On Sat, 17 Oct 2020 01:58:55 -0700 (PDT), whit3rd
wrote:

On Friday, October 16, 2020 at 7:35:43 AM UTC-7, Scott Lurndal wrote:
whit3rd writes:

Yep, fluorescent is still a winner on parts/availability/maturity, and was never far
behind LED in power consumption.

I would argue that a 50% reduction in power consumption between fluorescent and
LED does indicate that fluorescent is "far behind LED in power consumption".

Maybe, but maybe not; the LEDs might be half that efficiency in a few years (they age).
While individual emitters can hit 140 lumen/watt, the specs on typical bulbs are 75 lumen/watt.

Fluorescents also degrade over time, often quite quickly.

I suspect the various (low-voltage DC, high-voltage AC,
dimmable, not dimmable, flickering, flicker-free, etc.) LED options mean that one
can never re-lamp or re-power a fixture, if a lamp or power brick dies, you need... a new
fixture.

You can buy replacement LED tubes for standard fluorescent fixtures, the tubes
run on line voltage, so you simply rewire the fixture to bypass the ballast.

But fluorescents with an electronic ballast don't have 120 Hz or 60 Hz modulation (flicker).
If you work with moving machinery, that's an important advantage.

LEDs are no different.

The "simply rewire" means someone can replace the LED tubes with
regular fluorescent tubes (and blow a fuse, or explode, or... whatever).

I've thought about that. I'm not sure how to tackle it so am using
the replacement tubes. I suspect bad things would happen with one of
each but tubes _should_ be replaced in sets (whatever's connected to
the ballast)

I've converted a dozen F96T12 two-bulb fixtures with LED tubes, which _are_
easily replaceable.

You can also get LED tubes that are drop-in replacement in standard
48" fixtures using the existing ballast.

... and I tried a pair of those before I rebuilt with a new ballast; they didn't work (and I'm not
sure why); one variant of the drop-in type comes with a warning to only use a
particular model of GE "ballast", or "risk of fire or electric shock". So,
the replacement will require someone to read fine print.

Sounds like either the marketing or legal (or both) at work.