Exploding Florescent Bulb

[Emancipation 2]

Anyone have this happen to them? Yesterday in the midst of Christmas dinner prep, a light bulb exploded in our kitchen. A compact florescent bulbs Model 2425 (the new style energy efficient, spiral in shape). Thankfully i had just left the room, but there were pieces of glass everywhere, all over the table, and into 2 other rooms it had exploded with so much force. It terrified me. The light had just been on for barely 3 minutes, and thankfully there was no one else in the room. I've written to the company and saved the bulb (which was pretty much destroyed). It's making me leery of LIghts of America bulbs that's for sure.

[almaty 19]

interesting....i have not heard of this prior

[Emancipation 2]

Just found this... I cleaned this up oh about 100% wrong..

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/ge...0939/page2.html

Just for most members info about the mercury in CF bulbs:

Mercury--a toxic metal known to cause brain, spinal cord, kidney and liver damage in humans--does not break down easily and, once airborne, often finds its way into groundwater, rivers and the sea, where it can cause a host of contamination issues for wildlife and people alike.

The first thing to do when a compact fluorescent bulb breaks is to open all the windows to disperse any mercury vapor that may have escaped. Then put on gloves, sweep up the fragments, and wipe the area with a disposable paper towel

. Using a vacuum is a bad idea, as it will only stir up any lingering airborne mercury. Lastly, the fragments should be sealed into a plastic bag and recycled or disposed of.

The best way to dispose of burned-out or broken compact fluorescent bulbs is to take or mail them (in the sealed plastic bag) to a mercury recycling facility. The website of the Association of Lighting and Mercury Recyclers provides contact information for locating such facilities state by state. If mercury recycling is not an option in your area, the bulb or fragments should be placed in sealed plastic bags and disposed of at your local Household Hazardous Waste (HHW) collection site.

Ironically, compact fluorescent bulbs are responsible for less mercury contamination than the incandescent bulbs they replaced, even though incandescents don’t contain any mercury. The highest source of mercury in America’s air and water results from the burning of fossil fuels, such as coal, at utilities that supply electricity. Since a compact fluorescent bulb uses 75 percent less energy than an incandescent bulb, and lasts at least six times longer, it is responsible for far less mercury pollution in the long run. A coal-burning power plant will emit four times more mercury to produce the electricity for an incandescent bulb than for a compact fluorescent.

CONTACTS: Association of Lighting and Mercury Recyclers, www.almr.org; Earth911.org, www.earth911.org; EPA Household Hazardous Waste Page, http://www.epa.gov/epaoswer/non-hw/m...w.htm#options; EPA Fact Sheet: Mercury in Compact Fluorescent Lamps, www.nema.org/lamprecycle/epafactsheet-cfl.pdf.

Resource: http://www.boulderweekly.com/archive...earthtalk.html

[almaty 19]

wow..it is like a biological weapon

[Emancipation 2]

wow..it is like a biological weapon

you should have been around yesterday ... it was a weapon!

[Teacher Mark 53]

You are not alone.

http://www.cleanmpg.com/forums/archive/ind...com/t-7418.html

Here's the rest of the hits:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&cli...ode&spell=1

[NickD 202]

wow..it is like a biological weapon

you should have been around yesterday ... it was a weapon!

I just had a 100 watt equivalent Sylvania blow up, not the glass, but the base that housed the electronics had a large crack in it. Peeked inside, was fused, and the fuse was evaporated, but not before a capacitor and Triac blew apart. Put six of these in my lab where I demand maximum brightness, but have to wait about three minutes before they warm up enough to get that brightness. This one was in the middle of the string so can't really contribute line surges to this problem.

Back to engineering basics, the more ####### your put into a design, the more stuff that can go wrong, that tiny PCB was jammed with components all mounted vertically, the worse possible way to arrange electronic components. I didn't go as far to analyze the circuit but didn't spot any transient protection circuitry, didn't check on the ratings of the many capacitors and semi-conductors mounted in there for overload protection. That would be another concerned as even a mild transient can blow these things to hell if designed cheaply. The base is cemented to the lamp holder base, ha, on this one, that bond was broken. But would really be a ###### to recycle these things especially with mercury inside of the tube, assuming it wasn't blown to hell.

Talk about obsoleting all incandescents in the next couple of years, that would really screw me as if they did make the small and medium based units, would still look like hell in my many light fixtures. I have dimmers throughout my home, years go by before I have to replace a burnt out light bulb, a 10% cut in power extends a 2,000 hour bulb to over 4,000 hours, at 30%, still plenty bright, reduction to well over 10,000 hours, and get instant light when you just walk into the room to grab something.

These things are a farce, need something much better, safer, and easy to recycle. If the government wants to save on energy, can turn off those zillions of mercury vapor street lamps that just put in over a ten mile stretch of interstate type road, don't need them, vehicle has headlamps for that. Not only here, but in every stinking little town in the USA, what a waste that our tax dollars are paying for.

[Jasman0717 8]

Scary stuff