Comparing LED light bulbs with Regular Bulbs and CFLs - Page 2

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Lifetime
I also need to mention the life-expectancy of these bulbs. Halogens and Incandescent bulbs have a short life expectancy. 2-3,000 hours. The CFLs last almost three times as long.

But the real champions are LED bulbs. They last a really long time, 25,000 hours or longer. The VOID LED bulbs are rated with a 40,000 hour lifetime. There's a reasonable chance you'll have to put them in your will.

Price
The very long lifetime of the bulbs, coupled with energy savings makes LED bulbs very valuable. They are more expensive than halogens or CFLs.

The GE "Reveal" halogen bulb above was $13.97. It broke (internally) almost immediately and I returned it to the store. For the heat test and breakage tests below, I used a $5.99 incandescent "flood". Incandescent bulbs are actually going up in price as manufacturers stop making them.

The CFL bulb was $13.97 for a two pack, or $6.99 each.

The 12 Watt VOID LED bulb I tested sells for $39.

Heat Output
Incandescent bulbs are not very efficient at making visible light. A good portion of their power use ends up as heat. Sometimes this is a problem, such as when a bulb toasts the inside of a lampshade, or threatens to burn down your house when you use a higher-wattage than recommended for a particular light fixture. This extra heat isn't a problem when the heat is needed, such as when the lightbulb is warming a cold room, but in an already warm room, the bulb's unneccessary heat is often removed with air-conditioning, at a cost of even more electricity.

CFLs don't get as hot as incandescent bulbs, but they can still get hot. How do LED bulbs stand up against CFLs?

To test the heat output of these three bulbs, I conducted a test where each type of bulb would illuminate an ordinary wax candle, set one inch away. In 30 minutes, the heat from each bulb would assault the wax, maybe melting the side of the candle. I didn't light the candles.

The incandescent bulb became super hot and destroyed the candle in 30 minutes. I bet lampshades were originally designed to keep you from burning the crap out of your family.

Insurance companies should lower your rates when you get rid of these things.

The CFL bulb warmed up and its surface became hot, but it didn't visibly affect the wax candle.
The LED bulb, shown above was too heavy to be supported by the simple wall socket, so I had to prop it up with a jar of cocaine. The bulb surface became warm at the face and hot at the back.

Here are the results. There is no clear winner, but there is a clear loser. The candle placed in front of the incandescent bulb immediately started melting the wax. Just as the 30 minutes was up, the candle's structure had deteriorated to a point to where it was leaning over and couldn't recover. The wick down the center was exposed for a length of several inches.
Neither the candle in front of the CFL nor the LED bulb visibly melted the candle.

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