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The Great Lightbulb Conspiracy (2014)
- zkldi 2y ago[...] You've heard of the Kirghiz Light? well that's the ass end of a firefly compared to what we're gonna—oh, you haven't heard of the—oh, well, too bad. [...]
- tetris11 2y agoIt's about six days ride if you're hauling ass
- Animats 2y agoIs there a similar conspiracy today for LED lightbulbs? They should be lasting 10,000 to 20,000 hours, but they don't.
- Izkata 2y agoIIRC this is because those estimates are for the part that actually emits light, but the electronics in the base that control it are what fail faster.
- thrtythreeforty 2y agoAs a consumer, I don't give a shit - it's false advertising. I have taken to writing the installation date on the bulb body in Sharpie; I suspect I won't be able to force manufacturers to honor their claimed lifetime, but perhaps I'll get a free box of bulbs after a blog post about it goes viral.
- imp0cat 2y agoIf your LED bulbs do not last, I think your light fixtures might be to blame for that. They need to be "airy" to provide adequate cooling.
- Astronaut3315 2y agoAdding more LEDs to the design allows them to be underdriven, increasing efficiency and longevity. The driver board and LEDs run cooler that way. Less heat equals less stress on electrolytic capacitors, a common failure point. There’s only a few bulbs I’m aware of that follow this pattern. The Philips Dubai Lamp takes this to an extreme. A 60W equivalent uses only 3W. Other 60W eq. LEDs tend to be ~3x that. All that heat has to go somewhere. I just picked up a 40W eq. bulb from IKEA that has double the normal amount of LED strands- they’re unusually long, too. It also uses about half the power of the LED bulb it replaced. I expect it to last quite a long time.
- jchw 2y agoI would love to know why this is apparently being downvoted, as far as I know it's true. A lot of cheap LED bulbs use few LEDs being grilled at relatively high current and definitely get hot enough to impact the lifespan of the LEDs. Am I missing something?
- Astronaut3315 2y agoMy initial reply was a bit rough around the edges. I've since edited it for clarity.
- jchw 2y agoAhhh I see. I know it's discouraged to discuss voting for good reason, but I was definitely perplexed. That makes a lot more sense.
- ssl-3 2y agoSomeone thinks your comment is worthy of down voting, but you're absolutely correct. Heat is a primary killer of many electronic things, including LED bulbs and their constituent parts. And LEDs -- the diodes themselves -- do tend to become more efficient (in terms of lumens produced per Watt of input) when not pushed to their extreme operational limits. And it is definitely possible to create a longer-lasting, more-efficient LED bulb. It's absolutely trivial to do this, even: To start, just add more LEDs, reduce their individual RMS current, improve heat sinking and dissipation, and use better capacitors. But it does cost more to do these things, and regular consumer products are all built down to a price.
- dredmorbius 2y agoI've seen a few failures, most of which seem to involve electronics. A set of reflector spots (replacing 45W halogen bulbs) all in recessed ceiling fixutres in one specific location within the house failed within a few months of one another. Another spot in the kitchen, in an exposed can, failed within a year or so. It was located directly over the sink. I suspect moisture / condensation as issues in both, as the ceiling cans have minimal insulation between them and the roof, and the kitchen fitting would be exposed to steam / vapour coming off the sink. Other than that, a couple of stick-style closet bulbs have failed, also apparently electronics. And one fixture in the garage which seems to have been physically struck. That's over roughly a decade's experience and roughly 30 bulbs / fixtures. Far better than incandescent or even CF bulbs. Though still not quite meeting expectations.
- stephen_g 2y agoI have a bulb in my bathroom that I have had to replace every year or two. Meanwhile, in other rooms that I have renovated and I put good quality high-CRI LED downlights in, they're all still going strong after seven years. I think the biggest difference is that these downlights have separate driver modules and a short wire to the lamp itself, which must make the thermal aspect a lot easier to manage. This also puts the electronics up out of the condensation. The bulb in a regular socket in the bathroom on the other hand has the driver electronics there in the bulb, being heated by the lamps, so they're getting a lot hotter, and also it's there in the steam from the shower etc.
- dredmorbius 2y agoIs that fixture in or near the evacuation fan or not? I'd suspect that in/near the fan might reduce condensation / humidity. Lavatory moisture is no joke.
- vundercind 2y agoHad similar issues with CFLs, when those were A Thing. “Oh they last sooooo long! Don’t worry, they’re expensive but they’re actually cheaper than incandescent because they last so long and use so little power!” Shitty light, and they consistently averaged a shorter lifespan than cheap incandescents across two houses. Nope. Done with that tech forever.
- cyberax 2y agoI still have CFLs in my bathroom. The plastic in the plug has faded from white to yellow. Yet they still work fine, although it takes them 3-5 seconds to get to full brightness.
- gowld 2y agoBut you get free mercury vapor when they shatter, which is priceless.
- SoftTalker 2y agoYep, same. I replace CFLs and now LEDs about as often as I used to replace incandescents. On the upside they put out less heat. On the downside they cost 10X or more what an incandescent did, making the payoff in electrical energy savings suspect at best, and the quality of the light is worse (subjective).
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- rootusrootus 2y agoEarly ones for sure, but I've noticed steady improvements. And I've only ever had problems with fairly inexpensive bulbs. I have a house full of Cree retrofit cans which have been 100% reliable for years now. My guess is that is partly because Cree is higher quality, and partly because they are not bulbs, and so the heat management is way better.
- addaon 2y agoSome of the early ones were great too. I have a bunch of L Prize bulbs [1], some of which have been on for significant duty cycles since their production in 2011, and have had zero failures. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L_Prize#60W_Competition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L_Prize#60W_Competition
- brewdad 2y agoIs Cree considered higher quality? I had one of their CFLs try to burn my house down about 10 years ago. I smelled burning plastic from the adjacent room and found a bulb in an open fixture with a completely blackened base. I haven't bought a Cree product since then no matter how cheap Costco marks them.
- rootusrootus 2y ago> Is Cree considered higher quality? They were, for sure. However, in 2019 they were sold to another company and I do not know what may have changed since. All of my Cree lights pre-date that. > I had one of their CFLs Cree was founded entirely on the premise of creating LED lighting, I am pretty sure they have never done CFLs.
- kevin_thibedeau 2y agoThis is the downside of the race to the bottom caused by globalization. Commodity electronics are almost exclusively made in China by mystery brands that aren't around long enough to care about reputational damage from unreliable products.
- 01HNNWZ0MV43FF 2y agoOther way. Racing to the bottom caused globalization.
- gowld 2y agoThat's the oldest conspiracy -- the Invisible Hand of the Market.
- SeanLuke 2y agoIn fact there is. https://hackaday.com/2021/01/17/leds-from-dubai-the-royal-lights-you-cant-buy/ https://hackaday.com/2021/01/17/leds-from-dubai-the-royal-li...
- kalleboo 2y agoWe need to decide on a new design for "LED bulbs" that maximizes cooling, instead of insisting on sticking to a design that was optimized for a completely different bulb type (vacuum bulbs) where the electronics have to be stuck in an unreasonably small and difficult to cool base which is then mounted inside a cavity with no airflow. Here in Japan, ceiling lights have a standardized socket[0] so ceiling lamp fittings are easily user-replaceable without people being stuck with old bulb fittings, and so ceiling LED lamps are not fitted as bulbs but typically a large flat metal plate with the LEDs mounted to it[1], which results in fantastic cooling and good lifespan. [0] https://www.garageland.jp/wpimg/hikkakeceiling_topimg.jpg https://www.garageland.jp/wpimg/hikkakeceiling_topimg.jpg [1] https://kensroom.c.blog.ss-blog.jp/_images/blog/_bda/kensroom/LEDLIGHT-2-6402c.jpg https://kensroom.c.blog.ss-blog.jp/_images/blog/_bda/kensroo... Edit: Our apartment was built in 1998, at the height of "CCFLs are the future", and the hallway lights are all recessed "G24q" bulbs, which I had never heard of before. There were supposed to be the CCFL-native replacement for Edison screw bulb sockets, where instead of having to build the CCFL ballast into each bulb, it was external in the ceiling socket, increasing longevity and decreasing the cost of the bulbs themselves. We have yet to need to replace any of them, a much longer lifespan than I've ever had from one of those CCFLs with the ballast embedded in the base of the Edison bulb. With a less-compromised ballast they also work much better (light quicker, less affected by temperature)
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- musicale 2y agoIt seems to be forcing a switch to horrible, flickering, ugly LED lighting. And blindingly bright headlights.
- mtalantikite 2y agoWhen the incandescent ban went into effect last summer I bought a Phillips Hue system, since it was going to be harder to get regular bulbs. I could tell the difference, but was willing to just deal with it. Then I got 4 ocular migraines in 2, maybe 3 days. I shipped them back, bought a bunch of regular bulbs from a local hardware store with stock, and really don't know what I'm going to do when my stash of incandescents is done. It seems like Waveform Lighting is recommended for high R9 values and flicker free, but they're certainly not cheap. Don't get me started on blinding LED headlights. It's so hard to see on the road at night these days.
- nitins_jakta 2y agoYou're not alone with these LEDs causing migraines. See https://FlickerSense.org https://FlickerSense.org for a PhD scientists personal account, and, https://LEDStrain.org https://LEDStrain.org forum full of people that get migraines, dizziness, eyestrain and headaches from LED lights and other forms of flicker like temporal dithering.
- leni536 2y agoHere is a more nuanced Technology Connections video on the matter: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zb7Bs98KmnY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zb7Bs98KmnY
- cubefox 2y agotl;dw: No, it wasn't an evil conspiracy; a 1000 hour life span was a reasonable trade-off between longevity and power efficiency.
- vajrabum 2y agoThe Phoebus cartel lowered the average life of bulbs from 2500hrs to 1000hrs. In 1949 a US court found that GE violated the Sherman Antitrust Act in part due to it's actions as part of that cartel. And from the article on the topic on Wikipedia: The cartel tested their bulbs and fined manufacturers for bulbs that lasted more than 1,000 hours. A 1929 table listed the amount of Swiss francs paid that depended on the exceeding hours of lifetime.[11] Anton Philips, head of Philips, said to another cartel executive, "After the very strenuous efforts we made to emerge from a period of long life lamps, it is of the greatest importance that we do not sink back into the same mire by paying no attention to voltages and supplying lamps that will have a very prolonged life."[6] So, yeah that looks exactly like the evil actions of a cartel unless maybe you're claiming this isn't factual. If so, I'd be very interested in your source of information. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoebus_cartel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoebus_cartel
- kalleboo 2y agoThe thing is the the lifespan of bulbs is a tradeoff between brightness and lifespan. You make a 2000 hr bulb and it's half as a dim as a 1000 hr bulb, and so you're going to need 2 bulbs instead. Even today, long after the cartel is gone, there is no magic technology to make longer-lasting incandescent bulbs than they conspired to enforce back then. The cartel was more of a marketing self-regulation conspiracy so that one manufacturer can't make claims that their bulbs are more cost-efficient when they're just plain dimmer.
- daseiner1 2y agoI inevitably feel obligated to share “Byron the Bulb” from Gravity’s Rainbow https://www.tildedave.com/byron.html https://www.tildedave.com/byron.html
- Taniwha 2y agoIt's worth noting that the often quoted "50,000 hour" LED bulb lifetime largely comes from the data sheets for the LEDs themselves, it's the time it takes for the light output to drop by 50% - how long the rest of the lightbulb lasts (or LEDs if the enclosure allows them to run too hot) may or may not be as easily quantifyable
- jghn 2y agoAnd of course the enclosures have entered a race to the bottom, such that they're just as disposable as they always were. Which sucks as the marketing remains about the longevity. So now ppl complain about the technology, not the implementation.
- Helmut10001 2y agoI need to replace some LEDs twice a year in our apartment, whereas formerly bulbs lasted at least several years. I have tested different vendors, including expensive ones, but all last equally short times.
- chongli 2y agoYes, it’s because they drive the heck out of the LEDs to get their maximum rated light output. This produces excessive heat, shortening the lifespan of everything inside the case, including the very cheap electronics they use to rectify mains AC. In Dubai they actually have efficient and long-lasting LED lights [1]. These exist in order to satisfy strict government regulation there. They’re not sold anywhere else because they’re more expensive to make (more LEDs per bulb running at lower output). [1] https://youtu.be/klaJqofCsu4 https://youtu.be/klaJqofCsu4
- Helmut10001 2y agoI would gladly pay more for longer lasting but environmentally sustainable ones! Another case where government intervention seems necessary and there is no real "corrective" force with only capital oriented companies.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- samat 2y agoThere is an excellent video about Lightbulb Cartel by Technology Connections, highly recommended if you want an engineers perspective, with no 'great conspiracy' hype. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zb7Bs98KmnY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zb7Bs98KmnY
- throwthrowuknow 2y agoI wonder if there’s currently a lightbulb conspiracy against Hybrid Incandescent Bulbs https://www.techbriefs.com/component/content/article/15641-the-rebirth-of-the-incandescent-light-bulb https://www.techbriefs.com/component/content/article/15641-t...
- kazinator 2y agoIncandescent bulbs used in microwave ovens easily outlast the ovens themselves. When a 20 year old microwave oven dies for one reason or another, it's not unusual for the light to still work.
- pkaye 2y agoI replaced some overhead halogens recessed lights with some retrofit LEDs a decade back. Bought it on Amazon from some Chinese company. They have huge metal case/heat sinks so it seems to dissipate heat well and nothing has failed so far. Can't find them on Amazon anymore but I bought a few extra just is case.
- eternityforest 2y agoAre we ever gonna get new standards for bulbs? We can make DC supplies last decades, if we keep them away from the hot bulb. We can make just the LED itself replaceable without having to swap heatsinks. We can make it future proof with pins for RGB and color temperature. Why aren't there any standards for modular LED lighting?