Some of you may already be aware of my light bulb fetish… but it has now progressed to a new level. My first step, a few years ago, was to abolish all standard bulbs and replace them with energy saving equivalents. This was straight forward for most of my fittings, but not so easy for the GU10 spotlights (those are the 50W or 35W halogen spotlights you generally get in your kitchen – see the right-hand bulb in the photo above). My first energy efficient GU10s were daylight bulbs and quite massive – not suitable for putting in a recessed spot fitting in a ceiling as they’d stick out too far, and they took ages to warm up. Once we moved to Wales, our new kitchen needed 6 spotlights all recessed, and running these on 35W would be quite costly. So I invested in some very compact ‘Kosnic’ 7W jobbies, shown as the middle bulb in the above photo. These fit very nicely in the fittings and once warmed up to full brightness (about a minute) give off as much light as normal halogen bulbs do. But… I don’t think they like being turned on and off frequently and one went pop the other day. So I again turned to Google and discovered that LED bulbs are now not too pricey. I went for a couple of Enviro-Light LED bulbs (see the left-hand bulb in the photo) which claim to provide the equivalent light of a 35W bulb but using only 3W. The first impressions are pretty good, you get light instantly when you turn it on so no more waiting for them to warm up to full brightness. Colour-wise, the light it slightly whiter than the Kosnics and the halogens, but only very slightly so – if I had a full ceiling of LED bulbs I don’t reckon I’d notice. They run cool too, no more wasted energy in the form of generated heat. My only issue is their length – they are about 4mm longer than the halogens and the Kosnics so they stick out very slightly from the fitting, but I’m being fussy here more than anything and trying hard to pick fault with them for the sake of trying to find a problem. In all honesty, the real issue most people may have with them is the price at about £12 a bulb… but keep in mind that they should last around 20 years or so – I replaced halogens at least once a year so replacement cost combined with running cost must even out pretty quickly… someone do the maths please? If you’re interested, I got mine from BLT Direct which seem to be the best price around at the moment. So, Dad… guess what I’m bringing with me on Boxing Day for you to test out…..
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Tags: Energy Saving, Gadgets, Light Bulbs
