WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

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This video will be a little… different.

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This is a wonderfully earnest device made
by General Electric, and I use the word earnest

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because it’s clearly a neat idea, but a
far from perfect, and to be honest, weird

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idea.

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This is the GE Circlite energy saving lamp
from 1991.

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Many of this product’s details seem lost
to history, probably because these weren’t

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so popular.

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I mean, this box shows you right here.

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Started at 10.96, went on clearance for $7,
annnnd ended up at Goodwill for $1.99 many years later.

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Quick note--yes this isn’t what I said my
next video was going to be, I’m working

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on it--I promise!--but I wanted to show you
this thing.

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I had originally planned to showcase this
in my last video and had it in the first draft

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of the script, but it got lost in the basement
of my parent’s house, and only recently

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could I visit them and find it.

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So, what is this?

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Well, it’s a not-so-compact fluorescent
lamp, or an NSCFL if you will.

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It looks as though GE may have been making
these since the sixties in various forms.

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Really this is a magnetic ballast and starter
plug concealed in this, and I hesitate to

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call it such but, attractive adapter.

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You can tell it’s a plain-ol magnetic ballast
because it’s 1) Old, and 2) surprisingly

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heavy.

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It drives a 22 watt T9 circline tube, and
it’s meant as an energy saving alternative

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to incandescent lamps.

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Really forward thinking, and the box has some
compelling data on the back.

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This unit appears to have never been put to
use, as the lamp ends aren’t darkened at

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all, and it’s in the original carton.

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So, how does one use this thing?

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Well, a large part I’m sure of why these
never took off was the fact that installing

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them in a lamp could be fairly annoying.

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You’d need to remove the shade and harp,
install the assembled lamp, though the instructions

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say you should put the tube in after you’ve
screwed the adapter in, which is nothing short

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of asinine, and then the harp would go through
the space between the tube and ballast, and

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you’d put the shade back on.

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Cool.

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But it won’t work in a lamp like this, a
ceiling fixture like that, or really in a

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whole bunch of applications.

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Not exactly universal.

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Assembling it is somewhat terrifying because
this clip is is rather tight, and I know fluorescent

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tubes are stronger than they look, but it
still seems like it’s gonna shatter in my

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hands when clipping it in.

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Then you put the little plug in and you’re
ready to run it.

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Because it uses a preheat starter, it starts
erratically and differently each time you

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turn it on!

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So that’s fun.

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And after it fires up, you’ll see the second
reason these probably weren’t that popular.

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The phosphor formulation in this tube is AWFUL.

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Really, really bad.

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White balance is, weird, with it producing
a sickly purplish grey light--even though

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the box assures us it has a warm, pleasing
color.

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Nope!

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And white balance isn’t the biggest issue.

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ANYTHING under it looks bizarre, with colors
being reproduced very strangely.

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But, this was pretty much standard fare for
fluorescent lighting of the time.

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Let’s do a quick comparison.

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I tend to buy all of my household items from
IKEA because I’m cheap and boring, so I

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happen to have three identical lamps.

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Let’s load em’ up with a standard 75 watt
incandescent (what this promises to replace),

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the ENERGY CHOICE miracle device in the middle,
and a more modern 60 watt equivalent CFL.

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Ready, go!

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What a warm, pleasing color that middle one
makes.

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Well, let’s give it a better chance, then.

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One of the real advantages this has over a
modern CFL is that the ballast is separate

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from the tube, so we can replace the tube
with something a little less terrible.

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Off to the hardware store.

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Here in the US, we describe our fluorescent
tubes by their diameter in eighths of an inch.

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Not sure how the rest of the world does it,
but true to American fashion, it’s a rather

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bizarre numbering scheme.

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The older T12 tube is 1 and a half inches
in diameter, as it’s 12/8ths of an inch,

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and the now more standard T8 is one inch in
diameter.

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But this thing is a T9.

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Nine eighths of an inch.

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Not sure why that’s a thing, but apparently
it’s a standard size for circline tubes.

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Whatever.

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I’m truly sorry if this is standard convention
for the rest of the world because it’s ridiculous.

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So, now that I’ve got a not-terrible tube
installed, how does it look?

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MUCH better.

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It’s a little cooler than I’d like at
3000K, but at least colors look at least somewhat

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correct.

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I think I’ll leave this thing in one of
my lamps here, as it is plenty bright and

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a neat novelty every time you switch it on.

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One thing I can’t help but wonder is what
will happen when the starter fails.

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It doesn’t seem like you’re meant to replace
it, and truthfully I don’t know if this

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center bit even comes apart, but I imagine
it will last for a very long time.

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In fact the box suggests the adapter should
last 20 years.

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If for some reason it won’t start a tube
anymore, I’ll hack this open and see if

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it’s rocking a standard glow starter plug
thing or what.

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Though you can see the starter glow at the
bottom of the adapter, so we know for sure

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it at least has the guts of a standard neon
starter plug inside.

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One interesting note is that because the tube
is far away from the center of the adapter,

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in lamps that will accommodate it, it produces
far more light downward than even an ordinary

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incandescent.

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This can be useful for lamps such as desk
lamps, as it will illuminate the work surface

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quite well.

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Thanks for watching, and thank you especially
to supporters on Patreon!

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You can support this channel with a totally
voluntary contribution to help keep these

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videos coming.

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And with that, I’ll see you next time.