CFL Discoloration

[patlaw]

The CFL in the photo below still works, but take a look at the discoloration around the base. I'm not convinced that this bulb is safe. Quite a few of my bulbs have this same discoloration. What do you think?

In my experience, CFLs are MUCH more expensive to buy and maintain than incandescent bulbs. They may burn less energy, but the cost to purchase them eviscerates the potential cost savings. Plus, I have a bunch of CFLs that need to be discarded, and I don't know where to discard them.

CFLs are probably a stop gap between incandescent and LED lighting.

 

[Gary S]

I've seen discolored CFLs like that lots of times and have never heard of them causing any dangerous situations. I just run them until they fail to light. Maybe I should say that I plan to run them until they fail, because I've been using them for only 8 years and none have failed yet. They definitely save me a lot on my electric bill.

I have 7 outdoor florescent lights lighting my property. I did the calculations this week. Each 26 watt lamp out there saves me about $140 in electricity during the life of the lamp (bulb cost for my outdoor replacement bulbs is $8, compared to about $2-3 for incandescent) The $140 savings definitely outweighs the Additional $5 of the bulb. Mine are on photocells so they average 12 hours a day, 365 days a year. They are rated at 20,000 hours, and they last 5 years for me, which just happens to add up to about 20,000 hours.

My indoor lights get far fewer hours on them, so even at 8 years, none have failed yet. I can buy them for under $2 a bulb, so they definitely are cost effective.

If you don't like them, don't use them. Incandescent puts out weak and spotty light compared to florescent, and it consumes 5 times the electricity.
LED runs cheaper than florescent, but LED is like going back to the time before electricity. It isn't ready for real world use.

 

[ddawg16]

Patlaw....not sure why you think they are so expensive to buy and maintain? What is to maintain?

I think the average CFL is in the $2 or less bulb range....Incandescents are running around $0.50 and more....

Average 'stated' life of a typical incandescent is about 700 hours...CFL's around 10K hours. That means you typically end up buying 10 or more incandescents to one CFL......excluding electricity, that is at least a $3 savings....toss in the fact that the CFL uses 1/5 the juice....not hard to decide.....

The discoloration is normal....

BTW....I had my first CFL fail a couple of weeks ago....Not sure how old it is.....5-6 years would be conservative...

 

[travisd]

Did that bulb, by any chance, come out of a recessed "can" fixture? If so, many of the CFL's are not rated for such use...

 

[Charles (in GA)]

I've had two or three CF's fail. I leave one light near the kitchen entrance (inside) on 24/7 and a couple of times I've come home from work in the afternoon and smelled something burning. Eventually I figured out the light wasn't working and found that the burning smell was coming from the base of the bulb, electronics in the "ballast" I suppose. No fire, but it did concern me. I now change out the bulb every year or so to prevent this. The bulbs that failed each lasted about two years.

Charles

 

[ddawg16]

I've had two or three CF's fail. I leave one light near the kitchen entrance (inside) on 24/7 and a couple of times I've come home from work in the afternoon and smelled something burning. Eventually I figured out the light wasn't working and found that the burning smell was coming from the base of the bulb, electronics in the "ballast" I suppose. No fire, but it did concern me. I now change out the bulb every year or so to prevent this. The bulbs that failed each lasted about two years.

Charles

24/7? That works out to about 8736 hours a year, give or take a couple of seconds. If you get 1 year and 2 weeks then you are getting the stated life out of that bulb.....

 

[Charles (in GA)]

24/7? That works out to about 8736 hours a year, give or take a couple of seconds. If you get 1 year and 2 weeks then you are getting the stated life out of that bulb.....

Its not so much the failure, but the burning smell and the cooked bulb electronics/ballast housing that bothered me.

The new ones all seem to have a 10K hr life. The older ones all seemed to say "last 7 years under average use" and then define average use in the fine print to mean 8 hrs a day. I think they figured out that these things don't last as long at they originally thought.

Charles

 

[thdewey]

As I stated on the LED thread, I've had premature CFL bulb failures when they were placed in an enclosed hallway light fixture. Some new ones state on the box "for CFL use". I guess these new fixtures allow for some air flow to 'cool' the electronics on the CFL. I haven't had any problems since I swapped fixtures.

 

[tfi racing]

The discolouration is just normal aging,continue to use it until it quits.As for disposal,just huck'em in the trash like everyone does and is not supposed to and let someone in the future reap the consequences as we do now with the mess from what previous generations threw away,or seriously, Home Depot and most big box stores have disposal boxes for these bulbs and rechargeable batteries.