04-03-2009, 08:04 PM
I don't know how well the CFL bulbs are sealed for outdoor use, but I have seen that they don't work with the motion detector outdoor fixtures I have at my house and garage doors. They are often incompatible with electronic switches and dimmers as well. However, indoors, they did get me an award for process improvement at the lab where I work.
We have an indoor facility for performing RFI Susceptablilty on developmental electronics products before getting the circuits certified prior to release. In the two rooms, there are a total of ten triple shielded box fixtures. They are limited to 3 60 Watt bulbs each fixture. In operation, they consume 180 Watts per fixture, therefore up to 1800 Watt total. Also, when doing a test series, at least 1/2 the incandescents would need replacement beforethe end of a test. I started tracking the lifespan, and found we could expect maybe 6 months per bulb.
I replaced each trio of 60W bulbs with 2 27W CFLs. 54 W per fixture, about 1/3 the electricity, the rooms actually had more light, and the bulbs are lasting over 2 years. The bulbs are individually more expensive than incandescents, but over time, we save almost 65% in overall cost, and have more light to work with. The only irritation is that because the CFLs generate some electrical noise, we have to turn them off for certain testing. No real problem, since you don't want to be in the test cell when it's operating, anyway. It would be like beng inside a 350W microwave oven.
We have an indoor facility for performing RFI Susceptablilty on developmental electronics products before getting the circuits certified prior to release. In the two rooms, there are a total of ten triple shielded box fixtures. They are limited to 3 60 Watt bulbs each fixture. In operation, they consume 180 Watts per fixture, therefore up to 1800 Watt total. Also, when doing a test series, at least 1/2 the incandescents would need replacement beforethe end of a test. I started tracking the lifespan, and found we could expect maybe 6 months per bulb.
I replaced each trio of 60W bulbs with 2 27W CFLs. 54 W per fixture, about 1/3 the electricity, the rooms actually had more light, and the bulbs are lasting over 2 years. The bulbs are individually more expensive than incandescents, but over time, we save almost 65% in overall cost, and have more light to work with. The only irritation is that because the CFLs generate some electrical noise, we have to turn them off for certain testing. No real problem, since you don't want to be in the test cell when it's operating, anyway. It would be like beng inside a 350W microwave oven.