House lit up like the national grid

duckeggblue

JUst moved into this house,never seen so many light bulbs in one house.
What wattage should I change the inside lights to ie hall,candle wall lights,

noncom_2

You're going to have to give a little more detail.

For example, if the fittings are all standard Bayonet Cap or Screw In bulbs (the traditional incandescent style) the you could replace them with CFLs (energy saving fluourescents) which can give similar amounts of light (although some would say not the same quality) for lower wattages. If you have dimming switches then you can buy dimmerable CFLs but not everyone thinks they're very good. You can also buy halogen bulbs with those fittings, and they can also give more light per watt than old incandescents, although not as much as CFLs, but they do dim better.

If you have recessed "halogen style" ceiling fittings, then if these are mains voltage (GU10 fitting) you can replace them with CFLs, but again you will have trouble if there are dimmer switches.

Your other alternative is LEDs which can be bought in virtually every fitting. Most can't be dimmed, and if they are replacing 12v (MR16 fitting) halogens you may also need to replace the transformers with a special LED driver. If they are replacing mains ones (GU10) then they may stick out of the fitting further than the halogens did. Also, don't believe the hype about how bright they are: a 4W LED does not make the room as bright as a 50W halogen, more like a 20W I'd have said, so you may only want to consider those if you feel the rooms are already over-bright. These bulbs are the future, but personally, I've gone for an interim solution for halogens (below) and will wait a couple of years to see how far LED technology has come by then (both in quality and affordability).

Finally, for halogens (both mains and 12V) you can buy "energy saving" versions from Philips (Masterline series), Osram (Decostar I think) and others which can produce more light per watt than standard bulbs and also claim to last twice as long. For these, a 35W Masterline should replace a 50W conventional halogen and of course can be dimmed as normal.

So, if you let us know what exactly you need to replace, then maybe you'll get some recommendations.....

geordie_joe

duckeggblue wrote: »

What wattage should I change the inside lights to ie hall,candle wall lights,

We can't tell you what wattage you should use, as we don't know how much light you like, how big your rooms are, how many light fittings in each room etc.

maninthestreet

duckeggblue wrote: »

JUst moved into this house,never seen so many light bulbs in one house.
What wattage should I change the inside lights to ie hall,candle wall lights,

You don't have to switch alll of the lights on at the same time, just because they are there, do you? Only use the ones you need to use, when you need to use them, and turn them off when you are done. Seems to work for me.