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Good bulbs for the bathroom

Discussion in 'Techno-Magic' started by SlickRCBD, Jun 1, 2025.

  1. SlickRCBD Gems: 29/31
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    I installed LED lights in the bathroom over two years ago. They came from a 12-pack that I installed elsewhere.
    However, they keep burning out every couple of months. One at a time, not all at once.
    Previously I and my late mother who owned the house before me had been working our way through a huge stockpile of incandescent light bulbs left over from when ComEd used to give out free light bulbs when you paid you electric bill in person back in the '80s and the early '90s.
    The incandescent bulbs would last years.

    The bathroom differs in that the lights are often only switched on for 2 minutes or less when somebody does their business and leaves. Also it is the most humid room in the house because of the shower.
    I have no idea what could could LEDs to burn out so quickly. Most of the others haven't been replaced at all and those that have have only been replaced once.

    I'd go back to using incandescent bulbs for the bathroom only but I can't find them reasonably priced anymore.

    Any suggestions on what I should look for that is not too expensive in 2025 in the Chicagoland area? Of course I can order online, but I don't want to get a suggestion for something for Europe where they use 240v instead of 120v. It needs to fit standard American sockets. I'm using 60W equivalent. Used to use 60's like this and they lasted for years:
    [​IMG]
     
    Last edited: Jun 1, 2025
  2. Taluntain

    Taluntain Resident Alpha and Omega Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder Resourceful Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) BoM XenForo Migration Contributor [2015] (for helping support the migration to new forum software!)

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  3. Blackthorne TA

    Blackthorne TA Master in his Own Mind Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    As that Reddit thread mentions short life for LED bulbs is often caused by heat buildup in enclosed fixtures. Do your bathroom fixtures enclose the bulbs or are they out in the open? If they are enclosed, look for bulbs that say they are made for that.
     
  4. SlickRCBD Gems: 29/31
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    Semi enclosed.
    [​IMG]

    The thing is, the same bulbs from the same package are installed in a lamp on a timer that is on for hours every night and I've only had one burn out, while the box of 24 is almost empty after only a couple years from changing the bathroom lights. I used 7 of them in other fixtures and only had to change the light on the timer. The rest were all from the bathroom.
     
  5. SlickRCBD Gems: 29/31
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    Middle of the night, another bulb is going, it is acting like a strobe light.
    Any danger in not changing it until sunrise when I can see without a flashlight in there? I might have to use the toilet again before then as dinner was salty and I drank over half a gallon of water, possibly 3/4 between dinner and going to bed.
     
  6. Sorvo

    Sorvo Where's the nearest pub? Distinguished Member ★ SPS Account Holder Adored Veteran

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    I've had this same problem slickster, even though these new light bulbs take less energy to use they are still made to burn out fast. Just another way of making you think you're saving $ and helping with the earth :beer:
     
  7. SlickRCBD Gems: 29/31
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    I wouldn't be so pissed if they didn't advertise that they LEDs are supposed to last longer than incandescents. It says prominently on the box "Lasts 9 years", yet they are going bad after less than 9 months in the bathroom. It also says in the fine print "based on 3 hours usage per day". I'm not spending 3 hours in the bathroom every day. At least not 99% of the time, there was that one time when I had a stomach bug around Christmas last year where I was throwing up, but that was only for a couple days, and I suppose I have had it on for more than 3 hours total that one time when I was cleaning on a rainy day (if it's sunny the light from the translucent window is more than enough in the morning).

    They probably do last longer, if you are going by the incandessents from the 1920's or 1930's rather than the ones from the 1980's, let alone 21st century.
     
    Last edited: Jun 8, 2025
  8. Beren

    Beren Lovesick and Lonely Wanderer Staff Member Distinguished Member ★ SPS Account Holder Resourceful Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    Personally I can't stand those tube lights. Always have to just them just right, and even then just a slight falling out of position means you have to try and attain perfection all over again.

    At least the bulbs you can just screw in and they're good to go, even if you have to replace them semi-frequently.
     
  9. Sorvo

    Sorvo Where's the nearest pub? Distinguished Member ★ SPS Account Holder Adored Veteran

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    I don't know how tube lights came into this conversatin but yeah, they sucked too :beer:
     
  10. SlickRCBD Gems: 29/31
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    Do you mean ordinary florescents like the T8 or those torpedo shaped bulbs that screw into a normal socket?
     
  11. Keneth Gems: 29/31
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    I've never had an LED bulb burn out on me. I've even purposefully installed them in houses with old wiring because they're better at handling surges and stuff. I've had them in open fixtures, closed fixtures, and everything in between. Their life expectancy should be easily an order of magnitude longer than that of standard incandescents. I don't know what kind of LEDs you guys are using. Is this a common issue for people? :hmm:
     
  12. SlickRCBD Gems: 29/31
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    The packaging looks different (my box was green, but I recycled it on Tuesday morning so I can't send a pic), but it's the same Walmart generic brand that I just tossed:
    https://www.walmart.com/ip/Great-Va...2?classType=VARIANT&athbdg=L1300&from=/search

    More than half the 12-pack was used in that one fixture I posted a pic of earlier. Only the living room light bulb has burned out and that one is on a timer every day from sunset (varies from 4:15pm to 8:30pm from solstice to solstice) until 10:30pm.
    I used to have an electronic eye my parents bought in the '80s to automatically adjust the start time, but it broke and I never replaced it.

    So it's just the bathroom light fixture, which might be in part because it is turned on and off frequently for short periods of time. It might be because of the inherent humidity that comes from taking showers right next to the fixture.
    Hence my question on what to buy for the bathroom.

    So any suggestions on what to buy to replace the lights in that fixture?
     
    Last edited: Jun 13, 2025
  13. Keneth Gems: 29/31
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    Those seem to have a fairly low life expectancy for an LED bulb, but even so, it's around 10k hours. LEDs are also the best option for lights that get switched on and off a lot, so that shouldn't matter. I haven't had any bulbs that are directly exposed in a bathroom, so I can't tell you if that has any effect on it. Overall, I just find it weird that the bulbs are burning out at all. I don't even know what could cause that, aside from maybe extreme heat buildup or very strong power surges.
     
  14. Taluntain

    Taluntain Resident Alpha and Omega Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder Resourceful Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) BoM XenForo Migration Contributor [2015] (for helping support the migration to new forum software!)

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    Very common, I've had to change a number of them over the years in bog-standard conditions, nothing extreme in any way. In general, I'd say the average realistic life span of a typical LED bulb would be somewhere between 1/2 and 2/3 of a typical incandescent bulb. But obviously with dozens of different LED bulb brands, I'm sure YMMV depending on the brand.
     
  15. SlickRCBD Gems: 29/31
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    Yeah, the '90s incandescent bulbs ComEd gave out when you paid the power bill lasted longer in the bathroom fixture than the LEDs are lasting. A lot longer.
    The trouble is I'm fresh out of those 60W incandescent bulbs. Between my parents and grandparents they had stockpiled nearly a a 25 year supply, but they started running out about 5 years ago.
    Well, actually I have one box left, but I'm saving it for the socket with the dimmer switch.
    So I really need a suggestion (maybe with a link) to something I can put in that fixture in the bathroom that won't burn out so quickly, or maybe I need to try to locate some similar incandesent bulbs or maybe try CFLs? Although all florescent bulbs are in the process of being banned for reasons, which shocked me considering that our own Barack Obama advocated for them a decade ago.
     
  16. Keneth Gems: 29/31
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    Bizarre. I've never heard that before. The whole point of LEDs is that they're far more expensive but also last incomparably longer than normal incandescents. They must be making some truly low-quality LEDs these days.
     
  17. SlickRCBD Gems: 29/31
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    I wonder if it's a technicality. The LED part is fine and not burned out, but the driver fails so it doesn't work.
    As far as the average consumer is concerned, it doesn't matter. The darned thing doesn't work and doesn't last as long as the incandescent, but we know how lawyers and court judges have a different view of what "doesn't burn out for 9 years" means compared to the average consumer. If it technically didn't burn out but something else failed, well legally they might be in the clear.

    Just like how hard drive manufacturers have gotten away with using 1000 bytes to be a kilobyte so they can under-represent the capacity of their hard drives in the packaging.
     
  18. Blackthorne TA

    Blackthorne TA Master in his Own Mind Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    It is most likely the other electronics that have failed in a LED bulb. There are multiple LEDs in a lamp and I'd guess they are not all wired in series, so if one fails the entire lamp does not go out.

    Technically, the SI standard for kilobytes is 1000 bytes. The kibibyte (KiB) is used to denote the binary 1024 bytes.
     
  19. SlickRCBD Gems: 29/31
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    still, those bulbs seem OK for the other lamps, just not the bathroom, so what bulbs should I buy to put in the bathroom?

    It could be the short periods of being turned on and off, or it could be the humidity since they are less than 3 feet from the spigot where the hot water for the shower comes out, and the shower curtain is about the same level as the spigot so the steam goes right over it.

    For some reason the preview in this post is truncated
    https://sorcerers.net/community/threads/good-bulbs-for-the-bathroom.101471/#post-866821
     
  20. Blackthorne TA

    Blackthorne TA Master in his Own Mind Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    I wish I could tell you; it shouldn't be either of those things, but it could be either or both I guess. Have you tried opening one up and looking inside to see what might have happened? I can only suggest that if the bulbs you have don't work well in the bathroom, stop using them in the bathroom :) Maybe try different brands/types until you find one that seems to work well for you in that location.
     
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