDs I would guess and some diffusion apperatus That would be something like 3 3watt LEDs which gets costly compared to a CFL based bulb. I have heard people using CFLs in enclosed fixtures in the winter as the fixture helps heat up the bulb faster.

[twl]

The CF lights are good for reducing energy.
If you really want to reduce your electric bill, try getting a high efficiency refrigerator/freezer, and insulating your hot water heater tank.
Those are probably the 2 largest energy users in most houses.

[Minjin]

Originally Posted by Lynx_Arc

If you are wanting about 20-30watts of light you would need about 10-15 watts of LEDs I would guess and some diffusion apperatus That would be something like 3 3watt LEDs which gets costly compared to a CFL based bulb. I have heard people using CFLs in enclosed fixtures in the winter as the fixture helps heat up the bulb faster.

A 40W bug bulb doesn't put out anywhere near what we would expect from a 40w incandescent. I'd say it puts out about as much as a normal 20W incandescent, if that. Thats only a few hundred lumens. Each amber 3w luxeon puts out 100 lumens if driven at spec. I have a 9w CFL out there right now and it is FAR FAR brighter than the 40w bug light.

Mark

[Lynx_Arc]

I never thought of the yellow coating as reducing the lumens output. I think you still would have a problem with the luxeon putting out light in a omnidirectional pattern without some diffusion or something. I see one 11watt fluro buglight listed at 520 lumens
if that were accurate you would need close to 5 of the amber luxeons.

[Vikas Sontakke]

I was able to purchase CFL spirals 15W (claimed 65W light) and 23W (claimed 100W light) from Aubuchon Hardware (sp?) for $0.79 each! They even had a great daylight white tint to them. Unfortunately, the 23W one would not last more than couple of hours when I put them in the recessed light fixture. They got hot, started flickering and quit. This recessed fixture is rated for at least 65W incan and I had another CFL of 23W there for last year and half. I tried one in a stand alone floor lamp and that seemed to work for at least four hours. I swapped the 23W for 15W and will try them in the recessed fixtures. For $0.79 I don't mind experimenting. These lights are made by MaxiLight. This offer might be subsidized by local electric company. I am in Mass.

In general, I have been using Feit CFL for last year and half and only one burned out of 16+ that I have installed in the house. Those were also picked up cheap; no more than $1.99 each from the same place.

I am also using Costo purchased recessed CFL but those were not cheap. These are spirals covered in the conical cover and look like regular flood lights even though they do have spirals inside.

I did notice something funny. I have purchased infra-red remote switch/dimmer from SmartHome. This is controllable by the run of the mill IR remote. It is controlling 4 recessed lights. I swapped the 65W incandescents with the 15W CFLs. Interestingly, everything was fine when I swapped 3 of them. When I swapped the fourth and went all CFL, the switch started making buzz, the lights started flashings and they turned off. But even in the off mode, the bulbs were dimly pulsing. Very bizarre to say the least. I tried different CFLs; same story. But if I swap *any* of the four CFL back to incandescent, everthings works! So, that's how they are now. 3 CFL + 1 incandescent. Fortunately, the dimmer portion of the switch is usually "dormant" i.e. the light always comes on at full 100%, so it is OK to use CFL with this switch as long as you don't use the dimmer portion of it.

- Vikas

[James S]

Originally Posted by Vikas

I did notice something funny.

Thats exactly right. I have several arrays of lights here controlled on remote control switches and you must have at least one traditional bulb in there.

The reason is that those switches get their own power by trickling a little bit through the filament when the light is off. The cheap switches dont have a separate neutral connection, and there isn't a neutral available anyway at most people's switch loop wiring points.

The switch can't get much through the power supplies of the CF bulbs and they flicker and twitch and the switch may not even work at all that way. But with a single regular bulb in the loop it MAY work fine.

Or, the bulbs may overheat and burn your house down. Those dimmers/switches, even if you never dim them but only turn them on and off are still chopping up the power waveform and delivering something potentially nasty to the power supply of the CF bulb.

Depending on the brand and construction of the CF bulb that can shorten it's life, or overheat it to the point of catastrophic failure as in catching fire.

I said I have several setups like this, but when you are first testing it out it is important that you keep an eye on it and check the bulbs for overheating after a few minutes or so. Some brands dont mind it at all, some will be obviously unhappy immediately by overheating and buzzing and flickering. So watch out for that.

[Vikas Sontakke]

Thank you! That was very illuminating. I hope it would be obvious if they are overheating just by the temperature of the spiral. I will definitely verify that after running them for half an hour at least and monitoring it.

At 15W per CFL, it was powering around 60W. One would think that it should be enough current flowing through the switch. May be ballast circuitry causes the problem?

The CFL *will* start buzzing if I try to dim but that I learnt long time ago. I still have string of 2 CFLs on wired dimmer for last couple of years. It seems to work OK as long as I nurse the dimmer setting to make sure they don't buzz.

Obviously, a non-remote dimmer/switch does not need its own power, so that would explain why I never ran into funny business before.

- Vikas