LED bulb: 17 Years, $50.00

"GE says the new bulb uses just 9 watts and provides a 77% energy savings while lasting 25 times as long as the 40-watt bulb it's intended to replace."

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Assume a 40-watt bulb lasts 1000 hours.

40w x 1000 = 40 kwh x $0.15/kwh = $6.00 operating cost over life of bulb.

The new bulb uses 9 watts. So for the same period,

9w x 1000 = 9 kwh x $0.15/kwh = $1.35 operating cost.
Reply to
HeyBub
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My 9w =3D40 watt Cfls from HD have a 9 yr warranty. The 9 and 13 watt Cfls cost 1.85 a 4 pack or about 2$ with tax, thats only 0.50c a piece. The HD Cfls have a 61.1 LPW rating and many LEDs are only 80 LPW rating, thats only a 20% increase for a bulb costing maybe 300% more! And the Leds ive seen are not the Warm White like your old incandesant or modern Soft White Cfls, they are near 2900 K, not the

2700K that is "Warm White'.

Ive looked at them, the Leds are non dimmable, interior grade, 300% more in cost, only 20% more efficent and basicly offfered as a Spot light , [ by Leds direct lighting design]. So what you have is limited spot light useage and a reciept you cant loose for many years.

Also that compared those only to incandesant, do a Cfl comparison in advertising and its obvious Leds dont make sence yet as a prime time, complete replacement home bulb. The Leds ive seen are rated at 80-100 Lpw , but this is actualy a Spot light configuration. you can get T8

18" tube that are rated 80-100Lpw for near 300 % less of better color rendition and some new name brand Cfls are near 70 Lpw. So again Leds are way overpriced.

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point out that with the rush to market these high priced new bulbs that 80% of the ratings you read are bull shit, I bought a Lights Of America Led, [ makers of many high quaility commercial lighting products] and found the 9w Led to be a total lie and terrible color rendition, it put out about 25% as much as a HD Cfl ! Im looking, but havnt found Leds to be usefull for anything except Can lights, and I need dimable and cant find that either, so I wait and buy HD Cfls cheap.

Reply to
ransley

You neglected to figure in the life of the LED lamp at 25,000 hours, for a savings of over $30 per lamp, and the cost of all the standard lamps you would not be replacing.

Now count how many lamps in one typical home.

Reply to
salty

Over the life of the bulb, the savings is considerable, about $116.

Right now, I'm not going to pay extra for a bulb that is going to last longer than me. They need brighter bulbs and decent color. I wonder if they've done anything about that. I did buy an LED nightlight for the bathroom. It is 4W, IIRC and bright enough. It gives a very blue light and in a blue bathroom it is kind of overkill on blue. Good enough to take a leak middle of the night, now something I'd want to live with all the time.

I imagine the price will come down over time, just as the CFL has in recent years. They went from $20 to $1 and improved the light color too.

Reply to
Ed Pawlowski

"HeyBub" wrote in news:WdKdnTo7lvI3M1zWnZ2dnUVZ snipped-for-privacy@earthlink.com:

And the difference in purchase price between the two bulbs?

My problem with the CFLs is that the amounts of money they save, over the time they save it, are exceedingly trivial. Not worth it, to me. It's not worth it to most consumers either, which is why the bulb industry nas to lobby the government to ban incandescents in order to create a market for their CFLs.

Reply to
Tegger

I use quite a few LED lamps on my sailboat, where saving electricity is a way of life. They are rapidly getting cheaper and better than even a couple of years ago. "Boats" is a relatively tiny niche market where everything tends to be far more expensive for no apparent reason. Once they have decent LED lamps for the home and commercial applications, expect quality to rise exponetially and costs to plummet. I'm looking forward to it.

Reply to
salty

In this house and for ten months of the year, especially at night when lights tend to be on and it is cool or cold, we can use the electrically generated heat of 'wasteful' non LEDs and CFLs. i.e. incandescents inside the house.

It just means our electric heaters, using hydro generated power don't cut in quite as often!

Although we use (re-used) fluorescent tube fixtures from an old school, in workshop, kitchen, garage etc. (We saved a whole bunch from going to he dump, including some reusable tubes. Some are electronic, others old style).

Where we must try an LED is in the outside porch fixture which is on most of the night; mainly for safety purposes. And also insurance purposes, if someone did happen to trip up! The heat and light from that is just wasted outdoors.

Elsewhere outside we have a couple of motion sensor lights that come on for a few minutes each time. Haven't changed the bulbs in them for quite a few years.

However for some 10 hours per night; electricity for that outside porch light (long life/rural incandescent using 50 watts per hour), for one year costs; 365 x 50 x10/1000 =3D kilowatts. Each kilowatt hour costs about 9 or 10 cents including all taxes etc. So annual cost about $18. So an LED or CFL (provided it works in cold weather without hesitation) using one third the power might be cost efficient? The existing bulbs usually last several years (last one changed earlier this year) was the second of two bought some ten to fifteen years ago. Our voltage rarely above 119 to 121 volts and probably pretty steady at night when load is lower.

Reply to
terry

I figured LED TV would soon be followed with LED lighting panels. The size of say a 4 tube fluorescent fixture. Adjustable color, last 20 years, cost $100

Jimmie

Reply to
JIMMIE

Apparently you have not done the math, or have made some mistakes:

60W equiv. 13W CFL, 8,000hr rated life, $1.58 ea (8pk) 60W incandescent, 1,000hr rated life, $0.6225 ea (8pk)

CFL cost for 8,000 hours = $1.58 Incandescent cost for 8,000 hours = $4.98

CFL savings in lamp cost alone $3.40

CFL energy cost for 8,000 hrs at 13W (104kWh) at $0.15/kWh = $15.60 Incandescent cost for 8,000 hours at 60W (480kWh) at $0.15/kWh = $72.00

CFL energy savings over 8,000 hours $56.40

Total CFL savings over 8,000 operating hours for one lamp = $59.80

Total CFL savings over the life of the 8 lamps in the package = $478.40

If we presume that the 7 yr life listed for the 8,000 hr lamp life is reasonable (it's about 3hrs/day), and the household has 8 lamps that are used regularly (pretty average), the yearly savings of the CFLs works out to $68.34 or $5.70 per month.

$5.70 per month doesn't sound like a whole lot, but considering that you save that by doing nothing but buying a different type of light bulb, and also saving yourself around 3 hours of light bulb changing time (56 extra changes x 3 minutes per change), I'd say it's entirely worthwhile.

Reply to
Pete C.

=3D=3D What's with the 8000 hr. b.s.? I've had a number of them last only about 500 hours and of course I had thrown the packaging away. Now, I write the installation date on the sleeve and file it away. Of course if you don't have the freakin receipt, you're up the creek as well. Even some from the same lot have different life-times. The ones that lasted the longest were in outside enclosed fixtures and were turned on for eight to twelve hour durations all year long. =3D=3D

Reply to
Roy

JIMMIE wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@u34g2000yqu.googlegroups.com:

How about hanging a LED TV on the wall and encasing it with window trim. Think of the great views you could have !

Reply to
TheHack

"Pete C." wrote in news:4bc1e213$0$4801$ snipped-for-privacy@unlimited.usenetmonster.com:

Last time I bought incandescents, they were 30¢ each for a pack of four.

Now that incandescents are to be phased out, prices are going up, but that's an artificial increase.

Or $2.40 for the incandescents at the price I used to be able to pay.

And your numbers get thrown wholly out of whack if a few CFLs blow before their rated lives, which I'm discovering is not an uncommon occurrence.

That's the problem; it's a trivial amount (I give up one Starbuck's latte a month and there's my $5.70 savings right there). Plus I get ugly lighting unless I buy just the right kind of bulb; I need a special kind to put upside down, a special kind for over the stove; you're not really supposed to toss them out with the trash, etc., etc....

No thanks.

Reply to
Tegger

snipped-for-privacy@u34g2000yqu.googlegroups.com:

Been Done

Jimmie

Reply to
JIMMIE

That's assuming you ever get one to last 8000 hours. I never have. I replace CFLs more often than incandescents around here

Wouldn't be too bad if you could buy decent quality CFLs - but everything today is a crap-shoot. Doesn't matter what you pay for them they are all cheap chinese crap.

Reply to
clare

I bought a Lights of America LED bulb last year. It was very dim (Probably about half the rated output), had an odd color spectrum to it that I can't quite put my finger on, and it only lasted about 2 weeks before it burned out.

LED lights aren't there yet. Maybe in a few years.

Bob

Reply to
zxcvbob

Lights of America makers of "high quality" commercial lighting products?

This outfit is on my never even think about buying again from list, because every single one of their products I have ever purchased have died an early death, and even while still alive performed less than the competition.

Caveat emptor.

Reply to
Roger Shoaf

snipped-for-privacy@snyder.on.ca wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

China is, and from what I've read always has been, the intended manufacturing location for all CFLs.

A couple of years ago, I read a newspaper article about the CFL matter. According to the article (newspaper name unremembered now), the major light-bulb makers were in possession of North American factories that were reaching the ends of their productive lives, were expensively unionized, and were in need of extensive and expensive overhaul.

The makers were reluctant to pour large amounts of new money into an old- technology product that had slim margins to begin with, so they decided to develop and promote a relatively new technology that carried much higher margins: CFLs. Since CFLs required brand-new machinery, the makers could justify new plants in places where labor was very cheap. Guess where?

How many CFLs are made in North America? I'd wager...few to none.

Since CFLs are extremely expensive compared to incandescents; often produce unattractive light; "light-off" slowly; contain mercury; have limited application, consumers were understandably reluctant to purchase them. For this reason, governments in the First World were intensively lobbied by bulb makers (among other groups; for their own reasons) to have incandescents banned.

Reply to
Tegger

None of LED light bulbs I had lasted more than 1-2 month, and that's 1-2 month of very light use. The terribly low reliability pretty much renders any cost saving calculations useless.

Yes, I had a bunch of Lights of America bulbs but other brands, too, so the reliability problem is not limited to only one bad manufacturer. Seems to me a design flaw where you have 20+ LEDs in one circuit, each going bad shuts off the entire light.

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Reply to
DA

A local place has modern TV - Plasma/LCD (watering hole).

Behind the mirrors in the rest room are televisions. Looking into the mirror, you see TV. Amazing, TV through a mirror!

Reply to
Oren

I've been buying my CFLs in the multi packs at Depot / Lowe's / Sam's / Costco for quite some time and I honestly have not had any of them that had short life spans.

I moved about 5.5 years ago, and loaded up most all the fixtures with new CFLs at that time. So far I have replaced two CFLs, both within the last couple months and both were lights that got much longer than the 3 hours per day of on time that the 7 year life expectancy is based on. Indeed these two lights probably average 8 hours per day of on time, so they both outlasted their rating by a fair margin.

As for the quality of the light, I find they are quite acceptable, and having spent some 15 years in video production I am pretty attuned to color temperature. Also as a result of that video production experience I know not to light an area with mixed color temperature sources, so the color temperature is consistent throughout my house.

I also am using the 26W killer CFLs in inexpensive clamp light fixtures for tasks that I used to use portable 500W halogen floods for. I get plenty of light, for far less power and far less heat.

Reply to
Pete C.

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