[RFI] Recycling fluorescent tubes

[Roger (K8RI)]

I found many of the places listed as recycle points for fluorescent 
lights will not take the 8' tubes used in garages and shops.  IIRC I go 
through about 22 8 footers around every 18 months.  When one fails the 
others will soon follow, so I change them all when the first one or two 
fail.  I could get more use out of the ones that haven't failed, but 
then that would involve positioning and climbing a 10' step ladder in a 
shop with very little unused floor space, making some of the fixtures 
difficult to reach and changing the 8' tubes dangerously awkward, once 
or twice a week. As I can no longer climb safely, I need to hire the 
tubes changed.  Once or twice a week to change one or two out of 22 
tubes results in a lot of trips.  Now I know why many companies change 
their fluorescents.  They could save considerable money for the 8' 
tubes, but the labor for changing them as they fail would quickly eat up 
any of those savings and more.  It takes a lot more labor to change them 
as they fail when you look at the extra time to get the equipment out 
and to the site.  The increased time is counter intuitive.

Changing to 4' LEDs would be the way to go long term, but with surface 
mount EMT to all fixtures, the change over for my shop would likely run 
three thousand dollars or more.  The payback would take many years even 
if the lights were on 24 X 7 X 365.
I have 11 fixtures holding 22 8' tubes with 5,000 lumens for each tube 
depending on the type of tube.  I generally use full spectrum.  .  That 
would take about 22 4' LED fixtures plus the conduit change and I don't 
think I'd get the current 110,000 lumens for the shop.

73

Roger  (K8RI)


On 4/11/2016 Monday 8:27 PM, qrv at kd4e.com wrote:
> You mean setting them in a garbage can & wacking them
> with a long pipe then tossing them in the dumpster
> isn't the right way to dispose of them?
>
> 40 years later they tell us ...
>
> ;-)  David KD4E
>
>> David Robbins wrote: lets give this a proper subject...
>>
>> Hmmm, talk about timing... where I work we just got a delivery of
>> fluorescent bulb recycling boxes... if you are interested go to:
>> http://www.ezontheearth.com/ for more info if you can't find a
>> collection place in your area.
>
>
>


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