Thread: Light Bulb Quality

yes, a lot of those wonderful light bulbs are badly made

as you say, get them tested

even then, they often fail after a short while. Those that don't last for ages!

Originally Posted by DrAndy

yes, a lot of those wonderful light bulbs are badly made

as you say, get them tested

even then, they often fail after a short while. Those that don't last for ages!

Ain't that the truth! We have a 23 watter up on a light pole that is on every night. I'd like to know what brand that was but it's too high up on the pole to get at easily.

i think the problem is when they do this with the bulbs.

the slightest change in moving the lamp, maybe in the electricty circuit(?), finishes them off... its completely disgusting, really...

i had one EXPLODING with a fairly loud bang... there was nothing left than the socket and a little glass around.. of course i couldnt remove this socket from the lamp neither... geez, really...

whats the problem with having some electrictiy lines, which actually work normally, and make some bulbs as other people in the world do too?

Originally Posted by thailazer

Panasonic is not going to be my brand of choice anymore.

Not just Panasonic are crap. I only buy Eva these days. A bit more expensive but far better made. Except where I have dimmers, I get Eva, soft white florescent. Very good without the harsh white light.

Originally Posted by thailazer

Finishing up really the last project on the house build putting up teak light boxes above some photos. Feeling pretty good until I went to light them up. Of the five Panasonic 8 watt screw-in soft warm fluorescent bulbs I bought, one was a dead short that kicked off the 10 amp circuit breaker and another one was arcing inside its base making loud angry popping noises. (Noises like...."I'm gonna 'splode right in yo face.") Okay.... two fails out of five bulbs makes a 40% DOA rate. Now I see why they have those 1900's style light testing fixtures at the stores, and my bad for not having the cute sales girl do her job. Tomorrow will see how the local hardware yard's return policy is. Not holding my breath......But Panasonic is not going to be my brand of choice anymore.

When you screwed them in? Was it clean?

The transformers are high voltage... Where do you live? The bugs could be doing this.

Also be careful! your house could be in danger.

Well, no bugs. They were brand new bulbs out of the box going into brand new sockets. Not an application problem for sure. Good news is that the hardware yard was open today so I took them in and they replaced them without question, and tested the replacements. Tonight the wife and I will be having some red wine with the soft warm glow coming off the teak light boxes. The house is done.

Norton, I'll look for the Evas and give them a shot.

save a glass for me

have a nice evening

Only way to go these days is L.E.D.

More expensive to buy but will last forever and use a shit load less power.

I'm in Bali at the moment and have just bought a shit load to take home at 50% less than the price in Perth.

Originally Posted by thailazer

Norton, I'll look for the Evas and give them a shot

Correction. Eve rather than Eva. Florescent are called "warm white".

Originally Posted by terry57

Only way to go these days is L.E.D.

buying them in bkk for 180bt for bulb and fitting. 1.2w for the dim vibe and 2-3w for brightness. either way, nicer light and big savings on the leccy bill

LEDs are fine where you just need a bit of light or spot illumination, but not good for general room lighting. I bought 6 different kinds of LEDs when we were building and none of them fit the bill for what we needed. Also, lighting is not a big factor in electrical cost as an 8 watt florescent bulb on all month costs about 20 baht. I thought I was going to go all jihad with LEDs on the build but in the end it just didn't make sense on our project although it might on others.

Originally Posted by alitongkat

i had one EXPLODING with a fairly loud bang... there was nothing left than the socket and a little glass around.. of course i couldnt remove this socket from the lamp neither... geez, really...

It sounds silly, but you can use half a potato to remove a broken light socket if you don't have proper tools- just push the meat of the potato onto it and twist it to the left (after unplugging the lamp or tripping the breaker, of course).

I also find-out, that the light bulbs has often to be replaced. I assume, that this is a combination of quality, tropical climate and electrical installations and public net.

In my house, I have bulbs I have to replace often, others seems to last long. I assume that the hot-humid climate reduce the life of the bulbs. Also also think that the current/voltage variations are also a reason for short life.

I also have some places where the long FL lamps don't last long.

Currently I am trying the Lamptan "Extra Warm White" 9W bulbs. They give a quite bright but soft light.

I also have installed some LED lights. But here I also had several (very expensive!) failures after a short time.