In article , John Savage
wrote:
"Percival P. Cassidy" writes:
Note that I am assuming that the claim that even switched-off fluoro.
lights can intefere with IR switching is a bunch of baloney.

Probably in your case, but not always. I live in a block of apartments.
The building's stairwell and garage area lights are on a timeswitch--an
old fashioned mechanical relay arrangement that goes THUMP when it
switches on.

One cloudy afternoon as I felt my way down the stairwell in the half
gloom rather than switching on a dozen lights just to go a few flights,
out of the corner of my eye I imagined I caught a brief flash of light
from a CF fitting I was passing under. Intrigued, I waited, and waited,
and discovered to my amazement that every 4 or 5 minutes this globe would
give a momentary low-intensity (to my eye) flash of light! It was just an
ordinary CF globe that I'd installed.

I have not been able to come up with a satisfactory explanation for this.
In case there was a leakage current, I made sure after that to always have
at least one globe an ordinary incandescent.

I have found some CFs to flash from leakage current. Ones with glow
switch starters (and magnetic ballasts) may have the starters very dimly
glow or flicker a purplish color.

I saw this mainly when I tried switching a CF with the Radio Shack
"Plug-N-Power" switching system. The receivers intentionally leak some
current to detect whether a load is in place. I suspect CFs could even
have extra wear from dimly glowing or flashing when "off" with the
"Plug-N-Power" system, since their filaments will not be at the proper
operating temperature. Starters may not like to be glowing all the time.

However, I do not expect the much lower leakage currents found elsewhere
to cause much wear to fluorescents.

- Don Klipstein )