"Ken Weitzel" wrote in message
news:52sfe.1279990$Xk.373708@pd7tw3no...

Hi...

Anyone happen to know what the diff is between
dimmable cfl's and the regular ones?

Friend has a chandelier with half a dozen bulbs in
it, and would like to use cfl's. Confusion is that
the dimmable ones cost about 4 times as much, and
regular ones work real real wierd

Thanks, and take care.

Ken



If you look up ballast controller chips and look at the datasheets you'll
see the difference. The dimmable ones are quite a bit more complex, they use
a somewhat different power supply design and they provide a separate voltage
to keep the cathodes in the tube heated when the tube is dimmed. I have a
few and they're mediocre, they're large and clunky and flicker if you dim
them too far but they worked ok in the rec room in the last house I lived
in. In the one light in my house that's on a dimmer now I use incandescent
lamps, it's not on very much anyway.