Both my wife and my HOA have told me I need to keep our outdoor lighting on at night. While I’m not entirely sold on the rationale and am a reluctant switch flipper, I am a dutiful husband and neighbor.
When flourescents first got attention, I bought into their allure and outfitted my condo in early generation CFLs. Of course, as most folks in my situation quickly realized, this new fangled tech wasn’t all it was cracked up to be – dim, buzzing, slow lighting, lesser lifespans than equivalent incandescents, questionable cost/benefit, etc. So these days I’m much more judicious in how and where I apply fluorescent lighting. And I’d originally identified relatively inexpensive Ikea LEDs for my outdoor lighting project, consisting of four sconces, with intentions of leaving the fixtures on 24/7. Yet, at some point, I came across the Philips Dusk to Dawn CFL on Amazon… and changed up the plan. The 60-watt equivalent bulbs run $7-$8 each and feature a rotating light sensor, with the thought being that the bad guys will assume someone is home as lights go on and off. Also, I was hopeful these might be better suited for outdoor use.
Having run the Philips CFLs a few months, I have no real complaints. The 14 watt bulbs do what they were designed to do — my wife is satisfied and I’m not roaming the house twice a day flipping switches. I will say the model we’re running will not hit its advertised lifespan as the light goes on quite early in the evenings and stays on a bit too long in the AM. Also, in our two garage door sconces, the bulb appears a bit oversized (as shown above). However, the replacement model introduced just a few weeks back features a more compact and attractive form. Hopefully, it’ll be a few years before I replace mine, so you’ll have to tell us how the new ones work out.
Amazon shopping note… the Frustration Free packaging model is the new bulb, whereas the Retail Packaging is the older bulb I have. I’d say go with the new, assuming it’s better – although all we know for sure is that it’s more compact.
First, it annoys me that HOAs do stuff like this. I’ll never buy in an HOA again. I don’t need my life micromanaged to the point where I need someone to tell me to turn on/off a light.
Outside of that: I’d be tempted to try to find a replacement fixture with the photocell in place. It’d have to be a more modern fixture as with CFLs or LEDs you don’t want them flickering like some photo-sensor fixtures do. Basically you want it to say, “Ok, it’s dark enough. I’ll stay on for at least the next n hours..” Anyway, with that in place, then it doesn’t matter what kind of light you buy and you can get an LED bulb which would take the wattage down even further – from 14W to something around 9W or less – you don’t need a 60W equivalent out there, just something that’s bright enough – I used to use 25W incandescents around my garage back when I owned a home.
Of course, just buying the bulb like you did is the quicker and probably less costly solution.
Brad, this HOA is more nanny-esque than my last two, who seemed to find the appropriate balance. I think because it’s a new community, the developer is still building, and the onsite manager is young, very gung-ho that makes it a bit more extreme. On the flip side, a lot of folks are building all kinds of crap in back which I know couldn’t have been approved. Whatev! (I may take advantage of that too…) :)
Our lamp post does have a light sensor built-in (and houses three smaller 25-watt incandescent bulbs… for now). But, yeah, replacing the fixtures is way more effort (and cost) than I care to invest into a home built in 2012. 40-watt equivalent had been my original plan for the sconces, but when these bulbs presented themselves, I figured good enough.
Test the boundaries of your HOA. Build a helipad.
It’s still an ugly spiral! Will someone think of the aesthetics? I better call your HOA to get them to update the rules…
Ha, I can’t even spell my name!
You deal with my HOA, you may end up in some Wars…
“You deal with my HOA, you may end up in some Wars…”
Joel Wars? A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away?
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One passive/aggressive way of dealing with your HOA without actually commencing hostilities would be for you to install enough outdoor lighting at night to make your neighborhood as bright as Broadway. Sure, they’ll come and ask to you to desist, at which point you can just disable all nighttime outdoor lighting. Rinse and repeat with other such schemes, always taking the friendly attitude that you are merely trying to comply. With enough false clueless friendliness, eventually they’ll just give up on you and let you be.
Chucky, the outdoor lighting isn’t a requirement, just a suggestion… which my wife had been bugging me about since we moved in. This gave her more ammo. ;) Also, regarding your suggestion, we officially have limits on outdoor lighting brightness other than motion triggered security lighting.
The wife factor always carries more weight than anything else
This glow in the dark sidewalk might be a good alternative… Just don’t tell your HOA! http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/10391802/starpath-glow-street-lighting-council-cambridge-city.html
Our outdoor lighting is hooked up to timers – the simple ones that replace the light switch inside. Unfortunately, CFLs don’t work with timers or dimmers.
I’ve been slowly replacing all of our incandescent bulbs with Cree LED Bulbs. Cree is the world’s largest manufacturer of LEDs, but just within the past six months started making a consumer light bulb. You can only get them at Home Depot right now (or pay more via Amazon), but they cost around $10 each ($8 each if you buy in bulk.) They use less energy than a CFL, and you don’t have the same biohazard warning if one breaks.
A timely post, thanks. I’ve been looking for a good solution to this also, not b/c of any HOA mandate, but b/c I come in through my front door and no one remembers to turn on the front lights when it gets dark in the afternoon now. I was thinking about a programmable timer switch, but this seems like a cheaper/easier option. The only problem is I don’t care for the light that LCDs sometime give out and I don’t really dig the spiral design.
Lawson–some of the newer timers will work with CFL and LED bulbs. You need to make sure the timer specifically states compatibility. In particular CFL bulbs are problematic unless you have a special CFL-friendly timer.
We have a regular incandescent timer and it seems to work okay with two EcoSmart LEDs we use for our front door lights. So far the bulbs are almost two years old and still going strong, staying on all night every night.
Usually we’d have to replace incandescent bulbs every six months or even sooner.
Correction: I should have been responding to LarryS. Sorry, Lawson!
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Tom, the light quality is a tad bit whiter and obviously it’s a 60w equiv so that may be brightened than you were looking for. As I said, I’m quite satisfied although the spiral isn’t the most attractive – the new bulbs look much better.
Wasn’t aware I could stick a timer in the switch. Hm… :)
Bryan, yeah, figured it’d be two weeks. ;) The only mystery – does the new Netflix app hit at the same time? Hoping…!
Living in MN, the winter temperatures has kept me from putting CFLs outside. They don’t warm up to full brightness in the cold and lifespan is crazy short. Has anything changed in CFL technology to address this? Do LEDs have the same problem?
I can’t imagine LEDs would have the same problem, due to how they’re built. It’s basically an array of LEDs that are inside of a plastic shell. Here in the Memphis area, they use LEDs for traffic lights. If one goes out, there are still a hundred burning bright.
I used to worry about turning the outside light on and off when I use high power drawing incandescent buls. Back in the laste 90’s and early 2000’s I used the modules to control the time lights would turn on and off. Esepcially since I was away on travel for work alot. But since switching to flourescents, I just put a 10 or 11 watt bulb in and leave it on 24/7. In the Summer I switch it out to a yellow bulb to keep most of the flying insects away. ut they draw so little power, i don’t worry about leaving them on all the time.
Last spring, I installed a couple of those Cree 6-watt (40w equivalent) LED bulbs from Home Depot for security illumination by the garage. Not only are they cheap for LED lamps (around $10) they are aesthetically pleasing and quite closely resemble incandescents when lit. To switch them on and off I replaced the wall switch with one of the small automatic switches with an astronomical timer built in, so that the lights follow the sunrise/sunset cycle of the Sun year round.
So far, no problems, and the bulbs are quite the energy savers!
I have maybe a dozen Crees indoors. I don’t care for their standard bulbs, but am quite pleased with the floods. Post to come… Someone link these indoor switch timer things, I can’t figure out what we’re discussing.
Dave, I got this timer (http://www.amazon.com/Honeywell-Econoswitch-RPLS740B-Programmable-Switch/dp/B004AP92N2) for about the cost of four sensor controlled CFLs. It’s exactly what I was looking for. Lights turn on at sunset and off at 11. Sunset is determined by longitude and latitude, and is simple to to set.
The only hang up is that I had to figure out the odd series of wires in a 4 gang outlet. Other than that, it’s no harder than switching out a light fixture.
I got 2 of these free from Phillips, as when I purchased mine, the package said “lasts 7 years”, and in the small print “based on 3 hours of use per day”. I didn’t know of any location on earth that has 3 hour nights; well, except for northern Alaska and the North Pole during certain times of the year. They last a couple years any how. I just got 2 new ones, but the new version, although more compact; which is good…. they no longer feature the rotating EYE, so you have to hope the photosensor faces somewhat outward when screwed in.
Hoping to find the same type bulb in an LED form; as I understand these do not attract bugs; which is a good thing when you open the nearby door at night.
An update… I had purchased 4 bulbs. I originally bought two December 2012 and two October of 2013. My first bulb just failed, but not sure which batch is was from. Foruntately, I had a replacement ready in that 4th and we did have some crazy single digit weather days – so I can’t complain. Yet with the huge drop in LED prices the last couple years, my next outdoor lighting purchases will be LEDs and I’ll just leave them on 24/7.