Tall CFL Bulb for a Tall Lamp

Yesterday, I posted a slideshow of my new Sudhu Tewari Lamp. It's beautiful, IMHO. The only problem with it is that the light was a little dim for my needs at work. The lamp came with a standard bulb socket. I put in a compact fluorescent light (CFL) bulb, but all the light concentrated at the bottom of the lamp.

So, I decided to add a taller, brighter CFL. You can see the difference in the pictures, below. It's much nicer now, but wasn't as straightforward as I thought it would be, so I figured that I would post a little instructable.

Note, by the way, that this is not an instructable on how to make one of these lamps. You can follow my link to the slideshow for more information about the artist who made this lamp. Hopefully, he'll make more, or post an instructable on how to make these!

Step 1 Get Parts

I thought that all I would need would be a new CFL bulb, but as it turns out, fluorescent bulbs require a ballast run. The screw-in ones that you put into an ordinary light socket have a tiny integrated ballast, which I think is cool since they've still been able to make them so cheap.

The taller CFL bulb that I got doesn't have an integrated ballast, so I had to buy one. Here are the parts I got:

• Bulb: FT36DL/830. At 36 Watts, this bulb puts out almost 3x as much light as the 13W bulb that was initially in there, or about as much light as a 100W-200W incandescent
• Ballast: WorkHorse WH3-180-C. This was chosen because it fits in the base of the lamp and has enough capacity to power the CFL bulb.
• 4-pin socket

I got these at Universal Electric Supply, which is in the neighborhood. It wasn't cheap: the total cost came to almost $40.

Comments

[Carlos Marmo]

Sophisticated!
Simple!
Perfect for any environment.
Anyway, GREAT WORK!

[sudhu_tewari]

I'm in the process of making a few more of these lamps - using your fabulous improvement - the tall CFL.

[nagutron]

NIce! Make sure to post the link to your finished products so I can send prospective customers your way :)

[sudhu_tewari]

For those interested, these lamps are easy to make but the circuit boards are not so easy to find. I'll post an instructable soon

[appleimacdude]

Any info on if he will make more? This is a cool lamp - might be great adapted to be a "marker light" outside, or inside a home - maybe recessed into corner of a staircase, to illuminate landing.

[Yerboogieman]

Great project, i love converting standard things to kooler things like this.

[sudhu_tewari]

Awesome work, dude! The tall CFL is the way to go...