Flourescent Lights

[GasSavers_Diemaster]

Originally Posted by Matt Timion

Diemaster replaced all of his lights (except for the headlights) with LED arrays.

no i replaced all the lights in helga with floresents and in the house there LED..... or is it the other way around.

[jolt-tsp]

I'm having a house built and will be installing wiring to the roof. The idea is to use relatively cheap solar panels for lighting only. I will have the standard AC system with a mix of flouros and halos, but also a DC system with LEDS. The DC system would be the primary lighting except in bathrooms/closets, where people are so used to yellow light, that in white/green/blue light they would pick horribly matching outfits. I will probably also put a few random outlets later for plugging in DC fans, cell phone and laptop charger, etc.

One thing that is hard to remember is that you're trying to save money, not spend it on cool experiments

Oh, Wind mills are also a good and surprisingly cheap form of DC power

[Silveredwings]

I've changed a few of my lights with flourescents. There are surprisingly many places where I can't:
- fixtures that need candelabra or clear-globe bulbs
- lights that are on a dimmer (won't work with flourescents, may hurt them).
- flood lights
- ceiling 'can' lights that take a spot light halo

Also, they get a little getting used to: when you turn them on there is a short pause before they actually turn on. Not a big deal.

[DracoFelis]

Originally Posted by Silveredwings

I've changed a few of my lights with flourescents.

FWIW so have I.

Originally Posted by Silveredwings

There are surprisingly many places where I can't:
- fixtures that need candelabra or clear-globe bulbs

You are mistaking on that one. There are smaller base compact florescent out there that fit some candelabra sockets.

And while not a florescent option, you can now get energy efficient 110 volt LED lights for some small "spot lighting" (including candelabra socket) needs. For example, check these LED products out:
http://www.superbrightleds.com/edison.html

Originally Posted by Silveredwings

- lights that are on a dimmer (won't work with flourescents, may hurt them).

True of most florescent bulbs, but not all.

There is at least one compact florescent maker (if memory serves correctly, I think it may be Phillips) that makes a bulb designed to be dimable (i.e. designed to be used on a house dimmer circuit). I know, as I have one of them in the house. They cost a little more than most compact florescent (I think they are a little over $20 each), but they do work...

Originally Posted by Silveredwings

- flood lights

Again, you haven't been looking hard enough.

Compact florescent bulbs designed to directly replace "flood lights" are common (but again, not as common as the ones designed to be used in a house lamp). They have the same shape as a flood light, but use cheap/lightweight mirrors to get the flood light directional effect.

Originally Posted by Silveredwings

- ceiling 'can' lights that take a spot light halo

Correct. Those special halogen bulbs do not have a direct florescent replacement. However, often the entire fixture can be replaced with a florescent one...

Originally Posted by Silveredwings

Also, they get a little getting used to: when you turn them on there is a short pause before they actually turn on. Not a big deal.

True.

Also keep in mind that light tint/color does vary with the florescent used. If you prefer a more "natural" color (vs the slightly blue/green tint that some hate) than consider getting either a "warm white" or a "natural daylight" tint. Yes, the "cool white" is cheaper (and uses less energy), but it is not as natural looking as some of the other florescent tints! And even the less energy efficient florescent tints are still a lot more energy efficient than normal incandescent bulbs.

[DracoFelis]

Originally Posted by rh77

On my old Si, I had LED turn signals on the front -- kinda cool (only drawback, at the time, the LED array for each "bulb" didn't draw enough power to convince the blinker system that a bulb wasn't out, so it blinked super-fast 'n furious style

Replace the flasher with an electronic one that allows lower current draw, and this problem will go away (and you will get both the "instant on" advantage of the LEDs, and the power savings as well). The replacement flasher for my Honda CRX cost me around $13 from http://www.superbrightleds.com

Originally Posted by rh77

would've liked to have had LED brakes, tails and signals, but the tech at the time didn't allow it. I wonder if it's possible now...

Oh yes! I do that on my Honda CRX, and (since I don't cheap out and buy the dimmer/cheaper LED options)
most of the LED lights I use are brighter than the stock bulbs. See my thread here:
http://www.gassavers.org/showthread.php?t=1558

BTW: The main lights I still have to convert are in the dash. Because after converting all the exterior lights (except for the headlights, and my broken "fog lights") to bright LEDs, the dash is now my biggest power user when I choose to turn on my "running lights" to make the car more visible to other drivers (in my car, my "running lights" are everything that goes on with the headlights, except for the headlights themselves).

NOTE: There really aren't too many legal options to save power on headlights, other than to turn them off when not needed. At first it might seem that HID (High Intensity Discharge; or fancy arc-lamps) lights would be an option, as they are brighter than normal headlights and use less power. However, HID conversions are costly (often several hundred dollars), and I've heard that (while OEM installed HID can be legal in the USA) "after market" HID conversions aren't "street legal" in the USA. And I really haven't heard of any other "street legal" headlight either.

BTW: While you can't really save any power on headlights (given the legal requirements of the USA), you can get about 20% more light (for the same power), by very carefully looking at the specs of the halogen headlights on the market. A very few of those bulbs use more fancy halogen gasses (most notably xenon), and therefore produce slightly more light for the same number of watts of power. However, you have to look carefully at the watts and lumens for the bulb (info sometimes surprisingly hard to get), because many bulbs that produce the same light (or even worse than average) seem to imply (in their marketing) that they are better (even when they are just costly junk)...

[eivad1]

i changed all my lights n the house and with adding everything up i saved over 1000 wts

[GasSavers_DaX]

I'm phasing all my incandescents out with CF's, but it's a slow process. I think we'll keep incandescents in the bathroom vanity though.

[cfg83]

DaX -

Originally Posted by DaX

I'm phasing all my incandescents out with CF's, but it's a slow process. I think we'll keep incandescents in the bathroom vanity though.

Us too. My wife just said "you can have some interesting makeup applications" otherwise. The risk of CF in her words is "looking like you're from Kabuki theatre".

CarloSW2

[trebuchet03]

Originally Posted by cfg83

DaX -



Us too. My wife just said "you can have some interesting makeup applications" otherwise. The risk of CF in her words is "looking like you're from Kabuki theatre".

CarloSW2

Haha - I unscrewed all the incandescents in my bathroom - and replaced one center one with a CF :P I don't do makeup, and how much light does one really need to take a shower :P But, I have my own bathroom - that probably wouldn't fly with the other half :P

I replaced all but one of my incandescents. I bought my bulbs impulsively (because of price) and forgot to check the color temperature! So it has taken some getting used to :P

[GasSavers_DaX]

Originally Posted by trebuchet03

I replaced all but one of my incandescents. I bought my bulbs impulsively (because of price) and forgot to check the color temperature! So it has taken some getting used to :P

I knew nothing about color temperature until now - just been reading some Wiki articles on it (CFL and color temperature). I have no idea what I'm using in my house at the moment.

So am I right in assuming an ideal color temperature is between about 4700K and 7200K? Is there a downside to using a more "white" and less "yellow" bulb? More energy consumption?