I'm not suggesting that anyone is living like a hobbit. Being in the business may actually be protecting you from what's happening as everyone knows what you're talking about and are slow to risk big money on new technologies. However you may be buying 90W lamps because that's what does the job. I've seen them advertised as 120W replacements; that are replacements for 150W.
Efficiency means getting more for the same watts, or the same for less watts. So what do you
call a lamp that works like the old
standby but uses half or 1/10th the
power?
Retail light
bulb packages now come with the lumens, by law. Lots of tricks have been played with long life and "replacement" lamps until the consumer protection folks stepped in. It only gets worse with
CFL and LEDs. Lumens are the only workable replacement. Check out
www.lightingfacts.com for info on labeling of
LED "bulbs."
silicsound FWIW: the
incandescent bans don't touch 200W and larger lamps.
Think you are misunderstanding a few deatails. First, 90w
halogen PAR 38 lamps have been on the market for years now, possibly longer than the 120w version. Before the 120v was the really really terrible "Watts Mizer" lamps in being 85w and listed as comperable to 100w and also a 120w version - both were
incandescent still and bad ideas from GE at the time possibly amongst others that are confusing the issue. 90w
Halogen lamps have nothing to do with a 150w
incandescent PAR 38 lamp in history - they are not a replacement for anything - they are their own animal. Where are you shopping or getting this mis-informaion from? If wished I can post a copy of my not up to date table listing every
PAR 38 lamp between 250w and 45w in pages and pages worth of ten year old info that goes back to the 80's in
hand typed info about each lamp I knew of.
If a 120w
PAR 38
halogen is discontinued I have my doubts about, there is 100w and other suppliers in general. Otherwise in general, the
PAR 38 lamp isn't the best lamp in the world.
Yes a lot of retailers just list lumens out of a focused lamp...
CBCP or CP with beam spread is much more useful.
Second, talking Lumens from any
PAR lamp is a sort of figure of comparison brand to brand but basically useless information given you are not using 360 degrees of the light off the
filament - you are usng Center Beam
Candlepower and this will be very specific to beam spread as to
candlepower.
Third, sorry if I live in an insulated world. Yea.. I grew up with 150w
PAR 38 lamps in a poor store front theater that converted pinspot fixtures to
PAR 38 fixtures on their own. Could never figure out who was hot gluing the lamps to the
fixture in really stuck lamps to replace. Finally I figured out - once the single off center screw retaining the plastic lamp sockets to the can stopped getting loose on their own problem, that the plastic itself was melting and gluing lamp to
fixture. Who knew as I was a set desiner by study... Long time to figure out and for the most part all in
stock to
fill light with in a small space once the good stuff like inkies were used up. (Kind of a shame I never found one again to show in my museum - even if I upgraded to
porcelain at least over the years of working with such pinspot fixtures made into
PAR 38's.
Inspite of having to use them - it's a crappy not round or oval and sort of harsh beam, I still made magic. I never loved the lamp just got used to what I could do with it as only more light on the subject as opposed to no light on the subject. Also used them at times working free lance for cans say for up or down lighting say
drapes at weddings
etc. while working at such a company. It's just a
wash light and often full wattage would set the drape on fire anyway or at least make the room too bright. About the time the lamps went out of the industry, yes I had moved on and was at a company that was doing large shows at 250w
PAR 38 in places or small shows at 90w
PAR 38 already in these days neiter gets used much. Sorry about inheriting the lamp buyer position in working my way up to it and insulated.
Fourth, while I don't use 120w
halogen PAR lamps for shows, I do use them for my dock lights in past attempts to convert to
HMI, Flourescent and
LED have not proven acceptable given often late nights in loading show trucks. I abslutely know for sure I can get them from Ushio in only a few months ago having re-stocked them. Are we sure that the 120w
Halogen lamp is discontinued?
Beyond that, I'm sitting on just short of two full brand new cases of never used 150w
incandescent PAR 38
incandescent lamps, and I can fied more in the spot and flood if used.
Send me a PM if you want them for what they cost like 20 years ago in that I would love to free up shelf space. Sorry if hard in statements but I did just remember the dock lights and am fairly certain they are still available in general. That plus the mis-information presented as important info about the lamp in lumens an old scale of measurement about them and fairly useless for actual output used.
A GE 150PAR38/FL should be about 4,200CP when listed for that. No beam spread is listed but it should be within 36 and 30 degree based on other lamps when they also started listing that info. Dependant on brand and listing, the
halogen 120w flood was well within that output plus would have a higher
color temperature in seeming brighter. There has been some 100w
halogen especially the GE version of the HIR lamps that would even get up to 6,300CP. And the normal 90w lamps in similar beam spread has as much
candlepower as or more than the 150w incandecent - plus the better
color temperature. Wide range of what 120w can do in basically a replacement, similar or more output - lots of lamps to consider that might or might not be available.