Light fixture part question

Furniture, furnishings and other items of antique interest
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Old house lady
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Re: Light fixture part question

Post by Old house lady »

Willa - those are what I was thinking might be the right shape, at least in that family.

Phil - love that idea! I wonder if a hole could be put in one safely? The bulb is definitely different. Tomorrow I'll have to see if there are any markings on it. We're slowly putting led bulbs inallthe fixtures, my inner miser insists on it

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Re: Light fixture part question

Post by Lily left the valley »

Old house lady wrote:Willa - those are what I was thinking might be the right shape, at least in that family.

Phil - love that idea! I wonder if a hole could be put in one safely? The bulb is definitely different. Tomorrow I'll have to see if there are any markings on it. We're slowly putting led bulbs inallthe fixtures, my inner miser insists on it
I don't know which LEDs you are using. We found these LEDs at our hardware store, and we use them in both our bathrooms' deco sconce sets, which don't have slip shades.

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Old house lady
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Re: Light fixture part question

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All shapes and sizes of led - we're not brand loyal. We do avoid the candelabra ones from lowes though.Havent found a fixture they work in yet, something about the length or shape of the screw-in part just doesnt make proper contact. We have a number of ones like the picture in different fixtures.

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Re: Light fixture part question

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[quote="Old house lady"] something about the length or shape of the screw-in part just doesnt make proper contact.

I remember once having that issue , the springy bit on the bottom of the socket wasn't touching the tit on the bulb. ( forgive my technical terms lol) so I shut the light off and got on a chair with a kitchen knife to try to bend the springy bit up a bit higher and wow! at that moment I learned the hot wasn't switched. it was a wiring error. I didn't fall off the chair but it imprinted a lasting memory for sure ;-)

If you try doing this , be safe, find the breaker not just the switch, make sure it's really off in case the neutral is switched.. that's incorrect but a common mistake, and if you are re-wiring lamps remember to switch the hot wire ( the black one, the little prong) not the neutral.. either way will work until some moron like me gets their hands on it. old lamps might not have polarized cords ( one big prong and one little one) the cord ends are cheap. I know a lot of people want to re-use the old plug because it looks old. With a lamp obviously you would unplug the thing before sticking a fork in it ;-)

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Re: Light fixture part question

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Old house lady wrote:I wonder if a hole could be put in one safely? The bulb is definitely different. Tomorrow I'll have to see if there are any markings on it. We're slowly putting led bulbs inallthe fixtures, my inner miser insists on it


Im too cheap to buy those LED bulbs but maybe they will come down. instead I go to garage sales and reap my rewards as they have replaced every one and have a big box of lovely old incandescent light bulbs ;-) i notice you can still get the rough service , or appliance bulbs. the LED"S might not fare well in a stove!
but that seems to be an option if you can';t find real light bulbs ;-)

a glass shop can drill holes in glass. something like the cake dish might already have one for the handle to attach, that's what I was thinking. I haven't tried this but I have heard that if you put a wooden stick in a drill and then put grinding compound ( like valve grinding compound) on the stick you can drill, not sure how quickly, I'd assume you'd need to keep dipping it in the compound and a drill press might be more accurate so you don't wobble all over.. but it's a thought. maybe there is some sort of diamond point bit for this but no you can't use a masonry bit or a twist drill. I think it would break for sure. a little stone on a dremil might work? you have to be careful not to overheat the spot you are drilling.

it might be possible to melt a hole like with a little oxy-acetylene torch but you can't just heat the one spot , you'd have to preheat the whole piece or it would crack.. you can play with things like glass tubing and old bottles with a blowtorch, it will get hot enough to melt it but I'd get someone that works with glass to drill a hole in anything important like that.

probably there are better shades you can buy. maybe more appropriate. the sky is probably the limit on price some are so beautiful and sought after. If it's hand blown it is hard to date though. In Italy they do a lot of really beautiful stuff but we have glass blowers here, and probably near you. I would check them out , maybe they could make you one to your colors and specs for as cheap as the antique ones? its a fascinating craft to watch and some of them do such beautiful stuff.

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Re: Light fixture part question

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. No question they save power but the cost of power might be a lot different area to area. do they factor that in?
They completely neglect to enter the fact that all that electricity that is lost is heat and it is a no more inefficient heat source than any baseboard heater or in floor heat.. 100 watts is 100 watts... so there is no power loss in winter, the heat reduces the load on your furnace proportionately. Only savings is in summer when you don't want the heat.. The calculations misrepresent these factors and make it sound like you are saving more than you do in reality. I'd call that false advertising. I dont; have a bathroom fan. If I put in LED's I'd be growing mold in there. If I vent it I'll blow heat outside. not that a vent is a bad idea.. I just dont; have one. my point is I like the free wasted heat I get, it saves on the gas bill

the calculation in the bulb Lily pointed out is based on 11cents a KW hour
my basic rate is $0.0858 per kWh way over my actual cost of electricity in my area..
they are claiminmg an 82 dollar savings over 15000 hours. 4380 hours in a year so that is 3.42 years of continuous operation.

it would be interesting to see what others pay per kw hour.. we could all be paying wildly different rates. In BC if I go over 1350KW the rate is $0.1287

I wonder how much the US rates differ at consumer level? Im paying between 8.6 cents and 13 cents per KW hr.. In BC we have huge hydro electric dams and sell most of it to the US.. Is it cheaper here at a consumer level?

we area at 81 cents on the dollar today so If I factor that in I guess I have to multiply the cost by 80% so 8.6 x .8 is 6.88 and 13 x .8 is 10.4

If my numbers are right I'm paying 6.88 cents US per KW hr but if I use over 1350KW it is 10.4 cents US per KW hr.

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Re: Light fixture part question

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Never thought of trying to bend up the little contact bit... other bulbs work in place of the lowes ones, so at least its not the wiring (so far!)
I've really only based my choice on 4.5 watts vs 60. Currently, the rate is 6 cents per KWH. At our previous house, it was 4 cents per KWH between 8pm and 8am and on weekends. 8am to 8pm was at 12 cents. Same electric company, only an hour away in the same state.
No markings that I can see on that weird shaped bulb.

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Re: Light fixture part question

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the contact on the bulb protrudes more on some bulbs than others. sometimes they go cheap with the solder. the other thing that commonly happens is that little bent spring part at the bottom of the socket fails to make good contact. then you get arcing between the contact and the bulb. then the springy metal bit looses it's "springiness" the heat takes the temper out . this is called annealing. the result is that the springy bit is less springy and it gets flattened out. - see the vicious circle here? , now it makes bad contact because it is less springy.. and maybe more arcing.
the heat of the arc removes the temper. If it is blackened you know why it's blackened - because of arcing. You can replace the socket but you might like the old one in an antique. usually this springy bit is riveted on so it isn't easy to remove or replace you have to change the socket. so clean it up if you look at the bottom of the socket and see it's blackened.

If you bend it make sure power is off- of course! another solution - if the bulb maker went cheap on the solder , just use a soldering iron to re-melt it and add a bit more solder so it sticks out more. some bulbs dont protrude as much and this may also fix it.

in modern manufacturing they are leading away from lead , so you see more things that are riveted and crimped instead. sometimes they use stainless steel with tiny spot welds instead of soldering parts like they used to.. this creates an issue with repairs because you can't really solder to stainless steel very easily whereas traditionally they used more brass and copper.

I see this more and more on machinery and automotive applications , they are steering towards lead free products, even circuit boards.

to remove the blackened coating youcan do it by scraping, like with a pointy little screwdriver. or use fine sandpaper, or do it chemically. this is a good contact cleaner and it has chemicals in it that will clean the black stuff off chemically.
https://www.rpelectronics.com/dn5s-6n-d ... -caig.html

the same thing happens with old electrical outlets. they have springy parts in there to contact the prongs on a plug. when they get old and worn they don't contact as well. You can feel when you push the plug into a new outlet it grips the prongs, but when it gets old and used a lot then you get the exact same issue. the springy tabs get old , blackened , oxidised and this causes arcing and resistence which produces heat which removes the springiness..

I'm sure you have seen old outlets where you have to wiggle the cord. New outlets are cheap and I'd prefer to have good ones that work right and don't arc to vintage outlets..

If your house is a museum then maybe you want repros, or you can try to use ones that aren't worn and you can clean them with the contact cleaner.

those contact cleaners are also going towards "safer chemicals" but the old chemicals worked better. also they often have lubricants and for this purpose you don't really want the lubricants so I'd wash with alcohol after to remove any oily residue. If you use the cleaners on rotary switches and volume controls then you do want the lubricant so the switch doesn't wear out mechanically from lack of lubrication.

I see a lot of new made in china extension cords where they fail prematurely I've seen them go up in smoke because of this, its dangerous especially if you are also working with flammables. I found one recently in a wood shop where it was smoking and buried in an inch of sawdust on the floor. - fire hazard. I often cut the end of the cord off and put a new one on or just chuck the cord if it's all hardened up and old.

also you see the same circle blackened cord ends,, make bad contact with outlet springy prongs, prongs get hot ,, loose their temper or springiness, and that causes even worse contact even with a new cord now even your new cords get blackened. the problem transfers itself around. this arcing often isn't enough to actually blow the circuit breaker.

new wiring now requires a different kind of breakers for bedroom outlets "spark fault breakers" dont; confuse with "arc fault breakers" the reason for the code change.. people causing fires.. these new breakers are supposedly more sensitive to arcing I installed some and I haven't seen them tripping off even though I do have some old and temperamental lamps and things.. but the code change is for this reason.

all these parts are cheap(except those breakers are 100 apiece) when new so in my opinion it isn't worth it to keep old stuff in use. a typical outlet is only a couple bucks. - good insurance.

if you happen to have a old lamp, some can be valuable , like a tiffany so I think there is a point where you'd say No way am I putting a new socket in this old lamp ,, if it's worth a couple thousand then you want it safe but also originality is important.. so it's a trade off.

because I fix old radios lot I see a lot of bad cords. sometimes I put new on , sometimes I try to clean them and save the authenticity.. one source I have found is clothing irons in thrift stores, Often I can find old travel irons that have been put away and they have perfect soft supple cords because they were stowed away in bedroom dressers.. also things like hair dryers, toasters, fry pans, they have heavy duty rubber cords because they draw a lot of power.. sometimes I find these for a couple bucks in thrift stores.

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