David Nebenzahl wrote:
On 5/20/2008 3:29 PM Ozzie spake thus:

I've been reading some of the recent posts, on CFL's. Maybe I haven't
read enough of them, to find the same thing, which happened to mine.

First, I'm really disappointed, they don't have the life span, as
normal bulbs. My packages claim to have a life span, up to 7 years.
That's probably the "got cha", the "up to". But, I've never had to
replace my bulbs, as often as I do these. I've now replaced a grand
total of 14, which failed prematurely. This is in a 5 month time span.
These are/were the dimmable mini's, 75 watt, with a power factor of
0.90. They are listed as UL, and energy star, and claims to use only
15 watts.

Something else about these things. I've now had 3 of them go out,
which let out a puff of smoke. It's a foul smelling odor. Exactly what
is being released?


Nothing which is any good for you, I'd guess.

As discussed here and elsewhere, the longevity of CFLs varies all over
the place. My own experience has been, for the most part, the exact
opposite of yours: all my CFLs, including some I bought more than 5
years ago and use all the time, are still burning nicely. Depends on the
brand, etc.

I've only ever had one fail somewhat catastrophically, and it did emit a
pungent, foul odor, that "cooked electronics" smell.



My experiences are the same - only had one burn out, but that one got
very hot and smelled like fried electronics. Which worries me somewhat;
the main reason I'm using so many CFLs is because of the old wiring in
this house; I don't want it to get fried crispy by bulb heat before I
get a chance to replace it all.

But I've been here a year and a half and this is the first one I've had
to replace, so... so far so good.

nate

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