melted insulation

[rootofnewt]

that's what i found when i disassembled our quirky halogen torchiere.

o_O

a few years ago, it had a blown tube. after i replaced the tube (properly, i might add. i even changed bulbs a few time. we have another halogen like it, sans faultiness), the light would never work properly. it has two settings. on high, it shorts out when it gets hot and then turns back on. so we never left it on high, just low. and we never left it unattended. recently, it had two settings: high and high. the low no longer worked. i declared it time to buy a new light and did so.

and just now, as i was unscrewing the old lamp (which has been unused since sunday or monday), i smelled hot rubber... i pulled out the cord. melted. EEEEK. glad we didn't use it any longer.

i need to go clean out the car trunk. la la la

Comments

[ashbet]

Eeeuuughhh!! Good thing you replaced it!!

So, did the "Possible Type-A" bulb work? Geesh, you'd think they'd give more information . . .

-- Andi

you were right

[krasota.livejournal.com]

yeah. that was just a standard incandescent light bulb. i bought a three-way that goes up to 150. the one i had went up to 250. didn't wanna overpower the new lamp.

lamp is pretty. :)

eek

[lupusyondergir1.livejournal.com]

Those lights are known for that sort of thing. When I was living in a dorm we wern't even allowed to have them in our rooms because they were such a fire risk.
I know one person had the light actually cause a tiny fire in their apartment (luckily they were home and grabbed the extinguisher in time), and I've been afraid of them ever since.

I'd check out the other one, just to make sure it's ok. You might want to switch to a standard floor lamp with a three way bulb in it or something similar. They're just as bright, but no more dangerous than any other lamp.

Re: eek

[krasota.livejournal.com]

the new lamp is a three-way incandescent. the other halogen that matched this one happens to have a blown bulb. it's unplugged at the moment. that one has never given us any problems, we just replace the bulb every 18 months. i'll unscrew it and check the insulation and cord, though.

we have a dimmer halogen in the bedroom. an older one... very nice (one of the *heavy* ones that isn't very cheap)... no problems. i'm not sure we've ever replaced the bulb, even, and we've had it since at least 97. it was owned by a friend for a few years before that.