Goodbye, T12

[Steevo]

I had a ballast go bad in a fluorescent fixture in the closet of my house this morning. It is a 4-bulb-T12 fixture, and I know they are going the way of the dinosaur, but I thought maybe I could find a ballast at Lowes.
I stopped at Lowes on the way to work, and found almost no T12 ballasts at all, other than a couple of 277 volt models, and one 2-bulb 120v unit.
In case you are wondering if these are really dead, the answer is yes.
Stock is dwindling and whatever they have is the last available.

I bought a T8 ballast and four new bulbs, and swapped it out. It killed me, because we just listed this house for sale, and I hate buying stuff for it now.

 

[cowboyjosh]

Going to be allot of schools, government buildings, and retail stores that are going to have to retrofit to T-8's in the near future. This has been in the works for sometime, and many POCO's had rebates and incentives in the recent past as a incentive to upgrade before T-12s became completely obsolete.

 

[FluxCore]

I won't miss them.

Quality T8 ballasts are way down in price now-a-days. They are safer, produce less heat, no hum, instant on, work in low temps, and the bulbs are also cheap now.

 

[nwav8tor]

I had a ballast go bad in a fluorescent fixture in the closet of my house this morning. It is a 4-bulb-T12 fixture, and I know they are going the way of the dinosaur,...

Must be a tiny closet if all it takes is a T-12 4-bulb unit to light it up

 

[Executive]

I won't miss them.

Quality T8 ballasts are way down in price now-a-days. They are safer, produce less heat, no hum, instant on, work in low temps, and the bulbs are also cheap now.

Ever wonder why magnetic ballasts for fluorescent lamps hum?

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Because they don't know the words.

Chris

 

[Gary S]

Going to be allot of schools, government buildings, and retail stores that are going to have to retrofit to T-8's in the near future. This has been in the works for sometime, and many POCO's had rebates and incentives in the recent past as a incentive to upgrade before T-12s became completely obsolete.

I believe the Federal buildings are already converted due to the regulations leading up to the phaseout. This has been in the works for years, so many State and Local government buildings were also likely converted to T8 in the past few years.

 

[eljefino]

Now that I'm a lighting nerd I've noticed that retail is 99% T8 or "better" now.

Just run down stuff like a sad hardware store running a mix of T12 and T8, and an external roofed sidewalk outside of Goodwill at a strip mall running rusty ancient 8 foot T12s.

A new walmart has more skylights and is using single tube T8s waay up there to save energy/money.

My closet has a single two foot T12 on the inside doorframe. (Easy to not notice!) I put it on one of those wind-up timer switches after the wife left it on too many times.

 

[rlitman]

Most newer large retail stores I've noticed have T5-HO, mounted way high up. Those suckers are bright, but when the ceiling is lower than "warehouse" height, they have too much glare.
Anyway, retail stores are more concerned about bright light than just about anybody else.

I have the same observations when it comes to T12. Just some sad forgotten about installations are left.

My local school district switched to T8 in the 1990's. Supposedly the power savings were so great that the break-even point was within months of the last fixture being installed.

It is because of a total lack of foresight that places still have T12 installed in bulk. The NYC schools (who are paying just as much for power as schools on Long Island) have been sued because of PCB exposure from leaking T12 fixtures, and yet are still slow to adopt T8, because of the upfront costs. And yet these government agencies that can so easily float a bond, have it payed off in a couple of years of power savings, and reap the rewards from then on, just don't get it. So sad.

 

[eljefino]

... but if they spend the money on teachers lounges etc there might be a department of energy grant around the corner next year and putting T8s in will be "shovel ready".

Our local high school was built with a huge bond then suddenly when it was done they noticed they "forgot" the required fire sprinkler system.

 

[Falcon67]

Going to be allot of schools, government buildings, and retail stores that are going to have to retrofit to T-8's in the near future. This has been in the works for sometime, and many POCO's had rebates and incentives in the recent past as a incentive to upgrade before T-12s became completely obsolete.

They did our floor (top floor) of our building last year. 4 weeks to remove a zillion 4' single bulb mag ballast units, the "ice cube tray" ceiling from the 50s and replace it all with T8 troffers and a drop ceiling. No more industrial low frequency humm in the mornings when we flip on the lights while the ballasts warm up (real bad in winter), instant on bright light, floor is MUCH cooler in air temp and nobody has come around to replace a ballast or a bulb since the install. This year it was $60K worth of roof - total strip with new 2" foam board, tar and rocks. After 14 years, not sweating in my office on summer afternoons.

 

[skeletonizer]

Ever wonder why magnetic ballasts for fluorescent lamps hum?

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Because they don't know the words.

Chris