Of concern to many people; particularly those who haven't been brainwashed by the trendy eco nazis, is that incandescent lamps which have been such an important part of our civilisation are being banned by various governments. Because many people prefer incandescent lamps to other light sources, they have continued to be popular, even though CFL's are a huge proportion of the lighting market.  Here, we see the population deciding what kind of light bulbs are best for their use. But because what the population wants is not what the government, pressured by lobby groups, wants, incandescent lamps are now a restricted import in Australia. Paradoxically, we are made to feel guilty about using incandescent bulbs, but not about plasma displays, air conditioners, or four wheel drive vehicles..
In this article I describe methods to continue the use of incandescent lamps with what is currently available.

1. Problems with CFL's (Compact Fluorescent Lamps).

• Ugliness - no more need to be said here.
• Light quality is not the same as incandescent; in fact  it's quite nauseating to look at; especially the bright "daylight" types with a colour temperature of around 5000-6000K.
• Physical dimensions. Not the same as incandescent bulbs. This can be a problem where the light fitting relies on the shape and size of the envelope.
• Unable to be used in hot environments (e.g. enclosed light fittings) without shortening their life. The electrolytic capacitors dry out and switching transistors overheat.
• Unable to be used in damp environments. Moisture condensing on the PCB causes leakage and if the PCB doesn't carbonise first, the leakage current will cause a chain reaction of blown fragile semiconductors.
• Dim and slow startup in cold environments. Full brilliance is obtained after a few minutes operation. Not convenient where the lamp is only needed for a few seconds at a time.
• Cannot be rapidly turned on and off. No more flashing lights outside the pizza shop.
• Radio Frequency Interference. The inverter circuitry radiates harmonics into the Medium Wave band. Some lamps are worse than others in this regard. Of course, there are plans to shut down Medium Wave AM transmitters so that fixes that.
• Distortion of the mains supply. This is a serious problem, and is getting worse. Like other switchmode supplies, CFL's rectify and filter the mains supply thus providing 340V DC to run the high frequency inverter. Towards the peak of the mains voltage cycle is where the filter capacitor charges and draws current. As a result, the mains voltage is no longer sinusoidal. The resulting harmonics also cause losses in the transmission system.
• The lamps are not dimmable, unless you want to pay for a very expensive and not easily obtainable one.
• Running the lamps at reduced voltage destroys them. Unlike a filament lamp which is happy with 240V RMS (or less)  of any shaped waveform, the CFL needs a 240V sine wave to provide the 340V peak. If this is reduced, the switching transistors inside the lamp do not saturate due to reduced drive. Thus they overheat. This means CFL's shouldn't be run off a square wave inverter with only 240V peak output.
• Where a two wire sensor, touch switch etc., is used to switch the lamp, insufficient current  flows to power the sensor.
• Phantom flashing because of leakage current. The capacitance in the wiring between the switch on the wall and socket on the ceiling is often enough to cause the lamp's filter capacitor to slowly charge allowing the lamp to function as a relaxation oscillator. This could easily be fixed with a bleed resistor or shunt capacitor across the supply.
• Unable to deal with voltage spikes. Instant death to the fragile semiconductors is what happens if the mains voltage should be momentarily exceeded, whereas the incandescent carries on so long as the spike didn't have time to overheat the filament. Semiconductors die faster than a filament heats up.
• The waste of materials and electronic components. The nasty chemicals do not exist with incandescent bulbs.
• Ultra Violet light output. Mercury vapour when ionised such as in a fluorescent tube radiates UV light. Most is absorbed by the phosphor and glass, but not all. Have you noticed that light coloured plastic objects in a room lit by fluorescent light tend to become discoloured? For example, a white telephone becomes a sickly yellow colour after a while.  Incandescent lamps do not radiate any damaging kind of light.

3. Hoarding Bulbs.
Most important, and it seems many people have missed the boat, so to speak. In a place like Australia you wouldn't really think they would take away light bulbs for sale would you? Unfortunately, it did happen, the import ban did come into force in February 2009, and people were being met with empty shelves in the shops. I saw this coming well before and hoarded enough bulbs for my own use, but for others who later become aware of the situation there is some hope and ways to deal with the situation.
The new law (note that like most new laws, this one is yet another freedom taken away) stated that retailers had until November 2009 to sell off remaining stock. Some supermarkets (particularly smaller independent ones) still had bulbs which were being sold off at a reduced price at this time. Mostly these were E27 (Edison Screw) base, as these are less used in Australia.

Blown light bulbs are worth keeping for their bases to make adaptors or to convert bulbs from one base to another. In their own right they are a beautiful object that those with an artistic talent could use to make decorations. Why not hang them from your Christmas tree? Burnt out coloured ones would be ideal for this.

Even though most light sockets in Australia are B22 (Bayonet Cap), it is important to still collect E27 bulbs as will be explained later. Whilst the bulbs might not always be of your favourite wattage, you still need to hoard them. There are ways to get the brightness you prefer, which again will be explained.
Not yet banned, as of 2014, are Candle, Fancy Round, and Appliance Lamps of 40W or less. While these are more expensive than GLS bulbs, they are are still one option. So, if you've missed out on GLS bulbs, you have a second chance to hoard these.
Oven lamps are available up to 25W but are only available in E27 base. These and other appliance lamps will be available for somewhat longer. Having said that, there is still this insatiable drive to eliminate any kind of incandescent bulb no matter what, and you can be sure they will be eradicated.
However, where the shape and size of bulb is important (there were some old table lamps where the shade actually clipped onto the bulb) you still need GLS.

4. Changing the base.
So, you've got a carton of E27 bulbs because they were cheap (and that's all that was left), or you've decided to use screw base oven bulbs to light your house because they haven't been banned yet. Not a problem! There's several ways to deal with this:

The difference between the U.S.  Medium Screw (E26) base (left), and the Australian/European E27 (right). They are interchangeable but the U.S bulb may not always make contact in an E27 socket. Incidentally, the bulb shown here is 12V 50W,  as used on my solar/wind home lighting plant.

• Buy or make an adaptor. These are widely available on ebay. It is also easy to make one up yourself. Simply connect an Edison Screw light socket to a bayonet plug via a short length of flex. E27 light sockets are available from electrical wholesalers under Clipsal part number 501ES. If you prefer a batten (surface mount) socket, use a Clipsal 530ES. To connect to your existing bayonet socket, you'll need the Clipsal 466 bayonet plug. You can also remove the base of a burnt out B22 bulb and use that instead. If the Clipsal E27 sockets are not to your liking, plenty of E26 sockets are available from the U.S on the internet. What's the difference between E26 and E27 you may ask? It's the length of the base. The European E27 base is slightly longer than the E26. What this means is that an Aussie or European bulb screwed into a U.S socket will have more of the base exposed. If the possible shock hazard worries you simply wrap the exposed part of the base with insulating tape before screwing it in. Where U.S. bulbs are screwed into Australian/European E27 sockets there is a chance that the bottom of the base will not make contact. If so, simply bend the contact in the bottom of the socket up slightly. If this isn't possible then add a slight lump of solder to the bottom contact of the bulb base.

• Change the light sockets to E26 or E27. A difficulty that can arise here is where lampshades are used. The skirt size on the Clipsal sockets is larger than the standard B22 socket, so the hole in the centre of the lampshade has to be enlarged. U.S lamp sockets do not have removable skirts. Most of the world uses ES. It also allows ease of use with 25W oven bulbs.

• Actually change the base. If you're patient and careful this can be done. For this reason, do not throw away burnt out light bulbs...they are a source of donor bases! The first and easiest step is to get the base off a blown light bulb. After breaking away the glass you'll need to chip and break away at most of the cement inside the base. Also, remove the solder and remaining stem wires. Next, you need to prepare the E27 bulb. Incidentally, if you find any E27's with a loose base, don't glue it back on, convert it to B22. Getting the base off a bulb is somewhat difficult. I haven't found anything that just dissolves the cement.  The best option is to carefully cut it with a fine hacksaw a few mm away from the glass. Hold the base only when doing this, not the glass! Desolder the wires first so when it comes free they won't get broken. Now, you'll have to connect the wires to the bayonet base, possibly extending them. Glue the BC base to what's left of the ES base with epoxy. Then solder the wires to the BC contacts. If you've been lucky and had a bulb with a loose base to start with, attaching the new B22 base is easier, and the completed job makes it hard to tell anything was changed.

5. Getting the right brightness.
Your hoardings may not have have left you with your preferred wattage lamps. It seems that 60W BC is probably the most popular GLS lamp in Australia, probably followed by 100W. So, these are the hardest to come by. Not to worry; we can use others to obtain the required light output.

• You need more light but have only low wattage bulbs. Once upon a time you could get bayonet double adaptors. These were primarily intended for running appliances off light sockets before power points became commonplace in houses. They still turn up at swap meets, garage sales etc. By using one of these you can install two low wattage bulbs to bring up the light level. For example, a couple of 15W pilot lights could be used to replace one 25W bulb, and so on. Of course you can make your own double (or triple, etc.) adaptor with a bayonet plug and as many lamp sockets as required. This way, we can light a large room with candle, fancy round, or oven bulbs. The catch to this scheme is where the light fitting is enclosed and there isn't room for the extra bulbs and sockets. However, incandescent lamps are an object of artistic beauty and there is no shame in having them fully exposed.

• You've only got cartons of 100W bulbs or lots of 300W bulbs and don't want such brightness. This is easily dealt with by using a dimmer or other voltage dropping device. Alternatively, try connecting bulbs in series; not necessarily the same wattage either. See what combinations of brightness you can come up using this scheme. A quick and simple voltage reducer can be had by connecting an ordinary rectifier diode in series with the bulb; this will drop the RMS voltage down to 170V. However, flicker may be present dependent on the filament thickness due to the lamp flickering at 50 times a second instead of 100. A limitation with dimming bulbs is that the colour temperature of the lamp is reduced and becomes much more red.

• Low voltage GLS lamps. In Australia it has been possible, and was until recently possible, to buy GLS bulbs in 12, 24,32, 50 and 120V with both B22 and E27 bases. These came about as a result of the prevalence of home lighting plants in rural areas until the 1950's. They've also been used in boats(12V), caravans(6 & 12V), trains (32V), telephone exchanges and emergency lighting (50V) and more recently with solar and wind lighting plants (12&24V). With the closure of the ELMA factory in Newcastle, these lamps are now imported from China, mainly by Crompton. Unfortunately, they are not cheap, and Crompton have recently discontinued them. The 12V GLS lamps I use on my home lighting plant typically cost about $3.50-$7.00 each. However, they last an extremely long time. E26 GLS lamps in 12V are less than half the price from the U.S, and I imported a large supply of them a few years ago when I set up my home lighting plant. The point of this is to say that you can still use your existing light fittings with these bulbs. Simply power the light fitting from a suitable transformer. An option if you're serious about using these bulbs is to run two light circuits in your house as I've done; one at the lower voltage and the original 240V circuit for fluorescent lamps.

• 120V bulbs. These have been made and sold in Australia in the past. They were used in some trains, home lighting plants, and emergency lighting systems. While you can buy them here through electrical wholesalers, they are not cheap as I've mentioned above. Much cheaper to buy from the U.S where they're a standard supermarket item, although with an E26 base only. Keep in mind that they won't be available forever but you'll have a bit longer to stock up on them. Use them in series pairs, or off a transformer. Of course, when using in series, you must use ones of the same wattage. Again, one could convert the house lighting circuit to 120V fed from a transformer and change the light sockets to E26 types.

• 12V car/boat/caravan bulbs. For the diehard incandescent lamp user, these are yet another option. Brake lights and indicator bulbs are typically 21W. The bayonet base of these is smaller (19mm) so it need not be removed if fitting a B22 base. Most would use a transformer, but connecting 20 in series is an option. Keep in mind that if doing this, the lamp sockets will need to be insulated for 240V. Also, remember if one burns out, 240V will be present at the socket terminals. The SBC double contact base used with caravan and boat lamps is the same as that used for their 240V counterparts. Most 240V SBC lamps are used in chandeliers and vanity lights (lights around mirrors). B22 to SBC adaptors are available on eBay.

• Use a dimmer, or other voltage dropper. As an example, two Australian made Crompton 40W bulbs in my living room reading lamp were in use since 1987 and only failed in 2011. This lamp is plugged into a dimmer which is never turned up past about 80%. The difference in brightness is only discernable when making a comparison; the colour temperature is not noticeably reduced. A diode used as a dimmer, described previously, is effective and simple, providing flicker is not bothersome. One way to remove flicker is to have two bulbs in the fitting; one fed on the positive part of the mains cycle and the other fed on the negative. Although the individual bulbs may still be seen to flicker, the combined light output won't.

• Look for higher voltage bulbs. When bulbs were still manufactured here, you could buy them in 260V, even from some hardware stores. These would last several years.  In fact, the glass would blacken well before the filaments burnt out.

• Use higher wattage lamps with a dimmer/dropper to give the same brightness as a low wattage bulb. As mentioned previously, if you don't mind a reduction in colour temperature, this is a good way to get long life. For example,if you normally use a 40W bulb in a light fitting, change it to a 60W and reduce the supply voltage to get the same brightness. You'll get the same light but the bulb will last so much longer. If colour temperature is of concern, use the next highest wattage bulb to minimise the effect. A 300W bulb dimmed to give 40W of light will be much redder than a 60W bulb dimmed for the same amount of light.

• Surge suppression. Ring Grip used to sell various adaptors to fit between a light bulb and bayonet socket which would allow the bulb to be dimmed, used as an automatic night light, or as a timer. The "programming" of the adaptor is done by switching the light on and off in a certain pattern. Very convenient and they work well, despite creating very bad RFI. The one thing in common is that all these adaptors have a soft start feature; i.e. the RMS voltage to the bulb rises gradually after switch on. Prior to the adaptors, Ring Grip sold light bulbs with the circuitry inside the base. But, at a cost of $25 each they didn't sell. So, when Bunnings started offloading them for about 10 cents each, along with the adaptors, I bought a large quantity. I use one of the 30 minute timer adaptors for my 25W B22 laundry light. As the light is never needed for more than a few minutes, the timing function goes unnoticed, but the soft start is always there. It is also possible to build a soft start circuit, with several designs appearing in electronics magazines over the years. They were particularly popular with projector lamps. For the 300W GES base lamp in my garage, a resistor is in series with lamp which then is shorted out by means of a 555 and a relay after a few seconds. A suitable thermistor can be used for the same effect.

• Avoid vibration, especially when the bulb is on. Lamp sockets with switches on them are best not used; turn the lamp off with an in line switch or at the power point. Portable lead lamps will give very short life to bulbs used in them; this is one place I do recommend CFL's or LED bulbs.

9. Antique reproduction bulbs.

These are not in the banned list, so are available in Australia from Bunnings and various lighting shops. They are really intended to be a decorative item. Here you will pay about $20 each for them, although the price is dropping. To avoid paying the "Australia Tax",  it's cheaper to buy direct from the U.S at about half the price, if you can get a good deal on the postage. However, make sure of the voltage. While some U.S sellers can supply 240V bulbs, not all do. If you buy 120V bulbs you will need a transformer, or run two of the same wattage in series. Most are made under the "Ferrowatt" brand. I bought some 240V B22 ones from a U.S. ebay seller and found them to be well made. The exhaust tip on the bulb is just for appearance; the bulb construction is otherwise modern. The ones I bought have a squirrel cage filament as per the illustration above, but are available with other vintage styles. Interestingly, unlike the original squirrel cage bulbs, the reproductions actually have a coiled filament. This is visible upon looking closely. The bulbs certainly work, but are not really practical in many situations. For a 60W bulb, the light given out is about the same as a modern 25W bulb, and the colour temperature is much lower. So, from an efficiency point of view they are quite poor. On the plus side they are claimed to last 2000hrs.

10. Halogen GLS bulbs - Incandescent bulbs are still available.

These resemble and perform the same as a standard incandescent bulb.

These reappeared in 2009 as a permitted substitute for the standard incandescent bulb. I say "reappeared", because these bulbs have been around since 2002, made by Osram under the "Halolux" name. Externally, they are identical to the standard bulb, but contain a halogen filled capsule with the filament inside that.

Bought in 2002, this bulb is merely claimed to have long life, with minimal reference to improved efficiency.

What I find surprising is these bulbs are readily available at every supermarket, yet many people think you can't buy incandescent bulbs any more. These are incandescent!
The performance is virtually indistinguishable from the normal argon filled incandescent bulb.
The difference is that the halogen atmosphere allows the filament to run hotter (and thus more efficiently). The tungsten particles are reabsorbed in the filament instead of on the glass walls. This is why halogen bulbs do not darken as they age. The UV problem is reduced by virtue of the outer glass bulb.
This can in fact be broken and the bulb will still work, but the UV output will increase.
It is now possible to buy the halogen GLS bulbs for about $2 each. This equates to much the same price as the standard bulb when one takes into account the 2000hr life.
For those who didn't hoard first time around, I strongly recommend you start hoarding these. While they currently meet MEPS specifications, remember there is an underlying drive to eliminate filament lamps and you can be sure these will eventually be targeted. It doesn't take long to build up a collection if you just buy a couple each time you go shopping.

All the well known brands are now selling halogen GLS bulbs. This one is from Sylvania.

The obvious choice is to use these halogen GLS bulbs where all the characteristics of the argon filled filament bulbs are required. Externally, they are identical with the same light quality, and fitted with a tungsten filament, have the same resistive loading characteristics. Of course, as such they are fully dimmer compatible and do not care about waveform or frequency. For those who didn't hoard the first time round, you have a second chance with these.

11. Ebay.
Ordinary 240V GLS incandescent bulbs are obtainable on ebay from Hong Kong and UK suppliers. I would be interested to know the results of someone in Australia buying them and if there were any problems with customs. Likewise, purchasing from New Zealand is an option, where the government did implement the ban but then overturned it.

12. LED bulbs.
Since about 2012, there has been a huge increase in the availability of LED bulbs, which are available in all the styles of domestic bulbs; everything from candle to PAR38 floodlights.
Prices vary considerably from around $10 to $25. One type I have tried, a Click GLS shaped bulb is actually very good.

The colour temperature was very close to that of an incandescent lamp. In fact, it was not actually obvious that it was a LED bulb. It was far superior to any CFL.
However, there is a lot of variation in what's available. One limitation of many LED bulbs is the light appears only at the end of the bulb and not the sides. Also, where the LED is powered via a switchmode supply, some RFI might be evident. On ebay, LED bulbs are also available with B22 and E26/E27 bases in low voltage.
Unfortunately, although LED lighting has its place, it will be the final nail in the coffin for incandescent lighting. Already, it is becoming standard for automotive lighting. Portable lighting, like torches and camping lights is now virtually all LED based. How often do you see a torch for sale with an incandescent bulb now? Flood lamps are rapidly moving away from halogen to LED bulbs.

13. LED filament bulbs.

For non incandescent lamps, these are the perfect substitute. The light quality is for all practical purposes the same as an incandescent bulb both in appearance and colour. Power consumption is roughly one tenth of the incandescent counterpart for the same amount of light. Cosmetically, the bulbs are identical in terms of having a glass bulb and "filaments" inside, and when illuminated, it is very hard to tell they're LED. Various bulb styles are available such as candle and 1920's squirrel cage bulbs, as well as the normal GLS. The better designed bulbs have a fully glass envelope (as shown above), while others are part plastic (to get the extra room for their control gear). Like other LED bulbs, warm white or cool white types are available. Obviously, one chooses warm white to get the same colour as an incandescent lamp.
The filaments are comprised of lots of individual LED's and thus have a relatively high voltage drop; something like 60V. The power supply is built into the base and is either a switchmode converter or a capacitive dropper. However, this is where problems can arise. The switchmode converters are not bothered by supply waveform or frequency, as the mains is rectified and filtered to DC. So, there should be no problems with operating this type off an inverter. Capacitive dropper types are obviously frequency dependent because of the reactance of the series capacitor. Thus, operating such a lamp off a frequency higher than 50c/s (as from some vibrator inverters) would cause excess current in the LED filaments. DC operation is not possible with a capacitive dropper. There is also the question of waveform. Tests have yet to be done to determine if a square wave fed into a capacitive dropper causes more current to flow than if the supply is sinusoidal, but initial experiments seem to indicate that it does. There is also the issue of power factor; due to the largely capacitive load this will be low and problematic for some inverters.
For oridinary domestic use supplied from the public mains supply, these things are not an issue, but need to be considered if inverter operation is required. Note that the solid state parts in the power supply will be vulnerable to spikes on the mains.
These bulbs are now widely available, and I bought some to test. I quickly discovered the ones I bought use a capacitive dropper (they do not work on DC and the current waveform was indicative of a capacitive load). Unfortunately, the DC from the bridge rectifier is not filtered and thus a flicker is visible out of the corner of one's eye. In fact this was bad enough to prevent me using them as part of my normal domestic lighting. Apart from that, the light was as good as that from an incandescent bulb. It should be pointed out that what I bought were eBay cheapies, so the lack of filtering is perhaps not surprising.

14. Fluorescent tubes.
Finally, whilst on the subject of lighting sources to be banned, let's not forget fluorescent tubes. Of particular concern is the T12 style tubes, often called "fat tubes". These are the original 1.5" diameter 20W (2'), 40W (4'), and 65W (5') tubes. Already, warm white types have been banned. 65W types are increasingly difficult to obtain. Supermarkets; the ones that do sell flourescent tubes, no longer stock T12 types.
What have been passed off as "replacements" are 18, 36, and 58W types in T8 style (1" diameter). The T8 tubes originally came in 10W, 15W, and 30W. There's two problems here. First is the physical one of different tube diameters.
In some vintage flourescent fittings, that have spring clips and end caps, the tube will hang loose in the clips, and the end caps won't really hold onto anything.
Secondly, using the newer tubes in old fittings will cause shorter tube life simply because a 36W tube run with a 40W choke will be overloaded.
T8 tubes of 18W and above appear not to start on mains voltage alone, and this is a problem in fittings where a resistor or incandescent lamp is used instead of a choke. As such, they are also problematic with rapid start fittings.

Small flourescent tubes once commonly used in torches or caravan type lights will soon be very difficult to get. These are the T5 tubes in 4W, 6W, 8W, and 13W sizes. If you look at what's for sale now, you'll see these small fluorescent lamp fittings have been virtually overtaken with LED's. So, again, hoard the tubes while you can.
Note that the modern T5 tubes, now being promoted as "high efficiency" are not the same in wattage or length. It appears the "modern T5" trend was short lived as LED tubes have reached the same quality.

What are now replacing mains operated fluorescent tubes are LED replacements. The light quality is actually very good and has the advantage of no UV radiation. However, there are none in the T12 diameter. These LED replacements have an internal switchmode power supply, so have the usual vulnerability to spikes on the mains that proper fluorescent tubes do not have. There are several configurations used by the manufacturers in terms of the connections to the tubes. The better designed types are simply a drop in replacement in the common switch start fitting - provided the starter is removed! It's important to remove the starter because the tube will be subjected to a nasty inductive spike when the tube tries to "start". These tubes have both pins at each end connected together so the starter socket becomes connected in parallel to the tube. Leaving the choke in situ is satisfactory because the voltage drop across it with the lower current is unimportant, and the switchmode regulator takes care of this.
The other kind of tube has the mains fed in at only one end of the tube; the pins at the other end are connected together but not to the internal circuit of the tube. To get this to work, a substitute "starter" is required which is simply a shorting link, to complete the circuit.
While these LED substitutes can be connected directly to the mains, it's wise to leave the choke in place should a conventional tube be fitted by someone unknowing.