Do you use floresent lighting?

[2007glory]

DH and I have been considering replacing ALL light fixtures (including ceiling fans) with flush mount floresent fixtures in our home. How many of you use floresent lighting? Any Pros other than lowering your electric bill? Cons? Is there a particular brand you suggest? THANKS!! Cheryl

[comfortablynumb]

motion sensors kick on your lights while you are in the room and shut them off in 3-5 mn.

[2007glory]

That's a good idea, and we would do that, but the fixtures are out-dated and need replacement. We just figured floresent would be the best path to go down? Cheryl

[Windy in Kansas]

Please don't replace all of your fixtures with fluorescent ones. Fluorescents are best used where they will be on for a fairly lengthy time. Use incandescent light in places where lights will be used briefly such as closets or where light will be needed immediately. While fluorescents do come on instantly now a days it does take a bit to build to full brightness in cooler conditions such as unheated rooms.

I am a big proponent of fluorescents but do believe they have their places and incandescents or others have theirs.

My electric bill this month was $18.44 for 29 days of usage with 163 KWH used.
Fluorescents work well for me. Wonder how much I could drop my bill if I stopped using my electric cookstove and electric dryer?

[LisaInN.Idaho]

We use compact fluorescents pretty much exclusively because we are off grid on solar power. Even in the barn in the winter we don't have much of a problem with them taking long to heat up. I love that they come in a soft white color..you can't even tell they are fluorescent...mine look like incandescents.

[comfortablynumb]

Wonder how much I could drop my bill if I stopped using my electric cookstove and electric dryer?

it depends on how much you use it.

[no1cowboy]

Originally Posted by Windy in Kansas

Please don't replace all of your fixtures with fluorescent ones. Fluorescents are best used where they will be on for a fairly lengthy time. Use incandescent light in places where lights will be used briefly such as closets or where light will be needed immediately.

I agree my house is half fuorescents the areas where the lights are turnd off and on often I use incandescent.

[Scrounger]

I have ONE floro fixture in my shop, but it is surrounded by real light bulbs. We HAD a bunch of those fancy floro bulbs, but got rid of them because they throw out too much darkness. Can't stand the things.

[Spinner]

Most of my house is fluorescent lights, not regular florescent, the full spectrum grow lights for plants. They use less electric than the regular florescent, (at least the package made that claim). I have lamps with incandescent so I can use either/or depending on how long they will be left on.

My electric bill is so outragous that I do everything I can to lower it.

I unplug all "instant on" things like TV's, VCR's, satellite box, coffee pot, etc.

I bought clocks that run on batteries or wind up, and unplugged the electric clocks.

Put the hot water heater on a timer so it only runs 2 hours a day.

Filled the freezer with bottles of water to eliminate empty air space.

Even with all the things I've done, my bill has gone higher not lower.

[FreightTrain]

im off grid and use a 14w cfl while i run the generator and or 4' long shop lights...

for my itty bitty micro mini solar system i have two 5w 12v cfl's

[Callieslamb]

except when they start to go bad and flash at you. It can drive you crazy - they aren't broken or out yet, but don't put out enough light....but you hate to replace what isn't broken.

We use the compact ones in most places in our house. We have the long ones in our kitchen and shop. I used them for my lights for seedlings. They do seem to last a lot longer than the other bulbs.

[vallyfarm]

Every thing except the porch light in the winter. I do have 1 CFL and 1 reg in the bath over the sink to give a better lux. Mike

[moonwolf]

We have almost exclusively CFU's and/or tube fluorscent lighting. Outside motion sensor lights are flood incandescents and only stay on a few minutes if they come on.
The cost saving on the electric bill is significant. Have had this system in place about 3 years now. Never replaced a CFU yet.

[travlnusa]

We have changed about 80% of our fixtures over to floresents. The first to get changed were the general lighting in my pole barn. Hate having to climb up there to change them. I changed the one over my workshop, but changed back the one for brigher light.

To generalize, we use them for general lighting and standard bulbs for task lighting.

[beorning]

we use compact flourescents in most of our fixtures. I've got four foot tube lights in the shop. We didn't have much luck using the CFL's in the ceiling fans. Near as I could tell, they don't care much for vibration.

[rambler]

Been dabbling with the compacts. They are ok, but certainly _not_ as bright as they claim to be. Replaced a 100w real bulb with what is supposed to be the same output compact. Felt like I needed a cane to get across the kitchen - saving the bulb for a bedroom or something, put a real bulb back in.

The momentary hesitation before they come on is a bit unnerving, hard to adjust to for me.

In a 3-bulb fixture in one room we use a lot, we have 1 regular bulb & 2 compacts. That is cool, get instant on, about the same light as the other 2 come up to speed, but am saving some. Like that setup.

I would not want to go 100%, but can use them for some places.

--->Paul

[crafty2002]

I have them everywhere. I have the round two tube fixture in the kitchen but set up a shelve in front of the window to start plants last year and hung two 4' double tube fixtures over it. It always comes on when I am cooking. I know it's 32 watts a tube x 4 = 128 watts, but I can't see good and reading recipes is hard for me. They are usually in really small letters and the light help a lot.
The rest of the house has the CFI's. I even took an old string of work lights I had that had 15 sockets and strung it up through out the basement work area I have and put the 13 watt CFI's in them. That's only 195 watts but the shop is lit up very well. No way I could have put 2 / 100 watt bulbs down there and got the light I have.
Our living room fixture is made for 3 / 75 watt bulbs. 3 / 15 watt CFI's put out more light.
It does take a bit for them to come to full brightness, but it's less than a second before they give you light to see by. By the time you walk in, set down and pick up a news paper, they are probably at 90 %.
Our bath room light over the sink has 3, either 13 or 15 watt CFI's in it and we never even turn the overhead light on any more.
I have two of them went out in going on 4 years and I broke one of those in the shop and kept hitting my welding shield on the other one. If it had of been a regular bulb I would have broke a dozen of them.

[HermitJohn]

But where do you get well made incandecents anymore. They used to last several years. High price or low, they now seem to burn out in 3 months or less. I did find some 20,000 hour incandescents on internet, but crazy price. I finally tried one of the modern cf that I got at Aldis and it has done fine since May. Had tried halogen bulb. One lasted a year and other still going.

[Alice In TX/MO]

I hate the fluorescents with a passion. Hubby puts them in, and I follow behind later, putting in bulbs that actually give out light.

[baldylocks]

We use all CFLs now and I really like them. We have no problem with their not being bright enough and they warm up very quickly also. I prefer the regular light fixtures with a regular socket into which you screw a CFL. I have a few overhead lights that are made to take a flourescent bulb only. I don't like them as much as I figure someday, someone will stop making that shape bulb/connector and then I will have to replace the lamp. That being said, we have had the bulbs in for a few years and not replaced any yet.