Light bulbs regularly blowing

[dmcturk]

Evening all, got a customer who is complaining that her light bulbs across the house keep blowing, and could I come and have a look at it. Short of stripping the circuit down and testing it, ensuring all connections are tight etc, can anyone suggest what might be the problem. She did tell me that she had been buying the bulbs from Wilko's, so I suggested buying some from a more reputable brand and see how they go.

Any thoughts?
Thanks

 

[Octopus]

Defo change the units for a quality brand before you do anything. Are they downlights?

 

[kingeri]

Nothing wrong with the bulbs from Wilko! I'd say the first thing to do is test the circuit, it hardly involves stripping it down!

 

[Phil L]

Cheap lamps (bulbs grow lamps glow) always cause problems try some decent lamps

 

[gnuuser]

other than poor quality lamps i would suggest looking for a neutral conductor possibly being loose someplace

 

[Engineer54]

Checking the voltage at the supply would be a good first step!! It could well be on the high side, couple that with cheaper brown goods lamps manufactured for mainland Europe and the like, that are rated a 220/230V and you have your answer!! lol!!

 

[Geordie Spark]

Cheap lamps (bulbs grow lamps glow) always cause problems try some decent lamps

Take it up with Joseph. "Sir Joseph Wilson Swan, D.Sc.h.c., FRS (31 October 1828 – 27 May 1914) was a British physicist and chemist. He is most famous for inventing an incandescent light bulb.Swan first demonstrated the light bulb at a lecture in Newcastle upon Tyne on 18 December 1878

.. and; "His house (in Gateshead, England) was the first in the world to be lit by lightbulb, and the world's first electric-light illumination in a public building was for a lecture Swan gave in 1880. In 1881, the Savoy Theatre in the City of Westminster, London, was lit by Swan incandescent lightbulbs"

Gateshead - my home town .. I just knew it would be famous for something - other than being my birthplace.

Joseph Swan - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[ipf]

Take it up with Joseph. "Sir Joseph Wilson Swan, D.Sc.h.c., FRS (31 October 1828 – 27 May 1914) was a Britishphysicist and chemist. He is most famous for inventing an incandescent light bulb.Swan first demonstrated the light bulb at a lecture in Newcastle upon Tyne on 18 December 1878

.. and; "His house (in Gateshead, England) was the first in the world to be lit by lightbulb, and the world's first electric-light illumination in a public building was for a lecture Swan gave in 1880. In 1881, the Savoy Theatre in the City of Westminster, London, was lit by Swan incandescent lightbulbs"

Gateshead - my home town .. I just knew it would be famous for something - other than being my birthplace.

Joseph Swan - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Used to light candles with his matches...good mates with Captain Webb...he had one on his head when he swam the Channel at night.

 

[Brightspark2]

Take it up with Joseph.

Or the person that wrote the article...

Anyone could just edit it to say lamps or sausages...

But the person that wrote it chose bulbs...

 

[Lucien Nunes]

looking for a neutral conductor possibly being loose someplace

Although in the UK we don't generally have split-phase supplies, so for a domestic single-phase service, a disconnected neutral anywhere inside the house will just stop the circuit working. It would only cause voltage imbalance if the street main neutral failed. Does happen very occasionally though.

If the circuit is faulty the lights will probably flicker. Loss of neutral only affects 3-phase systems. A CFL contains cheap, highly stressed electronic parts. My money is on the lampbulbs.

 

[Deleted member 72666]

Take it up with Joseph. "Sir Joseph Wilson Swan, D.Sc.h.c., FRS (31 October 1828 – 27 May 1914) was a Britishphysicist and chemist. He is most famous for inventing an incandescent light bulb.Swan first demonstrated the light bulb at a lecture in Newcastle upon Tyne on 18 December 1878

.. and; "His house (in Gateshead, England) was the first in the world to be lit by lightbulb, and the world's first electric-light illumination in a public building was for a lecture Swan gave in 1880. In 1881, the Savoy Theatre in the City of Westminster, London, was lit by Swan incandescent lightbulbs"

Gateshead - my home town .. I just knew it would be famous for something - other than being my birthplace.

Joseph Swan - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I knew Gateshead for famous for you being from there Geordie but I didn't know Mr Swan was from there also! A bit like... I knew she was Catholic but I never knew the Pope was!

 

[7029 dave]

Test voltage would be a good start as well.

 

[telectrix]

swan may have been originally from gateshead but he saw the light and moved to liverpool.

 

[Brightspark2]

lampbulbs.

Ha ha now everyone's happy lol...

 

[Lighthouse Phil]

have a look at what E54 and 7029 dave have said.
If the lamps in use are rated at 220/30V and your incoming supply is above this value, the lamps will burn out quicker.
Buy / install lamps rated at 250V, you will not notice the very slight difference in output lux and they will last longer

 

[telectrix]

more fun to fit 12V bulbs and watch them explode

 

[Rockingit]

1) Over-voltage / spikes on cheaper lamps
2) Loose conductor causing spikes (prob neutral)
3) Cheap lamps, full stop
4) Maths and the law of averages - as in, if I have one lamp in a room it's going to fail 1 in H hours but if I have eight lamps in a room then my 'apparent' failure rate is 1 in H/8, so a much bigger chance of finding a lamp out at any instance in time (although it's not the same lamp, but Mrs Jones rarely remembers that!)

If it's consistently the same fitting then you've got a loose connection (remember to check at the switch as well!)

 

[telectrix]

replace with LED. saves money as well as lasting a coon's age.

 

[MDJ]

My experience with blowing lamps is as rockingit mentioned, but to add sometimes the lamp holder on the ceiling roses actually widen and the heat on the bayonet makes the lamp move about and short out the lamp

 

[Lucien Nunes]

2) Loose conductor causing spikes (prob neutral)

Why neutral especially? I can understand our American contributors finding this a more likely cause, with domestic split phase supplies where a neutral loss in the DB can cause 240V to appear across 120V circuits. But in an SP+N situation, I'm curious about the mechanism that would make a difference between L & N. Or do you mean they are more often found in the N, for some non-electrical reason?

I've also realised the OP doesn't say what kind of bulbalamps are blowing, whether they are tungsten, halogen, CFL...