Pondering bulb bans, and shop lighting...

[dbhost]

As we all know, here in the U.S., most incandescent light bulbs have been banned, and thus we are left with Flourescent and LED lighting options.

With at least the F40-T12 size long ago having been relegated to the history books, and now as I understand it, T12 entirely will be phased out, that leaves me wondering how to stay up on the lighting technology in order to be able to obtain replacement bulbs when the time comes...

The standard that folks seem to be going to is T8, however I have recently heard about yet another fluorescent standard, T5, and I am wondering if those are actually starting to hit the market, and if so do they work as well as T12 / T8 with better efficiency?

Simply put, I would hate to run out of my spare T12 bulbs, end up not being able to buy more, swap fixtures to T8s, and in a few years end up in the same situation with those...

Are there LED lighting options for shop lighting that are becoming reasonably priced, and are flicker free (I am one of the odd folks that can see LED flicker and it induces miserable headaches in me...)

[Stytooner]

http://www.digikey.com/en-US/article...g-applications

Looks like THEY are taking steps to resolve flicker. I see it easily in florescent, but not so much in incandescent or LED's. It is most apparent for me when the lights are cold and I am reading or doing something meticulous.

I do not care for CFL's and the LED's I do use in my old sockets for machine lighting are not all that bright. I do have a few that work great and I keep those in lamps over the machines.
My CFL's burn out with the regularity of a typical incandescent.

[tfischer]

I'm told you can swap the ballast on most T12 fixtures to convert them to T8 without replacing the whole fixture.

[TB Roye]

Being older it is hard to find a decent bulb for reading in the table by my side of the couch. Used to use the 3 way bulbs but they are getting harder to find and to find sockets for them in lamps. I have converted some new lamp to 3 way sockets. The other they want us to replace incandescent with CFL that contain Mercury and then want us to pay to dispose of them as hazardous material, only the Government can think that way. The LED's are expensive but i have used the LED recessed light bulbs and fixtures in some remodeling projects as a way to get general lighting, but at $50 for the Bulb and Fixture it gets a little expensive. The shop and garage have the T12 tubes and shop has some old track lights with flood light bulbs in them over the benches and aimed at the drill press, band saw and router table. The shop is only 10X12 with 3 small windows and a sky light so it has plenty of light, but I have a pretty good stock of tubes that should last me a few years and at my age I don't think I will run out.

In my Den/man cave which is a spare bed room that I recently remodeled i am going to put 4 recessed LED lights in it to get some decent general lighting. The new desk and floor lamp with CFL's are crap for light out put. This house was built in the early 80's and doesn't have very much natural light as the feeling then was to keep the sun from heating up the interior to save on AC and heating cost so you need light even during the day in most rooms, boy has thinking and technology changed.

Tom

[dbhost]

I'm told you can swap the ballast on most T12 fixtures to convert them to T8 without replacing the whole fixture.

Ballast and I think bulb holders are smaller... cheaper to just buy new fixtures at least for shop lights...

[tfischer]

Ballast and I think bulb holders are smaller... cheaper to just buy new fixtures at least for shop lights...

I think the pin spacing is the same actually. But yeah if it's a cheap fixture you might want to replace it.

[dbhost]

I have 6 of these...

http://www.homedepot.com/p/Lithonia-...IGHT/203081577

At least in my local Home Depot they run for $12.97

Honestly, the big difference in shop lights between these and "good ones" is the ballast.

T8 ballasts seem to start at around $14.99. Basic T8 2 bulb 4ft T8 fixtures start at $12.99

Admittedly the $14.99 ballast is a MUCH higher quality unit though, and it is tempting to just replace the ballast if I knew for sure the bulb holder / pin ends are the same... It is a mess more labor to install, but might be worth my effort in the long run for reducing flicker, noise, and cold start issues. Although I must admit cold starting in my coastal Texas shop really isn't a problem...

[tfischer]

I lucked out when I redid my garage/shop lighting a few years back. The Menards near my work was selling out so they could tear it down and rebuild it as a bigger one. All they had left in the remaining stock was some cold-start T8 fixtures, so I bought them, knowing nothing about imminent T12 bans or efficiency or anything. Turned out to be a good choice

[Charlie R]

Do the LEDs and new style flourescent lights work in cold weather? My old flourescent shop lights don't light when its cold out so I alternated with 100 w bulbs. Hope I have enough spares.

[tfischer]

Do the LEDs and new style flourescent lights work in cold weather? My old flourescent shop lights don't light when its cold out so I alternated with 100 w bulbs. Hope I have enough spares.

LEDs will work fine in cold weather (the weak link there would be the power supply, and they tend to work well down to at least 0F)

My garage/shop usually doesn't get below 20, even if it's below zero outside. When it's that cold, they will start fine, but require a bit of warm-up before getting up to full brightness (maybe 5min). But they do work ok and don't flicker badly. These are the cold-start T8 fixtures I mentioned above.

I have a couple older cheap T12 shop light fixtures that either flicker horribly, or don't work at all, at those temps.

[woodturner]

As we all know, here in the U.S., most incandescent light bulbs have been banned,

Just a point of clarification - no bulbs have been banned in the US. That is a common misperception and the media has further exacerbated the confusion.

What the bill actually says is that bulbs must meet higher efficiency standards. Incandescent bulbs that meet the new standards are available in the box stores as well as most department stores and will remain available for the foreseeable future.

Eventually, as other bulbs such as CFLs and LEDs become more popular, consumers will stop buying the incandescents. In time, the sales volumes will likely drop to a point where it is no longer economically viable to manufacture incandescents and they may disappear from the market in the next decade or two.

[woodturner]

The other they want us to replace incandescent with CFL that contain Mercury and then want us to pay to dispose of them as hazardous material

CFLs contain very little mercury, less than thermometers and in the range of the mercury in a can of tuna. The recommended disposal method is to recycle them, but it's fine to put them in the trash - CFLs are not hazardous material.

[Stytooner]

I do not think there are any high tech replacements for infrared incandescent bulbs. May be wrong. Halogen does heat up well. I mainly use them for heat, but I know they are used for curing powder coating in some ovens, especially for large items. Banks of those bulbs are installed and by the time the conveyor holding the parts comes out of the tunnel oven, the parts are cured.

Street lights and high powered outdoor spot light may be another area that will remain available and used. Most street lights being Mercury vapor and high powered floods are generally incandescent or halogen.

I remember a little shop I had in OK. 8' x 8'. It would get so cold in there that the electric heater would not warm up. My propane heater would go out pretty quickly as well. I use 4 of the infrared lamps though and they kept that little shop toasty. And bright.

[dbhost]

I do not think there are any high tech replacements for infrared incandescent bulbs. May be wrong. Halogen does heat up well. I mainly use them for heat, but I know they are used for curing powder coating in some ovens, especially for large items. Banks of those bulbs are installed and by the time the conveyor holding the parts comes out of the tunnel oven, the parts are cured.

Street lights and high powered outdoor spot light may be another area that will remain available and used. Most street lights being Mercury vapor and high powered floods are generally incandescent or halogen.

I remember a little shop I had in OK. 8' x 8'. It would get so cold in there that the electric heater would not warm up. My propane heater would go out pretty quickly as well. I use 4 of the infrared lamps though and they kept that little shop toasty. And bright.

That cold in Oklahoma? I smell something fishy about that tale...

[tfischer]

Just a point of clarification - no bulbs have been banned in the US. That is a common misperception and the media has further exacerbated the confusion.

What the bill actually says is that bulbs must meet higher efficiency standards. Incandescent bulbs that meet the new standards are available in the box stores as well as most department stores and will remain available for the foreseeable future.

Kind of splitting hairs there. They've changed the standards such the the traditional bulbs that 99% of us used most places in the home 10 years ago are no longer able to be manufactured. Effectively 'banning' them.

An equivalent might be new energy standards that required cars to get at least 100mpg equivalent. They're not banning standard engines directly, but...

That said, I'm not necessarily against it. The "ban" has caused the price of LED bulbs to come down from over $60 per bulb to where I bought a few at the BORG for $7 and some change a few weeks ago. Now some would argue that it's still a lot more than the old style, but they will last nearly forever, and are extremely cheap to run (something like 9W for 60W of power). And they have none of the drawbacks that CFLs have like mercury and slow warm-up time.

-Tim