Dimmable CFL's - any advantage with msw inverters?

[PNjunction]

I run CFL bulbs successfully from pure-sine-wave inverters - no problem.

But I have some msw inverters doing nothing, so I wonder if a dimmable cfl would be more resistant / last longer with the msw waveform?

I picked up a dimmable Sylvania cfl, and it works fine with my msw type inverter, but wonder if I'm spending a little bit more for no real advantage...

[Sunking]

PN do not bother with Dimable CFL's Even with commercial power is a PIA. Fluorescent just just not work with dimmers. This is one case for LED's or regular incandescent.

[PNjunction]

Heh, forgot to mention that I will not be dimming them.

I was just wondering from a possible durability standpoint, that maybe the dimmable cfl's would be able to stand the crappy msw waveform better than a standard cfl would...

[inetdog]

Heh, forgot to mention that I will not be dimming them.

I was just wondering from a possible durability standpoint, that maybe the dimmable cfl's would be able to stand the crappy msw waveform better than a standard cfl would...

Quite to the contrary, I would expect the dimmable to be more sensitive to the incoming voltage and waveform that a non-dimmable.
They might be able to withstand it better, but they also may misinterpret the MSW waveform as being a phase-controlled dimmer at half intensity setting.

[PNjunction]

Good point - I never thought about the dimmable possibly misinterpreting the msw waveform and running at reduced brightness.

Fortunately, even under my msw inverter (stanley mobile 100w fanless) the Sylvania 14w dimmable is just as bright as when I throw it on my pure-sine wave Samlex inverter. I even compared it to some standard FEIT 14w cfl's and just about the same brightness, although for a really decent test I'd need a light-meter.

I'm not sure I'll be using these cfl's long enough with the msw inverters to determine if there is any improvement over the normal ones, but at least it didn't go dim, smoke, or get too hot. I'll probably stick to normal cfl's unless someone has any conclusive data.

[Sunking]

PN what you really want to know is how much current is being taken from the battery from each type of inverter. My guess it will be less from the TSW inverter. Also let th elights run a while and see which runs hot to the touch on the driver base.

[PNjunction]

Sunking - ran the tests. Basically neither one got hot at the base (I could leave my fingers on them all day), and both appeared to be about the same brightness, although I'm sure a light meter would be able to tell the difference. The msw inverters drew less power, but I think I probably got just a tad less light from them.

After reading the docs for the FEIT bulb, I had forgotten about not using them in 3-way switches, or the need for them to be on for a *minimum* of 15 minutes to get any life out of them. Makes sense since they are flourescent tubes, and that explains why some of mine didn't last long in high-traffic / minimum on time usage like in the bathroom. Snugged the others in the house as they all had loose connections due to thermal contraction/expansion over time.

Ratings:
Sylvania dimmable: 14w / 880 lumens
FEIT non-dimmable: 13w / 900 lumens
(I couldn't tell the difference except for possibly a slight deviation from the 2700k color temp.

Power draw after 15 minute on-time

Samlex 120w pure-sine-wave inverter:
Sylvania: 1.5A
FEIT: 1.3A

Stanley 100w mobile msw inverter:
Sylvania: 1.0A
FEIT: 1.1A

Readings are not really accurate since they were taken with a clamp-on ammeter, but it did show a trend.

In the end, I suppose that if one doesn't actually need the rated lumen output of the bulb, the msw types will save a bit of power.

[inetdog]

After reading the docs for the FEIT bulb, I had forgotten about not using them in 3-way switches, or the need for them to be on for a *minimum* of 15 minutes to get any life out of them. Makes sense since they are flourescent tubes, and that explains why some of mine didn't last long in high-traffic / minimum on time usage like in the bathroom.

Short cycle uses seem to be ideal for LED fixtures or bulbs, since for the most part they are instant on and do not suffer much if any extra stress at turn-on.
A few years ago Consumer Reports reviewed a (then) new screw-in CFL from GE which included a halogen bulb that just came on during the warm-up period of the CFL. It gave good instant on for safety, but CR found that it had an even shorter life under short cycling than a conventional CFL. (Both halogen and fluorescent failed, or maybe it was the driver.) I don't think it caught on.

[PNjunction]

Yep - got an led bulb for the hallway for just that reason. It would take too long for the cfl to warm up to be useful, and it very quickly burned up.

The major problem for me with led's bulbs was that for my radio use, they did one of two things - totally swamp the radio spectrum with noise from 3-30 mhz, OR be very clean in that part of the spectrum, but then barf out noise from 30 mhz up to 300 or more. So I have to choose very carefully about which ones I put in specific locations. For example, a few of the FEIT led bulbs made OTA hd tv viewing a pain.

But that was about 2 years ago - specs change. Doing led's for me is always an expensive test - I learned to keep receipts that's for sure.