walmart's return policy is insane! they take back anything within 30 days of purchase. i have bought walmart bulbs and they worked just fine for me,just unlucky on your part.(i by no means have any walmart ties)

yeah, you got a product that was most likely handled too rough.....(ex retail worker)

I bought some shop lights from walmart about nine months ago. They brand they carry is called Lights of America I believe.

First light which I took home home completely confused me and made me say to myself "complete assembly required?" Then I figured it out, at the factory the light was run over by a fork truck many, many, times before being packaged in a box and then sent to walmart for sale. That light was totally and completely destroyed! A couple weeks later I gave the brand another shot and picked up the same model and it shorted out the very first time it was plugged in. Third try I went for the second cheapest model and that has worked fine ever since. That particular light has been in my possesion for about nine months with 8 hours/day of use average and it still seems to be going strong.

For a poor college student the price cannot be beat. For most anyone else with some extra money to spend on lights the run around involved with returning all the lights that are DOA makes it not worthwhile, in my opinion.

Over the years, I have bought over two dozen of the 4-foot Commercial Electric shoplights from Home Depot and have had only one that needed replacement, which Home Depot willingly did.

The first ones I bought cost about $7 and the price has risen to about $8 now, so they cost about the same as Wal-Mart's cheapest fixtures. The Home Depot Commercial Electric shoplights accept either T8 or T12 bulbs and can be readily overdriven, following the instructions given by Zink in the I have found the BEST cheap fluorescent ballast/fixture message thread.

A lot of us are grateful to Zink for calling our attention to the overdrivable Home Depot commercial shoplights. They have revolutionized my indoor seed-starting operation.

MM

i own 6 of these fixtures and have had no troubles at all, but then again, at that price you have to expect the occasional lemon....

I needed 6 shop lights for my new 12 x 25 (and tall) shed and smaller old shed, so I bought 6 of the $7.92 WallMart lights. I pulled two of them out and they worked perfectly with no assembley required. Before I hung them up however, I noticed that WalMart NOW sells a shop light that is all stainless steel instead of white. They cost $14. 97 I think.

I'm returning the cheaper lights today and will exchange them for 14 of the new stainlesss steel types. I plan to use the extra 8 new lights in my home cabinet shop since my existing lights in there are old and very ugly after 25 years of use and abuse.

As for WalMart... I have no love for them but I WILL say this: They will allow you to return nearly ANYTHING, with almost no reasons asked.

jim

Unless you want the nicer (very subjective) look of the "stainless steel" (read: silver paint) $15 lights, there is no reason to buy those units. They have an identical ballast and very often the $8 units even have the on/off switch so they lose nothing to the $15 units. I bought 2 of the silver ones at first until I realized I was buying a product that put out much less light than the $8 fixture. The reflective properties of the silver reflector stink.

Again, if you're just buying for looks then ignore my post.

Jason