The 47th TPBM Random Lazy Days (or not) Chat Thread

Timphoto wrote in post #17625839
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EDIT. By the way I found one of these power meters very useful.

It's amazing how much power all these little wall warts and things like the cable tv box consume when you add it all up. The meter paid for itself in the first month.

I ordered two of these but got the 4460 instead. I'm very curious how much power things really do consume. The biggie for us has been switching all lights to LED lights. We have no more incandescents and just a few CF lights left.

gjl711 wrote in post #17628148
I ordered two of these but got the 4460 instead. I'm very curious how much power things really do consume. The biggie for us has been switching all lights to LED lights. We have no more incandescents and just a few CF lights left.

We're headed in that same direction. In the kitchen I've replaced over 650 watts of incandescent & florescent lighting with 84 watts of LED lights, and I have better light on the counters now. In the den I replaced 500 watts of incandescent with 70 watts of LED's. We have the lights on in both of those areas at least 4-6 hours a day, so its a significant savings. Our electric utility just got the Okay to go to time of day pricing with the peak pricing in the 3-7pm time of day. Lovely, eh?

We've been on time-of-use pricing for a few years now. The on-peak and mid-peak time zones that switch between summer and winter seasons. The off-peak always stays the same.

We're full electric here, so we pay attention to the times. We put the water heater on a timer so it will only heat during off-peak hours. We can easily bypass it for the time cycle if we need more hot water, or it's the weekend/holidays.

We have a geothermal heat pump, so we don't have any fuel/gas/propane expenses. The system is quite efficient and trouble free. We keep the house at about 74F year round. It's cooler than I like in the summer, but Dad sets it. We don't fluctuate the temperature through the day, the system works better when we maintain a small temperature range.

We're replacing light bulbs as they die. I hate CFL bulbs. We'll buy the LED ones when they go on sale. Unfortunately, they are bigger and don't fit into everything. We'll have to replace the ceiling light fixture in the kitchen if we want to put an LED in it.

I knew the time of day pricing was coming when they replaced the old meters with the new "smart" meters.

Be careful when you buy the LED's. I found that the cheap Chinese LED's imported by a a company in Southern California were causing radio frequency interference and they were not as efficient as the better quality LED lights.

Timphoto wrote in post #17628241
I knew the time of day pricing was coming when they replaced the old meters with the new "smart" meters.

Be careful when you buy the LED's. I found that the cheap Chinese LED's imported by a a company in Southern California were causing radio frequency interference and they were not as efficient as the better quality LED lights.

That's why I want the kWh meter. Very curious on how efficient they really are. Even if a bit better than CF bulbs, I like the light that they give way better. More natural looking.

gjl711 wrote in post #17628282
That's why I want the kWh meter. Very curious on how efficient they really are. Even if a bit better than CF bulbs, I like the light that they give way better. More natural looking.

The LED's we bought are spec'd @ 3000k and 7 watts and equals a 50 watt halogen. I verified the wattage, but both the wife and I believe the light is better.

I have several different brands and several different wattages. In the family room and bed rooms it's 2700k and several sized. For the bathrooms and kitchen it's 4000k 4 foot tubes. Some are 3000k and I think we have one oddball 3200k.

On project my company does, I would be 75% of new lighting is now LED. Low current draw, results in lower temps and MUCH longer bulb light. We have just about done away completely with pot lights now, as we can get LED lights that broadcast a wider beam, and pretty much look like a pot light ring, nice and tight to the ceiling. With under-counter lights, we exclusively use LED strip lighting.

I need to win the lottery to be able to afford to switch to LED....I spent a small fortune converting to CFL and have never been happy with the life of those stupid things. I hate yellowish lighting....so every bulb in my house is in the daylight spectrum. Doesn't appear that will be an issue with the LEDs.

Woolburr wrote in post #17629941
I need to win the lottery to be able to afford to switch to LED....I spent a small fortune converting to CFL and have never been happy with the life of those stupid things. I hate yellowish lighting....so every bulb in my house is in the daylight spectrum. Doesn't appear that will be an issue with the LEDs.

I've had problems with the 4 foot tubes and ballasts burning out and we have a lot of florescent in the house. Since switching over to LED I have had none go out. They are more expensive bit it seems that the payback period is rather short. For the bulbs, I switched over a few at a time whenever some were on sale. Costco and Sam's have always had some one sale for somewhere around $8~$9 a bulb, which isn't too bad. Spread out over a few months an it's not too painful. My power meters come today so it's experiment time. Love to see what these bulbs really cost.

Even switched out the outside lights. I found some decorative typ LEW bulb replacements that turned out to be indistinguishable from the incandescent that use to be there. I have two fixtures with 4 bulbs in each so with 40w bulbs there, that.s 320w. I replaced with 2-40w equivalent (7w) and 2-15w equivalent (3w) so I went from a total of 320w to 40w. Doing the math, assuming an average of 4 hours a day, I went from $42 for a year for $5.5 a year. That's at least one meal out. , or a 2 year payback on the bulbs.

TSC had an incredible sale on LED bulbs, that's when we started switching. I like the light a whole lot better, and they don't need a warm-up period. Our front door light was always burning out. CFLs don't seem to like Canadian winters, or the constant slamming of the storm door right next to it.

Woolburr wrote in post #17629941
I need to win the lottery to be able to afford to switch to LED....I spent a small fortune converting to CFL and have never been happy with the life of those stupid things. I hate yellowish lighting....so every bulb in my house is in the daylight spectrum. Doesn't appear that will be an issue with the LEDs.

The cost of LED's is dropping all the time. The CFL phase was not a great one. We too have not had great luck with them. I would just change to LED as other burn our.

Jill-of-all-Trades wrote in post #17629976
TSC

Toronto Sock Company?
Wait, Toronto Socket Company, maybe?

BearLeeAlive wrote in post #17629982
The cost of LED's is dropping all the time. ...

When I first started looking at LED they were over $20 a bulb. I think I picked one up just because I was curious but at that price, it was just too much. Now nearly all except for some specialty bulbs are under $10. At that price it's a no brainer.

BearLeeAlive wrote in post #17629982
The cost of LED's is dropping all the time. The CFL phase was not a great one. We too have not had great luck with them. I would just change to LED as other burn our.

Toronto Sock Company?
Wait, Toronto Socket Company, maybe?

Tractor Supply Company. TSC. The Incredible Country Hardware Store.