[jambutty]

Well! Well! Well! I see that the kiddies have been out to play. Shouldn’t they all be tucked up in bed with a big fat dummy? Or maybe they’ve spit it out already.

Sorry to disappoint you but I don’t sit glued to my computer waiting for someone to make a post. I have a life!

No torpedoes Ianto.W. at least not at kiddies.

All this spectrum nonsense started in response to a simple observation of mine (post 30) with regard to LE and normal bulbs.

I often use a solar powered calculator whilst sat at my computer and in the evenings with the curtains drawn and the light on top of the telly on, the light from it was sufficient to power my calculator. When I replaced the hot filament bulb with one of the low energy bulbs the light from it would not power my calculator unless I moved it at least two feet closer to the light. Ergo the new bulb did not produce the same amount of light as the hot filament one.

Then Less chipped in to recall that I had made my point in a previous thread http://www.accringtonweb.com/forum/showthread.php?t=22924&highlight=energy+saving and claimed that in post 24 Cyfr had explained the reason why I had to place my calculator closer to an LE light to get it to work.

Obviously 'energy saving' lightbulbs do what they say, and hence use less energy, so no, your calculator isn't going to get the same energy going to it, because as the name says, theres less energy being used, so less energy being given out.

That is in effect an agreement that my calculator would indeed need to be placed closer to an LE lamp to work. It was in that post where the light spectrum was introduced. Although heaven knows why because it was totally irrelevant to the issue.

In post #29 madhatter chipped in with “It isn't actually a full spectrum of the incandecent, but the flourecent concentrates more on the blue spectrum , the incandescent on the red.”
Thereafter the thread died off.

No explanation there Less just an agreement that an LE bulb sold as an equivalent to a 60w normal bulb gives off less light. But then that is what I had already stated.

Then in post #42 Cyfr chipped in asking what I meant by intensity and followed that up some nonsense about energy and light source. A solar panel doesn’t measure anything at all. It reacts to light. If there is enough it will power a calculator, if there isn’t it won’t. If at a set distance from one light source the calculator works and from another light source it doesn’t then it has to be because one light source is less bright than the other. It’s not rocket science!

Then he went on blathering about spectrums again. Then went on to state unequivocally that LE bulbs do give off less light than a normal bulb. If that is the case, and it is, then it is obvious that to get a calculator to work on both sources it has to be closer to the LE bulb than the normal one. I believe that is what I stated at the outset.

Then in post #44 Cyfr states; “You seem to think that because your calculator works better off a certain source then that source must be brighter. Which is incorrect as I have explained many times we only need certain parts of the spectrum for lights to work well. Therefore the energy saving lightbulbs only show the parts we need.”
Now isn’t that a contradiction? But in an attempt to justify the about turn Cyfr burbles on about the irrelevant spectrum colours.

Then to cap it all Cyfr in post #78 responded to a post by cashman that I was correct in my assertion about colours and it had no relevance. Then stone me if he didn’t immediately contradict himself and start arguing about colours. And in post #100 argues that the colour of light does matter. Not in powering a calculator it doesn’t. It would be nice if Cyfr made his mind up.

Then DeShark joined the debate with post #87 – “Hello all. Long time no see. Been at uni in manchester studying... physics. I just felt that the physics being used was sketchy at best.”
Seeing as it was Cyfr who first started to use physics to try and make his point it says a lot for the physics. Then DeShark seemed to get lost in infrared. Unless I am missing something how long has infrared been part of visible light?

In post #89 DeShark seemed to agree that my lighter would power my computer and then in post #114 stated: “I really can't spell it out any more. The bottom line is that your calculator will NOT be activated by light from any source and it is NOT the brightness (or amount measured in lumins) of light falling on the solar panel that will determine at what point the calculator will become operative. It depends on the frequency of the light and how intense *that specific* frequency is.”
Now come on DeShark you can’t have it both ways.

I think that DeShark is a chum of Cyfr who has been persuaded to join in the debate to back up Cyfr and they are both trying to confuse the issue with science in some puerile attempt to prove my observation wrong.

My calculator doesn’t care what colour of light falls on the solar panel just as long as it is visible light. What it does care about is HOW MUCH light. If there isn’t enough light it won’t work. To make it work you have to bring the calculator closer to the source of light until it does. The closer you get to a light source the brighter it is. Take a decent torch with a tight beam and shine it on a matchbox three feet away in a darkened room and observe how brightly lit it is. Then take the matchbox away to say 30 feet distance and shine the torchlight onto it. Observe how badly lit it is. Then do the same with a solar powered calculator. Close to the light source it will work and 30 feet away the chances are that it won’t.

And that is in effect what I stated at the outset. Just to refresh your memory I stated that in the evenings with the curtains drawn, when using my calculator at my computer the light from the 60w bulb in the table lamp on top of the TV activated it just fine. When I placed an LE bulb that was rated as an equivalent to a 60w normal bulb into the table lamp, to get my calculator to work I had to take it closer to the lamp. This suggested to me that the LE lamp did not give off as much light as a normal bulb. I then established that my supposition was correct by reading and quoting the data printed on the normal light bulb box and the boxes of two different wattage LE bulbs.

All someone has to do is to get a solar powered calculator and subject it to various light sources of different colours and brightness, known as light intensity, and observe what happens. A kid of five could do it and conclude what I have stated all along. So why can’t Cyfr do the same instead of meandering into pseudo science babble.

and most importantly Jambutty will now fully understand why his calculator fails to work as well under Low Energy lightbulbs of equal brightness!

Isn’t that what I have been stating from the outset? Except I didn’t say brightness! I stated that the LE bulb was rated as an equivalent light output of a normal 60w bulb.

Incidentally a solar powered calculator either works or it doesn’t. There is no work as well Cyfr. However there is a point when it might take a second or two to start up in when the light isn’t all that good but once working it works until the light fades below its threshold.

The infinitesimal distance difference between various colours is nit picking in the extreme.

Now that should end this debate once and for all. Well it will be as far as I’m concerned.