[nheather]

One of the problems I face if I want to change is that many of my light fittings are the type that have 4 or 5 small 40W bulbs. These bulbs are either small candle or small golfball and have small screw or bayonet - they also run of dimmers and for the most part they are only on low as mood lighting.

To date I have been unsuccessful at finding suitable shape\size LE bulbs with the right fittings (the range of small bayonet is extremely limited). So even if I was prepared to get rid of the dimmers I can't find the bulbs to fit.

The advice I have been given is that in the future I will have to replace the light fittings.

I wonder if, in these sort of situations, anyone has done an environment\carbon calcuation of

(a) Continuing to use traditional bulbs

versus

(b) Chucking my dimmers and light fittings into landfill, the manufacture of replacement light fittings and switches which I will have to purchase so that I can use LE bulbs.

Cheers,

Nigel

[johntheexpat]

Originally Posted by busman12

I have started looking into replacing the `old` bulbs into new energy saving ones. On one side of the boxes that they come in, it states what you can and cannot use these bulbs for.
I know dimmer switches is one no no, but it also says no if you have your light plugged into a timer - WHY ?

We have some table lamps around the house on timers, why can`t you use them ? Surely this is no different to turning the light on or off yourself !

Thanks.

I have no idea, but have been using them with timers (both 'mechanical' and electronic) for quite a while. Perhaps I have been risking a major catastrophe without realising it! But will carry on and report back if disaster strikes.

[nheather]

I suspect the manufacturers are covering themselves.

The electrical profile (spikes etc.) may be different and there may be a possibility (however small) that this might not be compatible or damage some designs of electronic timer. BUt I suspect the risk is very small.

Another possibility are these push timer lights (that work by spring) that are often used in stairways and hallways in flats and apartment blacks to prevent the landlord picking up a big bill when they are left on.

I've seen ones where you only get 30 secs. Imagine this scenario. Landlord replaces normal bulb with cheapo Tesco LE bulb. Frail little old lady presses the switch, the LE bulb splutters and flickers for 10-15 secs before it comes on to full brightness. Little old lady starts walking down the stairs gets halfway and is plunged into darkness. Little old lady tumbles and is injured or worse - she sues the landlord. Makes the papers and Tesco is higlighted as contributing to the death\accident. So perhaps that's why they put the restriction on the packaging.

Cheers,

Nigel

[johntheexpat]

Originally Posted by nheather

Another possibility are these push timer lights (that work by spring) that are often used in stairways and hallways in flats and apartment blacks to prevent the landlord picking up a big bill when they are left on.

I've seen ones where you only get 30 secs. Imagine this scenario. Landlord replaces normal bulb with cheapo Tesco LE bulb. Frail little old lady presses the switch, the LE bulb splutters and flickers for 10-15 secs before it comes on to full brightness. Little old lady starts walking down the stairs gets halfway and is plunged into darkness. Little old lady tumbles and is injured or worse - she sues the landlord. Makes the papers and Tesco is higlighted as contributing to the death\accident. So perhaps that's why they put the restriction on the packaging.

Cheers,

Nigel

Nigel! You are so cynical

[Chris Muriel]

Originally Posted by nheather

One of the problems I face if I want to change is that many of my light fittings are the type that have 4 or 5 small 40W bulbs. These bulbs are either small candle or small golfball and have small screw or bayonet - they also run of dimmers and for the most part they are only on low as mood lighting.

To date I have been unsuccessful at finding suitable shape\size LE bulbs with the right fittings (the range of small bayonet is extremely limited). So even if I was prepared to get rid of the dimmers I can't find the bulbs to fit.

The advice I have been given is that in the future I will have to replace the light fittings.

I wonder if, in these sort of situations, anyone has done an environment\carbon calcuation of

(a) Continuing to use traditional bulbs

versus

(b) Chucking my dimmers and light fittings into landfill, the manufacture of replacement light fittings and switches which I will have to purchase so that I can use LE bulbs.

Cheers,

Nigel

Go for the 30% saving of switching to halogen based equivalent size/fitting bulbs; these are dimmable and so it's a straight swapover without throwing away your dimmers and with 30% energy saving (vs close to 80% with full LE).
As with full LE bulbs, look out for offers at various supermarkets and DIY stores.

[nheather]

I've not notice (or aware) of halogen bulbs other than the conical spots (like GU10s).

I must have a look if they come in different fittings and sizes.

Cheers,

Nigel

[Chris Muriel]

Some examples :
OSRAM|Consumer|Home Lighting|Halogen lamps|Product overview|Screw bases|ENERGY SAVER|index

I often find them on offer in places like Sainsburys.

[nheather]

No small baynonets (which seems to be a common problem with all the LE) but the small screw , small globe look interesting. Depends on the price compared with my normal golf-balls.

Cheers,

Nigel

[Lee_JTD]

Originally Posted by busman12

I have started looking into replacing the `old` bulbs into new energy saving ones. On one side of the boxes that they come in, it states what you can and cannot use these bulbs for.
I know dimmer switches is one no no, but it also says no if you have your light plugged into a timer - WHY ?

We have some table lamps around the house on timers, why can`t you use them ? Surely this is no different to turning the light on or off yourself !

Thanks.

Some timers have a small trace current running through them when they are off. So by putting a CFL low energy lamp in you will either find the bulb goes very quicky, or it will destroy your timer.

Some timers now say on the packaging suitable for low enery bulbs, in which case they will be fine.



For those saying about the 'guarantee' eg. 8000 hours, it doesn't exist. The packaging is very misleading. I'm unsure what size sample is used when testing the bulbs, but the 8000 hours is when 50% of the bulbs tested had already failed.

[KelvinS1965]

A while ago I bought some single LED 12V 3 watt lamps from a shop called Ecostreet, they had a shop within a garden centre near Oxford (Yarnton). They are very bright, if a little 'blue' but I put them in my enterance hall and landing as they are the two areas that the kids tend to leave on. Unfortunately Ecostreet seem to have gone bust/dissapeared, but I'd like to buy some more of these lamps or the similar 240volt version that they sold. They were about £15 each, so not cheap, but supposedly they will last for 40 years (unlike the shop ).

We are redoing our kitchen and it's the last room that I haven't put low energy lamps in (apart from an odd one or two halogen ones where there are mirrors as the women complained about the colour effecting their makeup process ). I'd like to be able to buy something that I've seen working, so any other supplier that has a shop would be considered.

I've found an energy saving light bulb that works with dimmer switches!

Switched to energy saving light bulbs sometime ago, but had a major problem with flickering in the lounge as the bulb wasn't compatible with my dimmer switch.

But recently discovered the Osram Dulux El Dim - currently the only fully dimmable energy saving bulb. However, there are plans for more to be developed later this year. If you run a search in Google, you'll find loads of places that sell the Osram.

Clare

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Small changes make a world of difference
Energy Saving Trust - Energy Efficiency & Energy Conservation to combat Climate Change

[JohnG]

I've had quite a few of the free energy saving bulbs from the gas board and electricity board.
Over the last year 3 of them have ceased working and they are all under a year old. My old fashioned normal light bulbs last much longer than these have

[Sonic67]

Originally Posted by nheather

Another possibility are these push timer lights (that work by spring) that are often used in stairways and hallways in flats and apartment blacks to prevent the landlord picking up a big bill when they are left on.

The switches on the push spring are adjustable to the length of time you want.

[simonoaks]

Hi,

I have had a look through the thread briefly, and it seems there is a mix of pro and cons to switching over to energy saving lamps.

My view is, whilst I do not believe in AGW, it could be a way of saving money so that is the main driver. I currently have conventional lamos throughout my house, ranging from normal 60W beyonet, to kitchen and bathroom in ceiling spots to golfball and screw fittings for lounge and study. I tried energy saving lamps about 9 years ago and they were rubbish.

Therefore, can someone recommend the best technology type to look for, and recommend a website where a can buy all the diverse fittings I require in order to convert all my rooms to energy saving lamps?

cheers

[Sandypusscat]

Originally Posted by simonoaks

Hi,

I have had a look through the thread briefly, and it seems there is a mix of pro and cons to switching over to energy saving lamps.

My view is, whilst I do not believe in AGW, it could be a way of saving money so that is the main driver. I currently have conventional lamos throughout my house, ranging from normal 60W beyonet, to kitchen and bathroom in ceiling spots to golfball and screw fittings for lounge and study. I tried energy saving lamps about 9 years ago and they were rubbish.

Therefore, can someone recommend the best technology type to look for, and recommend a website where a can buy all the diverse fittings I require in order to convert all my rooms to energy saving lamps?

cheers

There are 4 technologies as far as I am aware, (I got this from a bulb buying guide) Normal LED, Compact flourescent, Halogen and High power LED.

Modern energy savers are much better and smaller than the old great big things you used to buy, supermarkets are only good for normal fittings and CFL bulbs normally though, we have a 5 bed house full of awkward fitings, GU10 spotlights, screw fitting bulbs (in 2 sizes) and smaller versions of normal fittings and golf bulbs (the last house owner had a thing for odd light fittings we think), we found the best place to buy was eBay for price but only if you know exactly what you want as sellers can be very hit and miss about returns on light bulbs, I emailed then sent a list of bulbs to the chap at www.powersavebulbs.co.uk and they had most of what we needed for the house and even ones for our outdoor security flood lights.

The downside of CFL energy saving bulbs is that they dont come on instantly at full brightness they take time to warm up but the High power LED bulbs (The way forward when the price comes down) are getting brighter and cheaper, we got some Eveready 3w High power LED bulbs that replaced our 50w Halogen spotlights in the hallway, they are almost as bright and come on at full brightness. Problem is the price, they were about £18 each I think but they have 25 years life according to the boxes, it takes a while to get your money back but we have the hallway light on all the time in winter and there are 10 bulbs we were using 500 watts now we are using 30 watts, also we have fitted energy bulbs into lamps and put them on timer swithces to come on at night, it looks like someone is in when we are out and doesnt cost much to run. we have energy bulbs on all night for security as our house looks pretty dark otherwise.

Also when buying we found you have to be aware what light colour you want and match them, we had to swap some of ours because we didnt understand what "warm and cool" white were, We found we like warm white for relaxing areas and cool white for working areas, cool white is a brighter light per watt used apparently but its too harsh a light shade for the living room.

Feeling quite smug as my sister in law is very "green" and always lecturing us on how she wont fly as it adds too much carbon emmissions and all that (to the point that she has just got a grant and planted 1000 trees on her land to reduce her carbon effect on the planet) but she hasnt got energy savers in yet. I cant wait to make a big point of how green we are when I next see her, plus we have just got an AA rated freezer, I must point that out to her as well,

Last time I saw her I told her I had a great way to counteract global warming and that I was going to leave our fridge door open to cool things down, I was only kidding but she threatened to leave if I said another word on the matter !

[dbaplaya]

I have been trying out a range of low energy bulbs this year.

The CFL GU10 bulbs (normal size) are ok if you mix them up with halogen bulbs as the slow start up time of the CFL is pretty annoying.

In the kitchen i have 4w GU10 LED's. Cant think of the make but i brought them from Focus, they could be made by Ring thinking about it. they are 3 led's inside each bulb and they are very good, giving a warm colour.

In the porch i have a Philips 3W led, again very good, more of a cool colour. This has 3 led's inside it.

The downstairs WC has a 4.5w unit made by Elgo. This is the best in the house, very bright, cool in colour. A true replacement for a 50w GU10, but pricey at £25.

The outside coach lamps now have 7W Philips bulbs in. These are pretty good. Give out a similar light to a 40/50W normal es/bc bulb. They have large heatsinks on the back. I had 60w bulbs in there before, so a significant saving on the running costs for the future.

Last unit is in the lounge, there are 4 corner spotlights (gu10) that are used for background lighting. Originally they had CFL's in but i was annoyed at the startup time so tried the 4w General Electric bulbs. These give a slightly cool white colour from a single led bulb. Nice pin sharp spot off the narrow beam. They look great.

[Ian J]

Having had my attention brought to this thread by the activities of a spammer - I changed the light fittings in my living room a few months ago and now have two ceiling light fittings taking three 60w bulbs each plus four wall lights taking the same bulb.

I wanted to change to energy saving bulbs but can't as I need a very small globe type bulb with SES fitting and don't think that there is such a thing and the smallest that I have found pokes out of the top.

No wonder they were end of range

[Chris Muriel]

IKEA have a reasonable range of smallish bulbs - certainly worth checking.

[johnscarlet]

And if you don't find something suitable a change to 40w bulbs would use 33% less . Not ideal , but better than nothing