Smucky wrote: Fri Aug 29, 2025 5:38 pm

NinjaPoodle wrote: Fri Aug 29, 2025 9:19 am

Smucky wrote: Fri Aug 29, 2025 1:26 am

"go with LEDs", you mean like these LEDs?

539155555_1867861957164531_4353463517000197457_n.jpg

It doesn't matter, you drilled holes in your antique lamps destroying them. If you would have gone with LEDs you would have to do that since they run much cooler.

I think you missed the point that most of the "bulbs" in that photo are burned out

It doesn't matter, they are still better than CFLs.

Out of ideas for content. Maybe I can record turning it off and on rapidly

I forgot there is the fluorescent tube in the HVAC unit I can record. The ballast is "programmed start" which means it should have three distinct stages of starting the lamp, pre-heating, ignition, and run. And indeed, when power is first applied, there is a good second before the lamp lights. So I would expect to see the filaments start to glow. But I don't hmmpf

Felt like since I swapped the ballast, that the new one is dimmer. Even though, best I can tell it should be brighter. Ever weirder it seemed like the lights in the other rooms were brighter when I swear this fluorescent one was brighter. I was running a $5 generic lamp and was getting tired of the crappy CRI anyway so figured I'd swap it out for one of the $20 philips ones. And whoa, yea way brighter and way better CRI. Check out the spectrum, wasn't expecting to see yellow
And now my yellow fluke meter is yellow, unlike last time
Strangely the old bulb was growing a black dot on the inside, maybe from turning it off and on a bunch that one time
Before the swap, I did try to at least get some numbers to determine the "brightness". Best I could come up with was to use a small 1 volt solar panel. It reads 1.25 volts in full sun.

The highest I could get it to read with the old lamp was 1.040 volts, at the center of the lamp shade read .950. And the highest I could get using a nearby wall to reflect the light was .381 volts. The new lamp has 1.060, 1.018, and .402 for the same locations.

I'll try to compare numbers after a month or so, hopefully the brightness doesn't fade.

Wife informed me that the bathroom light isn't working. Was shocked to see it was a single CFL
It is a Philips mini twister 23w 100w equivalent.
I have no idea where it even came from which means I probably bought it when I first got married 10+ years ago. Seems pretty high quality, not even burnt looking.

This time by LED.

NinjaPoodle wrote: Sun Oct 05, 2025 8:02 pm This time by LED.

Unfortunately.
I would buy more CFLs but it is always so hit and miss whether they will last more than a couple of years. The day light colored ones I would usually get for the bathrooms would strangely always seem to last for many years though. Case in point here.

About 900 lumen, 2700K is "normal". That corresponds to a 60W classical incandescent light bulb. The problem is different brands have a different light distribution so you need a lamp that has solved this.

Last batch of gifs (I promise). These are with the new ballast and new philips bulbs. There is no blue flash at start up, and the start-up it self seems to take longer, about 350ms vs 250ms. Strange how changing a bulb would change that
I was going to buy a cheap chinese oscilloscope for $20 or so and then look at the different waveforms during start-up and run time. And was looking at schematics and stuff of electronic ballasts for a couple of weeks or so and was debating on trying to build one. But then I suddenly switched to looking at porn instead for a week and sort of lost my place with the project and then now I've completely lost interest

since you are nerding out on CFLs, you should get one of these watches.

I totally forgot about this thread. I should update it some more

I've enjoyed taking slo-mo videos of LED christmas "lights" this year. This tree always had an annoying slight flicker. A slo-mo video shows it to be quite the disco
We need fluorescent christmas lights

heh, even looks like the overhead "fluorescent" tube light is a crappy LED.

Smucky wrote: Mon Dec 29, 2025 11:17 pm heh, even looks like the overhead "fluorescent" tube light is a crappy LED.

pwned

Someone please call the EPA on me when I need to dispose of a lamp

No more CFLs for you Smucky, ever.

Smucky, in 2 months I will come home to you in order to ensure you have disposed all the CFLs you own in a responsible manner.

Until then I expect you have fully converted to LEDs.

Smucky wrote: Thu Sep 04, 2025 11:36 pm
Before the swap, I did try to at least get some numbers to determine the "brightness". Best I could come up with was to use a small 1 volt solar panel. It reads 1.25 volts in full sun.

The highest I could get it to read with the old lamp was 1.040 volts, at the center of the lamp shade read .950. And the highest I could get using a nearby wall to reflect the light was .381 volts. The new lamp has 1.060, 1.018, and .402 for the same locations.

I'll try to compare numbers after a month or so, hopefully the brightness doesn't fade.

So lamp has about 1200 hours on it or so (at least) now. It is noticeably dimmer. But still brighter than the led lamps in the other room, but not by much.

Old and new solar readings:

1.060 -> 1.050
1.018 -> 1.004
0.402 -> 0.384

Strangely at the start of winter, I was getting higher values than the first ones I posted. Figured it was due to colder air temps and thus colder bulb temps. But all through winter the values kept dropping
Guess I'll report back in a few months

Good, you should throw away the CFLs because of the inconsistent performance.

Smucky wrote: Wed Mar 18, 2026 10:08 pm
Old and new solar readings:

1.060 -> 1.050
1.018 -> 1.004
0.402 -> 0.384

And now:

1.060 -> 1.050 -> 1.051
1.018 -> 1.004 -> 1.004
0.402 -> 0.384 -> 0.360

(very) rough estimate of 2,400 hours of on time