To all the Lighting professionals out there. How to seal the deal?

[AnthonyZ]

Thanks, Opie, I'm feeling better now but I'm ALWAYS grumpy. It's just how I'm made...

Good stuff, though, Opie. I needed the laugh. Lutron's BURST training (while I did actually enjoy the bulk of it) is rife with BS of the highest order. Thankfully, when I attended, the presenter was a super hot, spunky little thing. She kept my attention throughout.

 

[opie]

Man I didn't mean to open a can of worms!!

No worries, Anthony speaks his mind and I respect that.

I typed the above reply before I saw the last post from Anthony.

 

[Steve]

Steve, studies have shown conclusively that vastly more mercury is released by the burning of coal to power incandescents than the CFL's will ever present. That argument doesn't hold water. I was a long time CFL antagonist until I did my research on the whole picture. CFL's are not nearly as toxic as incandescents in the grand scheme of things.

Well, I never said that only CFL's were an issue. Regular fluorescent sticks also are. And, if power plants are built right they can handle mercury in an environmentally safer way. And you still burn the same coal to power CFL's, just not as much. Problem is CFL's and other fluorescent wind up in regular garbage cans which wind up in dumps and don't get handled properly. And you still have the potential direct hazard from a broken bulb. As the parent of a special needs child with heavy metal toxicity, I have done my research for over 5 years. I don't really want to debate it but the bottom line is this world can do much better without CFLs or any technology that uses heavy metals.

 

[elcano]

... they don't last as long as advertised, are a poor choice where you need light quickly for a short period of time (especially in cold places)and really don't dim well if at all. Incandescents will be around long enough to get us to the better solution which are dimmable LED's.

Hi Bryan, I also have some partial disagreement with the statement above. My contention is that there is no universal better solution. Better for what? It depends. On cool areas where you need direction or spot lightning, yes LEDs will be the best solution one the economies of scale reduce their price. However LEDs are extremely sensitive to heat and are not good for enclosed fixtures with no ventilation. And their directional nature needs to be fixed to make them work on other places, like inside of a refrigerator (cool, but you want broad lightning),

On the other hand, I have been using CFL without major problems for years. The durability issue depends on the brand (quality depends on the brand, generally, doesn´t it?). The first CFLs that I saw in my life lasted about 20 years of very continuous use. However, some other cheap brands dont last even a year.

About lightning for a short period, I have never have seen that issue, but I concede that my situation is not typical for those living in the high latitudes. I live in the tropics and the warm temperature is favorable for the quick start-up in CFL.

I extemely happy with the savings that have achieved using CFLs in the exterior, common areas (living, family, dining, kitchen and bathrooms). However, I keep every single bedroom on incandescent with dimmer. On my opinion, dimmer+incandescent continue to be the best solution for bedrooms. The savings are not worth the inconvenience of not being able to dim, and not being able to use my preferred reading-optimized light.

So, the point is that there is no universal best solution. If God saves us from the politicians, we will continue using incandescent and CFL, and also will find a place where LEDs will happen to be the best alternative.

 

[Fiasco]

That article explains it pretty well, a halogen is pretty much an incandescent with just a few tweaks. They are not any more energy efficient although they do give slightly more lumens per watt. But, 75 watts is 75 watts. All that said, I use only halogens in all my recessed fixtures (75W PAR30). My switches turn them on to 50% as standard which is usally plenty of light for standard activity. They can easily be raised for reading or whatever. I hate CFL's and I will stick with halogens until LEDs are a little better available and affordable since I need alot of them. But I'm also in the camp that LEDs are the future and while CFLs do have their place, they generally suck with major cons being mercury and dimming. It absolutely amazes me how CFLs are touted as being the 'green' answer but in reality they just change one problem for another. Yea, lets save some energy but at the same time contribute to the worlds toxicity and hazardous waste disposal issues, not to mention possible health affects from exposure to broken bulbs.

One factor often not considered in the "light bulb is more efficient" argument is heat. A 75 watt halogen bulb will consume more electricity then a 75 watt incadescent bulb when you factor in HVAC.

I am not a fan of CFL's. Color Temp on CFL's is considerably better then it used to be but still not on par with incadescent. CFL's can't be dimmed. I'm sure someone will chime in and say they can but I don't consider unreliable dimming as real dimming. You can take two identical "dimmable" CFL's and put them on the same dimmed switch leg and odds are that they will not dim uniformly, have the same dimming range or drop out at the same bottem end dimmer settings.

Don't get me wrong, they have their place, but as a whole house bulb replacement definately not.

It's cheaper, provides better lighting control and a more "natural" light to keep the incadescents and swap out switches w/ dimmers.

 

[pete_c]

I am curious too how the various powerline/RF switches are dealing with the new technology. Personally don't like CCFL's but have switched over unfinished basement to CCFL's. Tried dimmable CCFL's for outside lighting and it didn't work for me. Not wanting to spend on new LED lighting yet.

I've only read rumors about California big box stores starting to remove all of their incandescents from their shelves and wondering about that right now?