Incandescents staging a comeback

Because of their poor efficency, incandescents have been essentially legislated out of existence in the USA.

Rather than losing much of their business, the lighting company's engineers have gone back to the drawing board.

Available now are bulbs that are 30% more effecient than last years. Next year they should be up 100% and within a few years they are slated to be on a par with CFLs or about 4 times more lumen output from the same wattage.

Now, despite a common misconception, incandescents have a great spectrum for plant growing, it is just that too much energy is wasted as heat and the life expectancy of a bulb is quite short. I currently use a low wattage incandescent in flowering as the light is rich in deep red, far red and infrared -areas most other grow lights are lacking in. (I recommend about 10% total wattage in incandescent - try it!)

If the engineers deliver on these promises we may have a new source of great supplemental lighting. And of course, the CFL manufacturers will not stand idly by and will be forced to make their lights more efficient. A win-win!

The only problem that I have with CFLs, is folks throwing them out and ending up in landfills. They have mecury in them.... heavy metals leach into the ground and the ground water, as well as rivers and lakes. That is not a good thing, and will do a lot of serious damage to the environment.

The government is real good with comming up with all kinds of stuff like that, without considering the consequences. Where are the recycling centers for CFLs and flouros?? There are none around here.... There *might* be one in New Orleans, or Mobile..... but nowhere within a 220 mile round trip.

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Originally Posted by RackitMan

Now, despite a common misconception, incandescents have a great spectrum for plant growing, it is just that too much energy is wasted as heat and the life expectancy of a bulb is quite short. I currently use a low wattage incandescent in flowering as the light is rich in deep red, far red and infrared -areas most other grow lights are lacking in. (I recommend about 10% total wattage in incandescent - try it!)

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First off what exactly can you prove that incandescents do for you in flowering? I understand that you "recommend" 10% of the wattage be incandescent, but WHY is the important detail that you left out.

Unless you don't know and you just think it helps you so you want to tell others to do it to, in which case I'll just ignore this thread, apologize for stopping in, and be on my way.

Please provide justification in the future for your suggestions. Nothing worse than another post telling growers to do something unconventional with no evidence of why to do it. Maybe I'm the only one that feels this way, but I'll do jumping jacks and feed my plants PEZ if someone can prove to me that it is beneficial.

why not just go with LEDs?

i feel ya irydyum....i do love PEZ though!


-shake

Some of you may have already seen this on another thread, but I thought I'd share it with you different light loverS!

[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTGsM9pplUs[/YOUTUBE]

I agree. That is the new future of lighting.

Things are probably going to be crazy expensive, but probably worth it in the long run if the hype built up to it doesn't famish. Just imagine doing a micro grow with one of those! OOOOO or even a grow in a room 10X10 with a whole bunch of them!

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Originally Posted by headshake

why not just go with LEDs?

i feel ya irydyum....i do love PEZ though!


-shake

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As you and others here know I love LEDs, but the cheapest and easiest source of Far Red 770nm is a simple incandescent (philips red glass party) bulb. :) I use them.

I'm gonna subscribe to this just in case the discussion fruits results

SMG

Click the title below for original link!

Breakthrough: Regular Light Bulb Made Super-Efficient with Laser (!)



Everything is Better with Lasers
What if you could take a regular incandescent lightbulb, zap it with a powerful laser for a small fraction of a second, and make it about twice as efficient as a regular lightbulb? That seems to be what researchers at the University of Rochester did. What does the laser do? It creates an "array of nano- and micro-scale structures on the surface of [the] regular tungsten filamentâ??the tiny wire inside a light bulbâ??and these structures make the tungsten become far more effective at radiating light." Read on for more details.

"We've been experimenting with the way ultra-fast lasers change metals, and we wondered what would happen if we trained the laser on a filament," says Chunlei Guo, associate professor of optics at the University of Rochester. "We fired the laser beam right through the glass of the bulb and altered a small area on the filament. When we lit the bulb, we could actually see this one patch was clearly brighter than the rest of the filament, but there was no change in the bulb's energy usage." [...] During its brief burst, Guo's laser unleashes as much power as the entire grid of North America onto a spot the size of a needle point. That intense blast forces the surface of the metal to form nanostructures and microstructures that dramatically alter how efficiently light can radiate from the filament.

The laser is very powerful, but the pulse is so short (in the femtosecond range - "a femtosecond is to a second what a second is to about 32 million years") that it actually requires very little energy and can even be powered from a regular wall outlet.
The team has also succeeded in making the bulb produce polarized light without the use of a filter.

Making Incandescent Bulbs Greener
If this works as well as the University of Rochester claims, it sounds like a big breakthrough to me. Once this process is commercialized and scaled, it probably would be very inexpensive and there wouldn't be any reason to keep selling regular incandescent bulbs.
In fact, if this technology can be further improved, maybe cheap incandescent bulbs will compete against CFLs in energy efficiency, minus the mercury and higher price tag. LEDs will probably still have the upper hand in longevity and directionality, but cost will probably stay higher for a while longer...

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Originally Posted by oldmac

As you and others here know I love LEDs, but the cheapest and easiest source of Far Red 770nm is a simple incandescent (philips red glass party) bulb. :) I use them.

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This is fine and acceptable to me because if you have an LED grow and you are trying to get the 770nm to fill out your spectrum then I respect that cause/effect relationship.

What I don't like is someone simply stating "add 10% of your total wattage in incandescent" without providing any reason or justification.

incandescent might have a comeback in future but who knows.

Thie nice thing about CFLs is that even if they are thrown into a landfill after failure, the net mercury released into the environment is still lower than if a traditional incadescent. The murcury produced by coal-burning powerplants over the life-span of an incandescent is greater than the mercury in a CFL.

If they are properly recycled, even better. My local IKEA and Staples have a bin for old CFL recycling.

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Originally Posted by FatSean

Thie nice thing about CFLs is that even if they are thrown into a landfill after failure, the net mercury released into the environment is still lower than if a traditional incadescent.

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Please check your facts... incandescent bulbs DO NOT contain mecury.

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Originally Posted by Mississippi Steve

Please check your facts... incandescent bulbs DO NOT contain mecury.

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Please re-read my post. Net mercury released over the life of the bulb. The incandescent may contain no mercury, but because it requires 4 times the electricity (generated from coal-burning plants that emit mercury) the net mercury released is lower for the CFL, even if you eat the CFL.

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Originally Posted by FatSean

even if you eat the CFL.

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Is this how IKEA and Staples are recommending to recycle? Where the hell did that come from?

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Originally Posted by irydyum

Is this how IKEA and Staples are recommending to recycle? Where the hell did that come from?

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They have collection bins and they send the spent bulbs to be recycled. The eating part was a silly joke.

Incandescent bulbs are set to be outlawed in Europe.