[time-nuts] Conducting Bench Top Material

Chuck Harris cfharris at erols.com
Sat Jan 30 14:42:03 UTC 2010


I have dissected many dead CFL's, and the key component failure
is the 10uf 350V electrolytic capacitor.  Most of these bulbs caution
against using them in a base up configuration.... which of course is
how most of my CFL's are operated.

I have several rooms that are lit exclusively with CFL's, and I find
that for best life, I have to leave them on all the time.  That is what
EPA has found too!  CFL's may take less power for a given illumination,
but the owners leave them on far longer than incandescent, and the net
result is greater power consumption overall.

Add that to the mandatory drop of mercury in each, and I really can't
see how they can sell them at all.

I got two for "free" from my power company (They hid the charge on my
bill, until the courts made them reverse it...) and included with the
CFL's was an elaborate procedure for cleaning up a broken CFL.  It involved
opening all of the windows, and leaving the room for a couple of hours,
and then, with a gloved hand putting the pieces on newspaper, and folding
the newspaper up and putting it in a 1 gallon zip lock baggie.  To clean up
the broken bits, you are supposed to vacuum the area with a fresh vacuum
cleaner bag, and then put the vacuum cleaner bag in a ziplock baggie, and
take the remains off to the hazardous waste disposal facility.

-Chuck Harris

Magnus Danielson wrote:
> d.seiter at comcast.net wrote:
>> I took apart the last dead one just for that purpose. I initially eyed 
>> the 105deg Al cap, but it was dead, along with one of the xstrs (hole 
>> in package). The film caps, diodes and fuse are still good too. As is 
>> the tube- don't know what I'll do with that. 
> 
> Sounds to me that the electronics died... rather than the bulb.
> 
> Cheers,
> Magnus
> 
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