ILLEGAL to sell regular lightbulbs after August 1st

Things I don't like, and mostly not LED related, but there's an LED part.... this use of "candelabra" base bulbs in ceiling fan light kits and outdoor lighting.

My outdoor lights, the decorative ones, I have 3. And each took two small base bulbs. I had LEDs in them, but they kept dying and would get filled up with bugs and removing the bulbs, the bulbs would always tear from the base, leaving me trying to dig out the base from the sockets. I ripped out all 3 decorative lights, replaced them with single normal full size socket single bulb units and from my priceless stash of CFLs, replaced them all with CFLs which have lasted for years ... and of course, I have the best lights in the whole neighborhood.

Having replaced a ton of LEDs inside the home over the years, I think the Phillips ones have worked the best for us, especially the warmer color ones. Obviouisly... LED, so get the absolute highest/brightest possible since no matter what you compare them to, they will always be "less". I mean, sure, they blind you if you look at them, but as far as actual light to ... I don't know... read by (for example), LED is sort of total crap. Anyway, again, if your world is all LED, you don't care, you have no idea what "real light" is like.
 
Darunion said:
What i fear now is the race to the bottom on led bulb quality and cost. At some point we could be looking back at "remember when incandescent bulbs lasted longer and were cheaper?"

I know the usage over time cost is lower, but theres a possibility of it shifting away from that as cheaper bulbs use crappier power supplies in them and less heatsink so heat reduces life.
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I repeat myself
Eulogy said:
Buy better LEDs, not the cheap crap.
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Consumers are a big reason for the drive to the bottom.
 
Eulogy said:
I repeat myself

Consumers are a big reason for the drive to the bottom.
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absolutely. Often the cheapest item on the shelf is what gets bought. Or online its sort by price and then what is available.
 
III_Slyflyer_III said:
Some people just hate certain things man... i absolutely can't stand florescent lighting... I freaking hate everything about it... lol.
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That's the thing though, I don't hate them. Quite the opposite. If I could find a LED light bulb that would last for more than a year, I'd be satisfied. That hasn't been the case so far.
 
w1retap said:
That's the thing though, I don't hate them. Quite the opposite. If I could find a LED light bulb that would last for more than a year, I'd be satisfied. That hasn't been the case so far.
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I've had really good luck with the Wyze LED RGB bulbs... only had 1 die so far out of 6 that I tried, and technically it works, it just lost the RGB part and only displayed whites.
 
We were losing one light every few days in my house. All random too. every room. No matter how often they were used. It was insane. We're all LED now.
 
Darunion said:
i REALLY hate the sound of ballasts. They changed our offices to led panels on 10v dimmers and they are a nice soft lighting with no visible flicker that i can see and am usually sensitive to. And quiet haha.
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We replaced our kitchen and garage FL with LEDs no ballast design or Hg in Fl to deal with. Plastic bulbs do not break either. The old FL tubes had to be wiggled to get to light, PIA.
 
w1retap said:
That's the thing though, I don't hate them. Quite the opposite. If I could find a LED light bulb that would last for more than a year, I'd be satisfied. That hasn't been the case so far.
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It sounds like the problem isn't the bulbs, if you've really tried decent LEDs. I don't disbelieve you and your experience, but, I find it incredibly unlikely that any person would have good LED bulbs die that fast regularly. Or they're being left on 24x7 in the wrong kind of use-case, or something.
 
Eulogy said:
It sounds like the problem isn't the bulbs, if you've really tried decent LEDs. I don't disbelieve you and your experience, but, I find it incredibly unlikely that any person would have good LED bulbs die that fast regularly. Or they're being left on 24x7 in the wrong kind of use-case, or something.
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I've tried LED bulbs from Amazon Basics, Philips, GE, Sylvania, and Ikea. Most of my lights stay off for the day and are only used in the evening when the sun goes down. All of the light fixures in the house are less than 10 years old since I replaced those shortly after I moved in. All outlets and switches are around 6 year old Leviton. The power in the house is very stable (monitored both from UPS units and at the meter from the utility side), and I have a 300A service. Your guess is as good as mine.
 
I gradually switched every light source in my house, garage & storage shed to LED's over the past 5 years or so, and have only had 1 of them fail in all that time, the others are still going strong :)

HOWEVER, last year I needed to replace the factory headlight assemblies and bulbs in 2 of my older cars, but when I asked my trusted, long time mechanic about installing the super-bright, low-energy LED's instead of the old style ones, he told me that he could not do it because it was illegal for any shop to do that for any vehicle that did not originally come with LED's from the factory.....

Go figure :) Yea, I know cars don't use electricity the same way as household lights do, but hey, energy is energy, yes ?

But the new LED bulbs (that I installed myself) light up the road SO MUCH BETTER that I can actually see the road at night again....
 
dogDAbone said:
I gradually switched every light source in my house, garage & storage shed to LED's over the past 5 years or so, and have only had 1 of them fail in all that time, the others are still going strong :)

HOWEVER, last year I needed to replace the factory headlight assemblies and bulbs in 2 of my older cars, but when I asked my trusted, long time mechanic about installing the super-bright, low-energy LED's instead of the old style ones, he told me that he could not do it because it was illegal for any shop to do that for any vehicle that did not originally come with LED's from the factory.....

Go figure :) Yea, I know cars don't use electricity the same way as household lights do, but hey, energy is energy, yes ?

But the new LED bulbs (that I installed myself) light up the road SO MUCH BETTER that I can actually see the road at night again....
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That's basically a DoT vs bulb manufacturer thing and is probably a case where some regulations need updating.

So the issue is not that cars can't have LED headlights, new ones do, you've encountered them on the streets, it is that they have to be designed that way. The reason is that there are regulations on the reflector and how the bulb interacts with it. This is to stop shit like lights that blast you in the eyes, or that6 have dark spots where you can't see. The DoT specifies how they have to work, and the result you actually get is a combination of the patter of light the bulb gives off and the reflector. Well, if you have a car that was designed for an incandescent bulb, that is what the reflector was made for. It counts on the light coming out in the pattern it did, and an LED bulb can't mimic that perfectly. Thus they don't allow it.

In reality you can get one that is close enough as makes no odds, but it isn't allowed. Now I'm not 100% clear if they flat out don't let it, or if the bulb manufacturers simply refuse to go through the hoops of getting certified, but that's the issue. DoT wants to make sure that your lights are safe.

However, things being what they are, DoT doesn't do enforcement on individual cars, that's up to local cops who give a fuck (or even know) in essentially 0% of cases, so you can buy bulbs that say "Not for use on roads, for offroad use only, wink, wink," install them, and use them on the roads and nobody gives a shit.
 
The only issue I've had with them in cars that didn't originally come with them (like my Evo X), is once I upgraded to projectors and used the LED bulbs.. they'll flicker if not turned on because the DRL's are still on with a square wave output. Older DRL's only worked with incandescent bulbs and you need a pretty big capacitor to smooth it out so they don't flicker. Haven't had those LED bulbs die over the course of many years, probably because they actually have a heatsink on them.
 
Sycraft said:
I mean a properly designed (as in has enough elements and enough cooling) LED system should last way longer than fluorescent. Now is what they are selling you well designed? Can't say. So far the T8 replacements they've put in around offices here have been working well, but they only started pretty recently (last 5 years maybe) so it isn't like we have real long-term tests. The hope is less replacements so less maintenance time wasted on it. Also the maintenance guys are excited about getting rid of the ballasts since those are more of a pain to replace.


Ya I am always wary of companies that go door-to-door selling shit. In my experience the good companies don't need to do that.


That is another area that LEDs should be great at, and in my experience are. Incandescent lights take extra stress during turn on/off due to the thermal expansion and contraction. LEDs can pulse on and off no issues.
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Yeah, and I think the ones that are being peddled aren't so much that. But it's great to hear about the t8 replacements! 5 years is long enough imo to know that they're doing pretty well. I know our regular ones would have to be changed by then. :)

Yep, good companies (especially these days) will have their customers find them. :)

I've had good experiences with LEDs liking cycles too. I've got 2x LED bulbs in some of those auto-sensing nightlights and they're so bright that their own light triggers the sensor for them to turn off and then it's dark so the sensor turns them on a again. So they basically strobe--and they've been doing this in extreme temperatures (pretty much almost like outdoor temps for about 3-5yrs now (or maybe even longer?). I think the on/off cycles don't bother leds as much, especially when low powered or when direct dc.
 
GoldenTiger said:
Ditto, turns me right off too, but it's what gets the views :(. I remember Linus (of ltt) mentioning that once.
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He's one of the chode faces I won't watch, lol. Oh well, I'm going to stick to reading--it's faster anyways. :D
 
Sycraft said:
No kidding. They still sell them too. And I mean I guess if you just want a drop-in replacement that's nice and all... but fuck ballasts, getting rid of them would be half the point.
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Drop-ins can be nice until the ballast fails--then you just wire direct and get the direct bulbs. :D
 
Darunion said:
What i fear now is the race to the bottom on led bulb quality and cost. At some point we could be looking back at "remember when incandescent bulbs lasted longer and were cheaper?"

I know the usage over time cost is lower, but theres a possibility of it shifting away from that as cheaper bulbs use crappier power supplies in them and less heatsink so heat reduces life.
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Be careful because china is listening...;)

This is the next phase actually. You destroy everything that was competition and 'good' and then keep feeding them the same crap and see if they complain. There are several industries where this has already worked--steel, radiators, SSDs, and even construction supplies. It's only a matter of time because that's the way those MFs roll...
 
Comixbooks said:
Well ebay hasn't removed the listings on their site so you can still stock up. Walmart removed them for sale back in like April I noticed because I just wanted to buy some more there.
They were clearance out and sold out like in two days. Really is a shame that politics had to get involved in this decision but it could be reversed again.
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I'm sure ebay will still sell them since you can buy all sorts of counterfeits there. :ROFLMAO: :ROFLMAO: :ROFLMAO:
 
cjcox said:
Things I don't like, and mostly not LED related, but there's an LED part.... this use of "candelabra" base bulbs in ceiling fan light kits and outdoor lighting.

My outdoor lights, the decorative ones, I have 3. And each took two small base bulbs. I had LEDs in them, but they kept dying and would get filled up with bugs and removing the bulbs, the bulbs would always tear from the base, leaving me trying to dig out the base from the sockets. I ripped out all 3 decorative lights, replaced them with single normal full size socket single bulb units and from my priceless stash of CFLs, replaced them all with CFLs which have lasted for years ... and of course, I have the best lights in the whole neighborhood.

Having replaced a ton of LEDs inside the home over the years, I think the Phillips ones have worked the best for us, especially the warmer color ones. Obviouisly... LED, so get the absolute highest/brightest possible since no matter what you compare them to, they will always be "less". I mean, sure, they blind you if you look at them, but as far as actual light to ... I don't know... read by (for example), LED is sort of total crap. Anyway, again, if your world is all LED, you don't care, you have no idea what "real light" is like.
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Those bases are a real pain! I have to deal with that on the vanity light in my room at my parent's place. Took me forever to find a cfl with 100w lumen equivalent, and then they were discontinued. I think I have one more of those bulbs, but the original one I got hasn't burned out yet.
 
w1retap said:
I've tried LED bulbs from Amazon Basics, Philips, GE, Sylvania, and Ikea. Most of my lights stay off for the day and are only used in the evening when the sun goes down. All of the light fixures in the house are less than 10 years old since I replaced those shortly after I moved in. All outlets and switches are around 6 year old Leviton. The power in the house is very stable (monitored both from UPS units and at the meter from the utility side), and I have a 300A service. Your guess is as good as mine.
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Grounding issue?
 
dogDAbone said:
I gradually switched every light source in my house, garage & storage shed to LED's over the past 5 years or so, and have only had 1 of them fail in all that time, the others are still going strong :)

HOWEVER, last year I needed to replace the factory headlight assemblies and bulbs in 2 of my older cars, but when I asked my trusted, long time mechanic about installing the super-bright, low-energy LED's instead of the old style ones, he told me that he could not do it because it was illegal for any shop to do that for any vehicle that did not originally come with LED's from the factory.....

Go figure :) Yea, I know cars don't use electricity the same way as household lights do, but hey, energy is energy, yes ?

But the new LED bulbs (that I installed myself) light up the road SO MUCH BETTER that I can actually see the road at night again....
Click to expand...
Were these just plug-in? I've been waiting for some good H7s since I have to disassemble the front half of the car to replace them every few years...
 
Sycraft said:
That's basically a DoT vs bulb manufacturer thing and is probably a case where some regulations need updating.

So the issue is not that cars can't have LED headlights, new ones do, you've encountered them on the streets, it is that they have to be designed that way. The reason is that there are regulations on the reflector and how the bulb interacts with it. This is to stop shit like lights that blast you in the eyes, or that6 have dark spots where you can't see. The DoT specifies how they have to work, and the result you actually get is a combination of the patter of light the bulb gives off and the reflector. Well, if you have a car that was designed for an incandescent bulb, that is what the reflector was made for. It counts on the light coming out in the pattern it did, and an LED bulb can't mimic that perfectly. Thus they don't allow it.

In reality you can get one that is close enough as makes no odds, but it isn't allowed. Now I'm not 100% clear if they flat out don't let it, or if the bulb manufacturers simply refuse to go through the hoops of getting certified, but that's the issue. DoT wants to make sure that your lights are safe.

However, things being what they are, DoT doesn't do enforcement on individual cars, that's up to local cops who give a fuck (or even know) in essentially 0% of cases, so you can buy bulbs that say "Not for use on roads, for offroad use only, wink, wink," install them, and use them on the roads and nobody gives a shit.
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Technically, it's the FMVSS (Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard) that the DoT is enforcing. My dad was an automotive engineer at Ford in the first career of his life so when I saw the 'not DOT approved' stuff on performance bulbs I asked him and he said basically the same thing you did. :) I miss him at times like this--lost him to covid in 2020.
 
w1retap said:
The only issue I've had with them in cars that didn't originally come with them (like my Evo X), is once I upgraded to projectors and used the LED bulbs.. they'll flicker if not turned on because the DRL's are still on with a square wave output. Older DRL's only worked with incandescent bulbs and you need a pretty big capacitor to smooth it out so they don't flicker. Haven't had those LED bulbs die over the course of many years, probably because they actually have a heatsink on them.
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My Kizashi is the same way, using the high beams on a low wave like that for DRL. I hate DRL and am always turning my lights on and off manually so probably wouldn't affect me, but haven't done any LED stuff on it yet since I was waiting for plug and play bulbs.
 
w1retap said:
I've tried LED bulbs from Amazon Basics, Philips, GE, Sylvania, and Ikea. Most of my lights stay off for the day and are only used in the evening when the sun goes down. All of the light fixures in the house are less than 10 years old since I replaced those shortly after I moved in. All outlets and switches are around 6 year old Leviton. The power in the house is very stable (monitored both from UPS units and at the meter from the utility side), and I have a 300A service. Your guess is as good as mine.
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What kind of fixtures? Are they enclosed?

You have to read the fine print if you have an enclosed fixture. Some bulbs are marked "Suitable for use in totally enclosed fixtures". Others say they're not suitable for use in enclosed fixtures and some just aren't marked. Usually the text is really small and hard to find, especially if they're "not suitable". Before I figured this out I put a lots of "not suitable for use in totally enclosed fixtures" bulbs in fixtures with little or no ventilation and had a ton of failures. GE Reveal bulbs were the worst. They are "not suitable", die quickly without ventilation and are on the pricer side! These days I just buy "suitable" EcoSmart bulbs from Home Depot or Feit Electric bulbs from Menards and haven't had any trouble with either of them. I'll use "not suitable" bulbs in certain applications, but only if it's a high output bulb (more than 1500 lumens, so more than 100W equivalent) and I know it's going in an open fixture. Anything 1500 lumens or less I won't buy it if it's "not suitable". Well, maybe I would if I knew it was going in an open fixture and it said it wasn't suitable for use in enclosed fixtures in big letters on the front of the box, but so far I've only seen that declaration in small print on the bottom or side.

In years past when LED bulbs were more expensive they were reliable. It's not the LED part that fails, it's the DC power supply. So I had no trouble with the ones I bought in like 2014 and the couple of first gen Phillips LEDs I bought shortly after they came out in 2010 or so at $30 a pop for an 800 lumen ("60W equivalent") are built like tanks and still working. Those first gen bulbs are heavy and feel like they have a metal chassis. I've been meaning to find a lamp to display them in, probably in my office/computer room. They don't look like regular lightbulbs. I'd describe them as "steampunk". Here's a decent pic: https://inhabitat.com/philips’-supe-efficient-ambientled-bulb-now-available-in-stores/ By 2017 when I bought my house they had gotten a lot cheaper and quality went to shit. Or so I thought until I discovered the fine print.

And yeah, I'm more than a little pissed about this fine print suitable/not suitable for enclosed fixtures thing. Wouldn't mind if the government did something about it. "Thou shalt make critical product specs obvious" seems like a legit use of the coercive power of the state. The thing I really don't get is why the "suitable" bulbs aren't marked as such in big letters. Many manufacturers sell both and the "suitable" bulbs are the more expensive ones.
 
zandor said:
And yeah, I'm more than a little pissed about this fine print suitable/not suitable for enclosed fixtures thing. Wouldn't mind if the government did something about it. "Thou shalt make critical product specs obvious" seems like a legit use of the coercive power of the state. The thing I really don't get is why the "suitable" bulbs aren't marked as such in big letters. Many manufacturers sell both and the "suitable" bulbs are the more expensive ones.
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Saving a penny or two on ink and people will burn through bulbs when buying the lesser quality ones?
 
Just make them like the led headlights that go in the halogen lenses for cars, with the fan on the back. That should help keep them cool.
 
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I've had pretty good luck with the Costco LED bulbs over the last 7-8 years. Feit brand I think. I have one kitchen can light that is starting to flicker after 5+ years of use. I have had a couple of the higher priced ones go out after 3 or so years. The cheaper 60w equivalent Costco ones, use 8.5w these days and I think the worst was one dying in 1-2 years. My outdoor lights are also Costco ones from 2015 or so. 7w leds meant for outdoor usage and still going strong.

I should probably find a few incandesents for my two dimmer lights since they work best.
 
zandor said:
What kind of fixtures? Are they enclosed?

You have to read the fine print if you have an enclosed fixture. Some bulbs are marked "Suitable for use in totally enclosed fixtures". Others say they're not suitable for use in enclosed fixtures and some just aren't marked. Usually the text is really small and hard to find, especially if they're "not suitable". Before I figured this out I put a lots of "not suitable for use in totally enclosed fixtures" bulbs in fixtures with little or no ventilation and had a ton of failures. GE Reveal bulbs were the worst. They are "not suitable", die quickly without ventilation and are on the pricer side! These days I just buy "suitable" EcoSmart bulbs from Home Depot or Feit Electric bulbs from Menards and haven't had any trouble with either of them. I'll use "not suitable" bulbs in certain applications, but only if it's a high output bulb (more than 1500 lumens, so more than 100W equivalent) and I know it's going in an open fixture. Anything 1500 lumens or less I won't buy it if it's "not suitable". Well, maybe I would if I knew it was going in an open fixture and it said it wasn't suitable for use in enclosed fixtures in big letters on the front of the box, but so far I've only seen that declaration in small print on the bottom or side.

In years past when LED bulbs were more expensive they were reliable. It's not the LED part that fails, it's the DC power supply. So I had no trouble with the ones I bought in like 2014 and the couple of first gen Phillips LEDs I bought shortly after they came out in 2010 or so at $30 a pop for an 800 lumen ("60W equivalent") are built like tanks and still working. Those first gen bulbs are heavy and feel like they have a metal chassis. I've been meaning to find a lamp to display them in, probably in my office/computer room. They don't look like regular lightbulbs. I'd describe them as "steampunk". Here's a decent pic: https://inhabitat.com/philips’-supe-efficient-ambientled-bulb-now-available-in-stores/ By 2017 when I bought my house they had gotten a lot cheaper and quality went to shit. Or so I thought until I discovered the fine print.

And yeah, I'm more than a little pissed about this fine print suitable/not suitable for enclosed fixtures thing. Wouldn't mind if the government did something about it. "Thou shalt make critical product specs obvious" seems like a legit use of the coercive power of the state. The thing I really don't get is why the "suitable" bulbs aren't marked as such in big letters. Many manufacturers sell both and the "suitable" bulbs are the more expensive ones.
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Only three fixtures are enclosed - two in bedrooms and one in a hallway. The rest are all open. In the enclosed fixtures with two bulbs, usually one burns out after 3-4 months of 3hr/day use and the other bulb lives on for about 6-8 months before it burns out. Never noticed any small print on any of the boxes or bulbs themselves. I just looked at the two bulbs in my bedroom and they don't mention they aren't for enclosed fixtures.
 
SamirD said:
Were these just plug-in? I've been waiting for some good H7s since I have to disassemble the front half of the car to replace them every few years...
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Mine were H11's, but yea they were plug & play. Note that both of my cars came from the factory with Halogen bulbs, not incandescants, so there weren't any reflector or bright spot issues....

However, the ones for my 09 impala came with a small "canbus error free" adapter box built into the wiring harness (to prevent the flickering & error codes), whereas the ones for my 2012 caddy did not.

On the impala, it was like a 7 min job, I only had to take out 1 screw, pull up on 1 plastic retainer clip, and the entire headlight assembly comes out of the fender, which gave me access to the wiring harnesses & sockets where the bulbs are located.

However, on the caddy, I was replacing the entire assembly AND the bulbs anyways, so once I received them, I installed the LED bulbs myself & put them back in the boxes. I then took the everything to my mechanic because it also required disassembly of the front half of the car to access the mounting screws & wiring harnesses, something for which I lack the skills, time & tools to do.....
 
w1retap said:
Only three fixtures are enclosed - two in bedrooms and one in a hallway. The rest are all open. In the enclosed fixtures with two bulbs, usually one burns out after 3-4 months of 3hr/day use and the other bulb lives on for about 6-8 months before it burns out. Never noticed any small print on any of the boxes or bulbs themselves. I just looked at the two bulbs in my bedroom and they don't mention they aren't for enclosed fixtures.
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I was a bit off on the label text. It's "luminaries" not "fixtures" lol.

That sounds about like what I got out of GE Relax HD bulbs. That one says it's not suitable for recessed luminaries too, so I guess you can't even stick it in a can light with no cover. I guess that makes sense because they're the absolute worst bulbs I've used. Are you having trouble with open fixtures too?

What kind of bulbs are you using in your bedroom? If they're not marked I might have to put the manufacturer on my do not buy unless it's the only thing suitable for the application list along with GE branded bulbs. The ones I've got were made by GE, but they sold their lightbulb business to some company called Savant in 2020.

I grabbed a few spares from my box of bulbs in the basement and all 4 are marked. Funny thing is the highest wattage one is the one that can go in an enclosed luminary and it's also dimmable.

bulbs.jpg
 
Does anyone know of an LED bulb with a standard E26 base, 40-60W equivalent, that can handle flicker sockets? I have an OLD traffic light what has two sockets that strobe / flicker and can't find any LED bulbs that work. They get power, but stay in a very low power mode.
 
My kitchen LED recessed lights are about 7 yrs old and I havent had to change a single one. I then did the rest of the house about 4 yrs ago and still not a single one has gone bad. HALO brand in 3xxxk (warm) at Home Depot is all I use in case anyone was curious cause I cant stand the 5000k white/blue lights ( they give me a headache).
 
I'm at 3+ years with most of the LED bulbs in my house, never had an issue with any of tm. Slowly phased out my incandescent as they died, never gonna go back to them, so this "ban" doesn't bug me at all.

I got lucky and got a ton of LED lights when a local grocery store went out of business for less than .50 each. I got around 40 of the things. Considering each one is lasting me 5+ years, I think i'll be good for decades.
 
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