OT: lighting for shops in a cold climate

Is it true that incandescent lamps will become obsolete in the near future? If so, how will folks get light into a cold building where flourescents don't come on?

Pete Stanaitis

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Reply to
Pete S
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Stock up on torches and matches? Then make metal wall holders for them. :)

Reply to
Michael A. Terrell

Smoke and mirrors?

-- Experience is a good teacher, but she send in terrific bills. -- Minna Thomas Antrim

Reply to
Larry Jaques

Second thought:

Despite the mispelung, I grokked your meaning. How about: a bunch of light tubes, fiber optic cables with lamps at the other end, or EL tubes?

-- Experience is a good teacher, but she send in terrific bills. -- Minna Thomas Antrim

Reply to
Larry Jaques

For one option, halogen lamps will still be available. They put out lots of light.

Paul

Reply to
Paul Drahn

LED lighting is probably the long-term solution; LED's work just fine in cold environments, except for being expensive. They are efficient (eg, Wind Cave's electrical bill dropped a lot:

) and "green" (eg, NPS and/or its Xanterra contractor have installed a bunch of LED's in shops and visitor centers in Yellowstone and Yosemite, and for the Liberty Bell: ).

For fluorescents, "Cold weather ballasts that can start the lamps at temperatures below 0°F should be specified for applications where the ambient temperature is expected to be below 50°F. Cold weather electronic and magnetic ballasts can be specified for HO and VHO lamps that can start them at temperatures as low as -20°F.", per

and also see .

The 750 watts of fluorescent lighting (with ordinary magnetic ballasts) in my garage works ok at 20F; if it's much colder than that, I work somewhere else.

Reply to
James Waldby

In Europe, many of them are already illegal. This is a political decision.

Turn them on in the summer and leave them burning all winter. That way, you also get a little heat to help keep your tools rust free.

Reply to
Robert Roland

There are cold-start fluorescents for use outdoors and in cold buildings. Check with a lighting shop.

Reply to
Ed Huntress

Pete, just went through this scenario with my shop (Eastern TN). I settled on T-5 HO 6 tube fixtures, 54 watts ea, electronic ballast. Electric supplier has them in his warehouse and said there is no problem with instant start in zero degree temps. Hope this helps. Bill

Reply to
Bill

The cold starts don't work if it gets to 20 below. Now, its colder than a witches tit AND you can't see. So, I move to FL when its this cold.

Karl

Reply to
Karl Townsend

Neither do I.

I think they'll handle most situations, though. I put one of the new outdoors screw-ins in my porch light last fall, and it started just fine all winter. But it doesn't get that cold here.

Reply to
Ed Huntress

It is not entirely true. The law basically mandates that bulbs which put out light similar to current 40 watt through 100 watt have to be as efficient as halogen bulbs are now. So for cold weather you can use halogen, and in the very near future LED lamps will drop in price enough to be a no-brainer. The law still allows exception for all sorts of decorative or specialized bulbs.

Reply to
anorton

I replaced all exterior lighting with 50 W halogen flood light bulbs which work fine for me. Gerry :-)} London, Canada

Reply to
Gerald Miller

I've never had fluorescents fail to come on. The might be a bit slow, I'm using older technology with mag start ballasts and the larger tubes, I live near 45N in michigan. We occasionally get some cold weather from time to time.

Fwiw, waste heat isn't waste 6 months out of the year up here. Your mileage may differ in California where cooling is more of an HVAC issue.

Wes

Reply to
Wes

may differ in

When I operated a facility in a low heat (above freezing) facility, I found that I could initiate light by sweeping a corn broom along the tubes. Gerry :-)} London, Canada

Reply to
Gerald Miller

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If you want an extreme example of this -- wire up a PR-2 flashlight bulb (3V) to the 120 VAC line. You will get a very brief bright flash, and the bulb will turn into a mirror -- silvered on the inside by the evaporated filament.

I did this decades ago (about 1960 IIRC) and didn't have the tools which I now have. It would be interesting to see an oscilloscope trace of the flash, and to compare it to another identical filament, but in a much larger enclosure, to see whether the coating starts dimming the output before the filament totally dies.

Enjoy, DoN.

Reply to
DoN. Nichols

It snows around here, but I've never seen a driving snow storm in North Central Florida. :)

The LED traffic lights around here also generate so much RFI that AM radio is useless. Any signal from the BCB to 30 MHz is either full of noise from the switching power supplies, or below that noise floor. Reception was great during and right after the hurricanes a few years ago.

Reply to
Michael A. Terrell

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