Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

[stj]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

Without removing any of the bulbs:

(The cord was scuffed when I bought the fixture, IIRC, LOL)

LMFAO - they even painted/anodised the endcaps green!!!!!

[RJARRRPCGP]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

a flourescent tube contains a drip of mercury,
when you turn it on from cold it has to heat the mercury to make it vaporise and spread through the tube for the tube to start and light evenly.
thats why sometimes when you turn it on you may see the ends glow - that's the heaters

I liked that heater glow that I saw on a fluorescent tube at the Springfield community center, over one of the pool tables.

[eccerr0r]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

LMFAO - they even painted/anodised the endcaps green!!!!!

Yeah, that's a trademark of Philips Alto branded bulbs... Product "differentiation" ...

Can't think of other brands that did something like this, but if you see green, it's an alto.

I think I have a bunch of F40T12 Altos spare for my fluorescent fixtures. I'm not sure which of my fixtures have E-ballasts or not and the F40T12s should work for any ballast I think...

I liked that heater glow that I saw on a fluorescent tube at the Springfield community center, over one of the pool tables.

Unfortunately it's a tell tale sign of EOL I think. Fluorescent tubes' filaments shouldn't remain glowing or at least you shouldn't see them glow orange after they're lit. If they are, the starter is leaking too much as it's thinking the tube hasn't fully lit, and probably also destroyed the phosphor near the filament (or a F40T12 whose phosphors aren't as thick) so you can see it.

[petehall347]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

straying off topic a bit but has anyone else ever taken fluorescent tubes under high voltage wires like pylon wires ?

[RJARRRPCGP]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

Unfortunately it's a tell tale sign of EOL I think.

It's during startup and then the glow stops quickly.

[stj]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

do american starters have anything other than the glass bit in them??

in europe they have to have a film cap across the switch to suppress noise.
also, osram had some comercial ones with a latching bi-metal switch that cut the heaters if they stayed on too long - to avoid the 24/7 flicker/glow in unattended fittings.

[eccerr0r]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

I don't recall, been a while since I had an open "classical"/"neon-heater" starter. Thought they all should have a bimetal switch... but probably no caps. I'd imagine that the noise generation would be extremely short lived and that's why they omit them in the USA starters?

I forgot I actually had a PL-13 (with its integrated starter) hooked up to an electronic ballast. It starts up fairly quickly, but not instant start like typical CFLs. Blinks are very short in duration (like 0.1 second) unlike magnetic ballasts with bimetal starters (which have 1-2 second blinks...)

[sam_sam_sam]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

If you see it glowing after they have been on for a few minutes and it will not stop glowing replace the light bulb the when they first start doing or else you can fry the blast

The green colored end cap ones and I do care who manufactures them are hit and miss with quality I have replaced a many of them

I have gotten some out of case one time 4 to 8 that in a very short time were dim and shortly after that they started glowing sent them back to the vendor for credit a few months later the same thing happened again went with another brand of bulbs

The explanation that I got was they did not put enough mercury in them when they were manufactured and apparently it was this one plant that was having the issue

I buy the LED light bulb that replace the fluorescent bulbs yes they cost more but I have had them installed sense 2017 and this light fixture is on most days 16 hours every day for most part

If I had regular fluorescent bulbs in like I use to I would probably be close to replacing by now

The only weird thing about this type of LED fluorescent type of tube is that when you turn off the power to them they glow for a moment and fade out but has done this from the day I installed them

[RJARRRPCGP]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

There were a faulty batch of Alto II 48-inch T8s manufactured in 2018.
(broken filament)

[sam_sam_sam]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

There were a faulty batch of Alto II 48-inch T8s manufactured in 2018.
(broken filament)

They have been having manufacturer issues from time many times in the past I did not know about the one in 2018 that a new one for me

I have watched the show “How it Made” here is the segment

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwsDvINxA84

they had a segment about how they made fluorescent light bulbs
They showed the quality controls that they have as they moving the production line this was very interesting to watch

[eccerr0r]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

Wonder how many companies are still making linear fluorescents, I suspect there's still a huge market for replacements...
Not even sure if there are any chinese linear fluorescents yet? Perhaps whoever bought GE's lamp division, but all of the linear fluorescents I have are either GE or Philips...

[sam_sam_sam]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

You can still find them online but they are a little bit expensive compared to other regular fluorescents light bulbs

I work at company a long time ago that these type of linear fluorescents in can fixtures and the heat generated by these linear fluorescent light bulbs would destroy them in about a year or so

[stj]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

they are hard to ship, so different country's have different brands.
but the big ones still cant be beaten for lumens/W by leds.

in europe we mostly see GE(made in hungary i think), sylvania, osram and philips.

[eccerr0r]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

Yeah I was wondering about the shipping issue, and it appears all my T12 and T8 linear fluorescent bulbs are made in the USA. I only have Philips and GE bulbs as far as I can tell.

True that lumens/W for fluorescent bulbs are worse than LEDs but it's not as stark as incandescent vs LED and the infrastructure replacement cost is large as well... Not sure if they can make LED retrofit tubes worthwhile/cost effective as a replacement yet in terms of initial cost, equivalent brightness, and longevity. If LEDs are 4x cost, 2x longevity (fluorescent bulbs last quite a while if they are not mistreated!), and half the power, it's not entirely clear if it's worth it.

[stj]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

True that lumens/W for fluorescent bulbs are worse than LEDs

no, i meant the other way.
look at T12 5foot 58/65ww tubes.
5000Lumens.

[eccerr0r]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

They are still about the same or less lumens per watt last I checked, neither have that much of an advantage. At 58W 5000lm = 86lm/W, which is not that far from LEDs which can get around 100lm/W.

The F40T12 I have usually get around 3200lm. I have $1 overdriven 14W 1500lm LEDs, so 28W to produce 3000lm which over 100lm/W. Unfortunately they're cheap crap models and only rated for 15000 hours which is not much far off to the life of a typical F40T12, and to swap them out I'd need new fixtures... so cost cost cost.

Granted if you want to power cycle the fluorescent bulb vs LED, you're better off with the latter... Alas I'm not going to swap out linear fluorescent fixtures for LED compatible fixtures. Also linear fluorescent lighting is not point source, more of line source, and at least for me, shadows of darkness are annoying.

[stj]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

the 5000lumen tube isnt generating anywere near the heat of the leds though - and they spread the light all around

[eccerr0r]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

err... watch your energy conversions!

The fluorescent tube is necessarily generating more heat because more watts in and same light out. Energy cannot be destroyed, just converted.

however the LED has localized heating - some spots will be hotter. However, if the LED had a metal heatsink as big as a fluorescent tube, you'll find the LED(s) will be cooler!

[RJARRRPCGP]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

we mostly see GE(made in hungary i think)

Those seem to be the most popular GE incandescents, at least for the 3-way ones! There were a ton of them in the late-2010s.

[RukyCon]

Re: Light bulb flicker when turning on after long time off.

Not even sure if there are any chinese linear fluorescents yet?

Satco, Sylvania, Duracell (Sold exclusively at Batteries + Bulbs), and a number of generic brands that are not worth listing seem to get their linear lamps from China, i've also seen Satco F40T12s from China.

Oh, and the green end caps of Philips fluorescent tubes might be going away as Philips packs up the Salina, Kansas factory to move overseas (saw a few F40T12s at the Home Cheapo recently with silver end caps, made around December 2020).