Today I checked out the lamps a large retail outlet (Saturn in Dresden) stocks. Incandescents are of course now limited to clear ones, so far up to 60 watts, and LED retrofits have mushroomed, with light colours I still find not really satisfying.

A major change, which I already glimpsed from outside also in other outlets, concerns the CFL offerings: The 6500 K lamps have disappeared and replaced by 4000 K ones. I could not resist from picking up one, a 18 watts Osram "Made in Germany", and just put it on in the windowless bathroom. Well, I think I will leave it in, at least if it, as I expect, really looks better during daytime than 3000 K. The lighting level falls behind 200 lux, not that much for 4000 K (and definitely not enough for 6500 K, thus I never tried these lamps), but already the 18 watts lamp fits under the ball just barely. Simply screwing in a big 23 watts puppy and let it burn open next to the shower does not seem to be really advisable.

The "warm white" Osram CFLs are now mostly 825, but in the big sizes around 20 watts some 827 models were still in stock and also on display, giving a reference for the particularly yellowish 825 light which I think should look good at low lighting levels but too dull at higher levels. Have meanwhile some details about this 825 phosphor, which appears to be proprietary to Osram, emerged? It must have particular components, since it has a disctinctive yellowish/green tint, pretty obvious when seen next to the 827 and 840 lamps with their white powders.

Actually I went into the store to see if they stock replacements for the Philips "Made in China" T5 / 13 watts lamps that just started to fail with blackened ends almost simultaneously, after hardly more than 7000 hours. These lamps had replaced identical ones, with the exception that the predecessors were still "Made in Holland". Now they have disappeared from the store where I got both sets and I was already fearing that this time it would not be an easy "walk in and take away" purchase (in the pre-1990 days these lamps were notoriously difficult to get, although Narva Brand-Erbisdorf always made them). But not so, under the big tubes loomed what I was looking for, and it turned out to be Osram "Made in Italy" 827 lamps. The Dutch and later Chinese Philips lamps were 29 / 530, i.e. 3000 K plain halophosphate. The improvement is pretty obvious, red and green things that so far at night looked dull, almost gray, now literally light up.

Also on stock was T5 / 8 watts, if I'm not terribly wrong also 827 and of same origin. I think it had been discussed here how this lamp size appears to exist in the wild only with 640 phosphor.

Interesting observations. Here in the USA, incandescents are still available in clear and soft white, although the 100w bulbs are getting hard to find in California. LEDs have indeed grown in selection, but are still too expensive for widespread acceptance. CFLs are available in 2700K-3000K, 3500K, 5000K, and 6500K. 4100K ones also exist but are not easily found. As for the classic preheat T5s, we have them here too. But the GE and Philips lamps are Chinese junk. The Osram Sylvania preheat T5s are made in Mexico on old GTE Sylvania machinery moved from one of the US plants that closed in '98. They are very good, although I came across a few that had no mercury. The SLIs were German or British made but have not seen recent ones so I don't know.

The Phillips F4T5 I saw at Home Depot was made in Japan, the rest in China.


Powell

In the UK, you can get 2700K CFLs nearly everywhere. The other option is daylight (6500k)ones, but they are rare. There are no 825 or 840 CFLs. As for leds, very dim, expensive and pretty coloured. Not my thing!

Sorry to bump an old topic, just found my password 

I was always frustrated that you couldn't get daylight CFLs anywhere except for speciality outlets such as the Eco Centre at first but now they are appearing everywhere - for a few years now my local DIY shops have stocked them albeit intermittently, the wholesaler down the road can always get them and the cheap offerings from some of the smaller shops are often 6500°K. I've also bought 4000°K golfball CFLs from a local shop although these didn't last long when in use every evening from dusk until around midnight.

Daylight CFLs can be seen in many houses these days. There is also a trend for new shops (round here at least) to install daylight T8s/T5s or 5000°K T5s. Refits tend to get the same treatment. I think Wilko's are about the yellowest stores left here even though they had to ditch their 8 footers recently due to the exorbitant price of 100W tubes.

I have some classic T5s in each colour from Warm White to Daylight plus several 4W 6" "blue" UV tubes and a 6W 9" "Black Light Blue" UV tube. I had to wait until a few years ago though before I could find a supply of 13W 21" tubes in daylight as I use these in the kitchen, alongside the ceiling 65W 5' SRS fitting with a GE F65/55 tube.


BG

BG101: If you lose your password and forget it, you can reset it (If there is an option in LG) or restore it (Depends on which option available in LG).
In Israel, all of the household PL fixtures were discontinued and now you can find only CFL and LED desk lamps and wall fixtures.
Both incandescents and halogens of over 60W were banned, and all of the fixtures that sold here that aren't linear fluorescents or LEDs, are screwbases, there are no 2D or PL household fixtures sold anymore.
Also, preheat T8s seems to be declining also from shops in Israel, and being replaced by very short life HF T5 (>14W) fixtures.

dor123, I tried the password reset several times but didn't receive an email, fortunately I have retrieved it from a memory stick so all is well.

I'll have a look at the offerings in the DIY stores soon and see what's available here in England. As for lamps, even 60W bulbs have all but disappeared from the supermarkets although they can be bought in discount stores and local shops, these are now selling 100W incandescents marked as "rough service" to get round the ban.

Interestingly (for me anyway) ES bulbs seem to be more readily available these days (everywhere) - this is a fairly recent phenomenon, maybe the last decade or so, though I changed my household fittings to ES many years ago. It's also true of CFLs. Many fittings and standalone lamps are now supplied with either E27 or E14 lamp-holders. The only issue with E14 is the bulbs tend to work loose quite easily, not a problem with E27. This may be due to the plastic thread in the holder itself or the thread pitch?

Classic T5 fittings such as my Fitzgerald 13W lightpacks are still readily available and the PL lamps are commonly found in security lights though the latter have seemingly never been popular for indoor fixtures.

The supermarkets tend to only stock the horrid yellow warm-white CFLs, same for the major DIY stores such as B&Q, Wickes, Homebase.


BG

PL fixtures are available but lose populrity -as both them and the lamps are more expensive

Example :

11W PL fixture (comes with lamp) = over 200 NIS = over 54$. The fixture takes about 17W and lasts about 5 years with the original lamp in heavy use, 10+ years in light use

20W CFL fixture (comes with lamp) = about 50 NIS = 13$. The fixture takes 20W for marginally higher light output. The CFL lasts no more than few months (in enclosed fixture). The fixture itself is made of cheaper plastic that degrades faster and missing a proper reflector

As everuone is looking just at the retail purchase price of the fixture (and not at maintenance later), so there is no demand for the PL fixture



I recently found a HF 2D fixture which appears to be of pretty low quality, for a 240 NIS = 65$. Wonder if it's cheapish looking HF ballast will last even up to the fixture with the CFL that costs allmost 5 times cheaper

I will take PL anyday!!