(guess it’s ok to posst in more than 1 forum same topic)
Running a room full of trains is probably not that energy efficient, but I thought I’d bring up this topic to see if anyone is using the new energy efficient bulbs (they look like an archamides screw). My wife bought some and they give off pretty good light. They come in different spectrums with some giving a good daylight spectrum appearance.
In a related energy efficent topic, the Washington Post yesterday said it’s worth spending $100 to get a thermostate that automatically turns off and on (you set it) for when you are home or not home. It will save $150 a year, the article states.
Also, totally unrelated to trains, the same article said to throw away your washing machine if it is a pre 2004 model. The new energy star models save $100 a year. However, keep your dryer as they haven’t yet become efficient.
We use those bulbs, David. All the bulbs in our house are energy efficient. I always look for the bulbs that give off a blue glow. Those more closely approximate natural light. 75 W is the highest wattage bulbs we use anywhere in the house. We also have a thermostat that’s programmable (two actually). We just bought a new washer a few months back. Not only is it more energy and water efficient, we mailed in a coupon and recieved $75 back from some energy organization.
Now if I could only get my kids to shut a light off when they leave a room.
Years ago, I replaced all the bulbs in the house with the 1st gen fluorescents. They make quite a difference in the ComEd bill. We don’t have a programmable thermostat - I just keep it low… [;)]
Replacing appliances is a great idea if one has the cash-flow to do it. I don’t. So they run until they die. May they run forever… [8)]
Compact flourescents are great, the new LED bulbs are going to be even better. I have a pair of Luxeon LED flashlights that bow away even halogen based units AND they run on way less power. The three cell AA unit can run continuosly for 30 hours if needed.
Set back thermostat is fine if no one is home but we found that with pets and kids, the money saved on energy went for vet or dr bills.
Re the washing machine, If you only run one load week, it’s going to take a long time to amortize the energy savings from a new $1,000 washing machine.
Unless you have a massive layout you aren’t going to pull much more power than a typical blow dryer.
As a matter of fact it is, Brent. I’ll have to look into that.
Who said one load a week? I have 3 kids and a wife who constantly changes her clothes. We do one load an hour for Pete’s sake!
I saw some doohickeys in a catalog recently that attach to the bottom of an ordinary lightbulb, and are supposed to increase it’s life by thousands of hours. I wonder if they really work.
There is almost always someone home at our house. We never really drop the heat more than a few degrees at night. 67 in the day, 63 at night.
Those bulbs are great energy savers, but contain mercury. You shouldn’t throw them in the trash, they are hazardous material. Dangerous if broken.
I like the light from incandescent lights…and use dimmers on the lights we keep on in the evening, bathroom, living room, and bedrooms. I am also using low voltage xenon under the kitchen cabinets…10,000 hours of life with little heat compared to halogen.
A programmable thermostat was one of the first upgrades I put into my house. It saved me a fortune–considerably more than $150 a year. Savings drops if you have people home during the day, but I think $150 a year is still pretty conservative. If you don’t have one, buy one the next time you’re anywhere near a hardware or home improvement store. I’m extremely confident that it will pay for itself by the end of the year.
When my furnace died early this year (it was original to the house, dating to the 1960s) I replaced it with the most energy efficient model available and I also added a whole house humidifier and de-humidifier. That made a difference. It’ll take a lot longer for a $4,000 furnace to pay for itself than a $50 programmable thermostat, but… I hear a lot of people complain that their wives want the temperature to be 80 degrees in the winter but they’re comfortable at 70 degrees in the summer. The reason is humidity. Crank the humidity when it’s cold, and everyone will be comfortable at 70 in the winter if they’re comfortable at 70 in the summer. The dehumidifier allows you to keep the temperature a couple of degrees warmer in the summer. The A/C itself acts as a dehumidifier, but a dedicated dehumidifier does a better job.
As for CFs, a few years ago I started replacing my conventional bulbs with CFs as they burned out. The only conventional bulbs I have left now are lights that rarely get any use. They make a difference, though in my experience they don’t last nearly as long as the package says. I may need to try another brand.
I also put the plastic film over my windows in the winter time. Since I have a lot of 1960s vintage windows still, this makes a big difference. If you have reasonably recent windows, it may not be worth the time, effort, and expense. New windows are next on my list of home improvements.
Quote from Dave: “I hear a lot of people complain that their wives want the temperature to be 80 degrees in the winter but they’re comfortable at 70 degrees in the summer.”
Good point!
Re: thermostat, not sure how to install or program; guess I can read the instructions after getting thru 20 pages of safety warnings followed by 10 pages in Spanish
Installation should be a matter of either three or four wires (I forget which). Try pulling your existing thermostat off the wall and look how it’s wired. It’s usually just a matter of removing four wires and hooking them up to the equivalent terminals on the new one.
I got in over my head (my wiring wasn’t as simple as it was supposed to be) and had to call in a pro to straighten it out, but it was still worth it.
Programming the thermostat isn’t too bad. Most models today are menu-driven. They can’t make it too hard, or people would uninstall them and bring them back to the store. The manual for my thermostat was about 40 pages long but it was in 2-3 languages and included tons of pictures and diagrams.
I’ve seen “pro’s” screw up the wiring on the more elaborate set backs.
Make sure it has a backup battery and that the battery is fresh (and stays that way). I’d say look at the units on display at the local home emporium then go back home and pull up the manual on line and see what it’s like to set up/install and program. You can also peek behind your existing unit and see how many wires you’ve got and whether that matches what the thermostat (and your heating/cooling system) would like to see.
Each compact fluorescent has about 5/1000 of a gram of mercury. Not very much, and not a hazard if you break one in your house.
Putting an incandescent bulb on a dimmer does reduce the energy used by that bulb. Those little discs (diodes) you put under a screw base bulb also dim the bulb and reduce energy consumption by almost 50%. The downside is that bulbs dimmed either way also have a much lower efficiency. Reducing the power to an incandescent bulb by 50% will reduce visible light output by substantially more than 50%.
High power LEDs, which will probably find their way into many of your common home lamp fixtures in the next 5-10 years, will actually increase in efficiency when run at lower power levels.
Newer xenon halogen cycle incandescent lamps are more efficient than standard incandescent lamps, but still do not even begin to approach the efficiency of fluorescent bulbs.
There is an even newer incandescent bulb technology which utilizes a coating on the surface of the bulb capsule to reflect radiated heat back toward the filament. This will increase incandescent efficiency even more, but it still will not approach the efficiencies of fluorescent and current generation LED light sources.
As for our trains, the addition of superheat and feedwater preheating should yield impressive improvements in motive efficiency. Oh, wrong forum and 80 years too late!
I’ve yet to see a compact fluorescent bulb with color I was happy with. In particular, I can’t stand to read with one of the compact fluorescents.
Regarding extending the life of incandescent bulbs: Most bulbs fail from the thermal shock to the filament when first turning them on. In fact, if you watch a clear bulb, the filament will “jump” and vibrate if you give it full power when cold.
You can dramatically extend the life of an incandescent bulb if you put it on a dimmer and slowly ramp up the power every time you turn it on.
I think that this is what some of the lamp life extenders commonly sold do.
I have several of the diode disks that fit under an incandescent bulb and they do work to extend the life of the bulb considerably. I assume they reduce energy consumption, but the sure do dim the bulb! I needed to replace the porch light several years ago, (used to do it at least once a year!) and I had just purchased the diode disks, unfortunately, the only bulb I had on hand was a 25-Watt bulb. I thought that since I was replacing the bulb so often, I would just get a bigger bulb next time… that was 5 years ago, haven’t replaced the bulb yet.
I have tried using the energy saaving thermostat that I bought at Home Depot and reccomend it for the trash pile as the quality was NO Good!! Worked when it wanted to, I programmed it according to directions(replaced batteries) and even reset it three times before removing the monster, could be a Home Depot reject.
The flourescent lights that are the new screw in bulbs are a real savings on the light bill!!
Energy efficiency makes sense of course but there are times when good old incandescents can do you a power of good. As kids, my friend and I had a cold garage to run our trains in but thanks to incandescent bulbs and I guess body heat too, we could get the place quite cosy! I’m glad it wasn’t me paying the electric bill though. Dad came down to the garage one winter and said “I’m having the electrician lay in a proper line because those three extension cords you boys have laid, have melted the snow on either side of them.”
Fast forward to today when our cheap and cheesy landlord cut off the heat to our pad, I installed the most inefficient high wattage incandescents I could find (those ‘long life’ bulbs) and that plus some plastic on the windows made such a huge difference we have to leave the door ajar in winter! Long live incandescent bulbs!