Energy saving bulbs using more than rated output

navig8r

As title,I have replace all my bulbs with 11 watt philips bulbs but they seem to be using more than the rated power.
My DIL bought me an Owl Cm119 enegy monitor so I have been going round the house turning things on and off to see what uses what.
I have found that it will display in steps of 0, 32,48,and 64 watts even if some thing is turned on of 4 watts between those steps .After 64 watts it will show lower wattage items so was very suprised to find my 11 watt bulbs are showing to use 16 watts each eg, one bulb shows 16 watts 10 bulbs show 165 watts.To eliminate errors I have repeated this with more things turned on so the starting point is over two KW.
I guess that these energy monitors are not likely to be highly accurate but has anyone else done any tests on these bulbs ?

Dave

moonrakerz

You will find somewhere in the small print something that says these monitors are not accurate at low readings !

I think your experiment has proved that quite well !

navig8r

Thanks for the reply, I have today plugged in my Ebac dehumifier which is rated at 250 watts..the meter showed 485 watts:eek:
I then plugged it into a Maplins energy monitor which showed 248 watts,so a much more accurate reading .I then tried a bedside lamp in the maplin and tried some 11 watt bulbs which showed 9 -10 watts, a 60w incadescant bulbs showed 56w
I have come to the conclusion that the bulbs are ok but the accuracy of the Owls "current usage" errs on the side of giving the user a fright ..unless mine is faulty. What is interesting is the fact that the running total used since xmas very nearly matches my mains meter usage.
dave