Re: Cost of electricity for light dimmer

phil-news-nospam_at_ipal.net
Date: 10/27/04 

Date: 27 Oct 2004 19:56:10 GMT

In alt.engineering.electrical Sylvia Else <sylvia@not.at.this.address> wrote:

| This in particular is why you shouldn't use dimmers with lamps that are
| mounted so that the filament is above the socket. When such lamps burn
| out it is not uncommon for a broken piece of filament to fall and
| briefly short across the two thick wires that feed the ends of the filament.

I had one bulb do that in a non-brief way, once. The filament shorted
in such a way that it had about 75% if it's length still working. It
got brighter (in theory, from 60 watts to 80 watts if that estimate of
filament length was correct. The nice thing was the light now looked
a lot more "white". Unfortunately it gave out about a week later.

Someone once suggested getting 100 volt (because that is their nominal
voltage) light bulbs intended for the Japanese domestic market. That
would get a brighter whiter light. Just be sure to get a lot of them
as you will be changing bulbs more frequently. A 60 watt 100 volt bulb
run on 120 volts will be dissipating about 86 watts (NOT figuring in the
change of resistance due to the change of heat). Which could be used in
place of a 100 watt bulb. Power usage goes up. Light output goes up even
more. Bulb replacement goes up, too.

Other people prefer bulbs rated for 130 volts so they don't have to change
them so often. In hard to reach places that's definitely a plus. 

-- 
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
| Phil Howard KA9WGN       | http://linuxhomepage.com/      http://ham.org/ |
| (first name) at ipal.net | http://phil.ipal.org/   http://ka9wgn.ham.org/ |
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Cost of electricity for light dimmer
    ... | mounted so that the filament is above the socket. ... I had one bulb do that in a non-brief way, ... from 60 watts to 80 watts if that estimate of ... Someone once suggested getting 100 volt (because that is their nominal ...
    (sci.electronics.components)
  • Re: Bleeder Resistor Value & Wattage
    ... regular 240 volt 100 watt light bulb tests at around 42 ohms. ... Whatever's handy - probably a couple of hundred ohms. ... I'll just use a clear bulb, so the filament is easily visible. ...
    (sci.electronics.basics)
  • Re: Toyota developing solar powered green car
    ... will be powered solely by solar energy in an effort to turn around ... filament burned out immediately. ... Is it a combination of nitrogen and argon? ... The glass envelope of an incandescent bulb can't contain air because ...
    (alt.autos.toyota)
  • Re: Filaments ..Wave break
    ... You can say with certainty if a bulb was ... filament and would not have a significant wave shape from manufacture. ... Incandescent lamps designed for high vibration environments, ... This means that tungsten at the operating temperature is ...
    (sci.engr.lighting)
  • Re: Filaments ..Wave break
    ... You can say with certainty if a bulb was ... filament and would not have a significant wave shape from manufacture. ... Incandescent lamps designed for high vibration environments, ... This means that tungsten at the operating temperature is ...
    (sci.engr.lighting)
Quantcast