Arcadeshop.com no longer carrying 19'' CGA CRT's ?

In simple terms, the risk posed by breaking a CFL bulb is much more like breaking 64 mercury thermometers. Does 64 broken thermometers in your child's room sound like "a very small amount of mercury"??

And if it's such a negligible risk, why does the EPA recommend these actions;

* Open a window or door to the outdoors and leave the room

* Shut off the central forced-air heating/air conditioning

* Check with your local or state government about disposal requirements

* leave the heating and AC system shut off for several hours

* The next several times you vacuum, shut off the HVAC system, close the doors to other rooms, and open a window or door to the outside.

http://www.epa.gov/cfl/cflcleanup-detailed.html
(insert googly-eye emoticon) And these are what we are switching to instead of incandescent bulbs?
 
I had a CFL bulb pop above my head a few weeks ago out in the shed while I was moving a PC10 cabinet... all I thought of was great... there goes my lungs now but at least I saved $0.07 last month on my electric... :rolleyes:
 
Check this. At a minimum it looks like you need an emergency kit of supplies on hand, according to the state of Massachusetts, if you break a CFL.

http://www.mass.gov/dep/toxics/stypes/brkncfls.htm

Oh, and if your pregnant or have kids and you broke it over carpet...you need to cut the carpet out.
 
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Are any of the CFLs actually manufactured in the US? All I've seen are made in China. If the govt is forcing us to buy CFLs instead of incandescent, supporting China and ending jobs here, that's kinda screwy.
 
Are any of the CFLs actually manufactured in the US? All I've seen are made in China. If the govt is forcing us to buy CFLs instead of incandescent, supporting China and ending jobs here, that's kinda screwy.

It's probably illegal to manufacture them in the USA.....you know, all that toxic mercury used in them. (this is sarcasm and based on zero research from my part:))

Edward
 
Actually the evidence is exactly the opposite, a study performed by the Maine Bureau of Remediation & Waste Management found levels of elemental mercury above the threshold of 300 nanograms per cubic meter (ng/m3). Levels monitored were noted as having: "short excursions over 25,000 ng/m3, sometimes over 50,000 ng/m3, and possibly over 100,000 ng/m3 from the breakage of a single compact fluorescent lamp."

Source: EPA.gov, direct link: http://www.maine.gov/dep/rwm/homeowner/cflreport.htm

Somewhat dry reading, but good info to know if you're going to use CFLs.

Good info, Mike -- definitely more intense than the stuff I've read recently. I thought I'd heard that they had reduced the amount of mercury in the newer bulbs but I'm not 100% sure.

I've only had one break in the 20 or so years I've been using them and that was where the screw on base broke away from the top part of the bulb. Not sure if that released anything or not but it's water under the bridge now since it was 5-6 years ago.

LED bulbs are coming and are available now but are pretty darned expensive and will be for another couple of years. Looks like they have at least one really nice 60W equivalent LED bulb that spreads its light out widely unlike most of the LED bulbs now.
 
Sort of OT, but if anyone ever makes it to the Smithsonian museum of American History I think in DC..one of the museums... has a massive display of early incandescent bulbs.. looked like 100 or more. Doesn't sound like something that would be interesting, but it sure was.
 
Sort of OT, but if anyone ever makes it to the Smithsonian museum of American History I think in DC..one of the museums... has a massive display of early incandescent bulbs.. looked like 100 or more. Doesn't sound like something that would be interesting, but it sure was.

That reminds me of that "Centennial Bulb" that's been on in a fire station for over 110 years: http://www.centennialbulb.org/

RE: CFLs, too bad they couldn't be made with a coating to contain breakage, some kind of a clear tough rubbery substance.
 
That reminds me of that "Centennial Bulb" that's been on in a fire station for over 110 years: http://www.centennialbulb.org/

RE: CFLs, too bad they couldn't be made with a coating to contain breakage, some kind of a clear tough rubbery substance.

You can buy a flexible plastic cover for fluorescent tubes to contain the plastic. You just glue them inside the tube, and when they break, the cover contains all the glass shards and mercury. This would be rather difficult to do with the squiggly shape of CFLs though.
 
>sigh<

....and to think I simply clean up CLF's and shit can them like any other bulb. Maybe the feds will raid my place some day for doing so?

I guess I'll be dying a few days/weeks/months/years earlier as well as I sure as hell don't follow any special cleanup procedure... broom + dust pan + trash can and maybe a wash of the hands.
 
I guess I'll be dying a few days/weeks/months/years earlier as well as I sure as hell don't follow any special cleanup procedure... broom + dust pan + trash can and maybe a wash of the hands.

You won't die, but it will make you bat-shit crazy. Ever heard the expression "mad as a hatter"? Three guesses where that comes from... Yep, mercury poisioning.
 
Are any of the CFLs actually manufactured in the US? All I've seen are made in China. If the govt is forcing us to buy CFLs instead of incandescent, supporting China and ending jobs here, that's kinda screwy.

Dude, no one's made incandescent light bulbs inside the US in like 20 years. They are a low-cost commodity item, so they were some of the first things to go overseas. CFLs are not the problem in this domain.
 
LED lights are coming on strong. The newest ones are very nice, throw light in all directions, come on instantly, have a nice color, and have no mercury.

They're just still too expensive although they are dropping rapidly in price.
 
LED lights are coming on strong. The newest ones are very nice, throw light in all directions, come on instantly, have a nice color, and have no mercury.

They're just still too expensive although they are dropping rapidly in price.

Interestingly, even with the higher price I'm finding that the LED bulbs are the best bet for the fixtures in my living room. They are a size that's apparently become uncommon and I can't get higher-wattage incandescent bulbs, and they don't make CFLs in that size. So I've got LED as my only real choice now.

Oh, and I'm probably going to end up going LED for the kitchen can fixtures as well - the damn CFL versions of those bulbs are freaking LONGER than the incandescent version. Who farked that up? I used to be able to get CFL ones that were the right length, but no more. So I'm probably going LED in there as well, if I can get them in high enough output rating.
 
Start hoarding 19" TVs now. I got about 6 sitting in my garage now, not all will be worthy in the end. It seems like I see at least one a week next to a dumpster at apartments and what not. With the prices of LED/LCD TVs at an all time low, it won't be long before you won't see them around when everyone has a new TV at home. I've been building monitors from the Wei-ya 819H chassis sold at Alva Amusements for awhile now. They look and work great, very easy to mod to fit perfectly. Purists will always disagree (Chinese crap yada yada), I don't listen to them, I have zero issues with these and they are cheap to make. I heard the chassis production is shut down at wei-ya now as well, so these are on the way out.
 
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