Troy Lighting BF2952, Potter Photocell Outdoor Wall Sconce, 26 Watts Fluor, Fired Iron

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Price: $638.00    

Product Feature

• Dimensions - 39.5" Height x 14" Width x 16.25" Depth
• Includes: (1) - 23 w Mini-Twist CFL Soft GU24 Base Light Bulb
• Clear Seeded Glass

Product Description

Height of tail is 27".

Troy Lighting BF2952, Potter Photocell Outdoor Wall Sconce, 26 Watts Fluor, Fired Iron Review

Let me just start out this review by confirming how stunning this lamp is. It's big, it's relatively sturdy, and the design finds a nice balance between "practical" and "eccentric."

The wall sconce selection for lights of this style seems to be slim pickings -- I immediately fell in love with the look of this lap the instant I laid eyes on it, and found a way to justify the expense.

Troy needed one month to ship the order (drop shipped from a non-Amazon seller), but it came to my doorstep in a HUGE box. Disassembled, all of the component parts were protected in foam blocks, some with an added layer of bubble wrap. The glass came separate from the cage, neatly stacked in its own custom-cut foam block. UPS or FedEx would have had a tough time damaging this light in transit.

Assembly was quick, with two tail lengths to choose from. The light even comes with a darkness sensor wired it -- something I didn't see in any of the product descriptions, but also something easily clipped out (since I had already wired my exterior lighting circuits with light / motion sensors).

The exterior finish is consistent, the mounting backplate is sturdy, and the "vine" pieces are thick and solid. The glass is of above average quality compared to other lights, a slightly opaque "seedy" glass with an yellow-orange tint that does an excellent job of hiding the included spiral CFL blub. Even the cut lines are clean and straight, without any splintering or rough breaks.

The proportions are huge: the cage is 9 inches wide by 8 long, tapering down to about 5� inches along the bottom edge. The shade is 14 inches square. The vine extends about 10" above and two feet below the wall box. This sconce claims its space on the wall, and can't be ignored. In fact, the whole thing projects out a good 17 inches from the wall (front edge of shade).

The included 26W (max rating) GU24 bulb is probably overly bright -- I'm still judging, but I'm think an 18-watter will be more at home here. The 26W lights up the patio, but looks "security light bright." Thankfully, GU24 bulbs are getting easier to find in stores.

The shade, by the way, does exactly what it's supposed to: it keeps the light projection down and out, leaving a satisfying dark space above. I mounted the light with the shade right at the 6' height, the intent to light a small 10x10' section of patio where we have a mid-height dining table.

And in case you're wondering, NO, the lamp doesn't swing from the hook -- it's solidly welded in place (darn!).

Why the "It's OK" rating? I generally don't assign my review ratings based on price, since we all find our own deals, and have different perceptions of value / cost / etc. But after spending time shopping for lights both online and in the aisles of Home Depot, there's no denying that this lamp leans towards the higher end of the price spectrum. And believe me, we have three lamps on the front of the house that, all together total about $100, that we're quite happy with.

For this price, I'm not getting much (if any) additional value.

Take for instance the glass mounting tabs. Troy opted to use metal "bendy tabs" that are either glued or possibly spot-welded to the frame. For one, the tabs are all placed haphazardly: severely crooked, at different heights. They're painted over, and the paint flakes off as soon as the tab is bent. The glass panels are too large to fit in some of these pre-bent tabs, so it was necessary to bend them all flat and start from scratch, lest the glass didn't sit flush against the cage. And due to the random placement, a few of the tabs are visible through the glass, poking up above the frame.

Another example is the tail piece. It has a very sloppy fit where it plugs in to the main lamp body (you can see the large seam and awkward angle change in the photo I posted). When I preassembled the lamp + tail prior to mounting, I was unable to get the backplate to touch the wall -- the tail stuck back too far and "arched" the whole lamp out away from the wall. Instead I had to squeeze and coerce the tail into the slot only after the the light was affixed to the wall. This was its own challenge, made more difficult by the Phillips head set screw that binds the two pieces together: there's no way to get a screwdriver back once the lamp is mounted to the wall, so out came the pliers. Even then, the too-long screw sticks out a good half inch from the back of the tail; I'll soon replace this with a grub screw with an allen head.

The cage (and all the glass) hangs from the shade by two thin tabs, secured to threaded posts by thumb nuts. The tabs, like the glass mounting tabs, are at uneven heights, fragile looking, and only connect in one orientation. Turn the cage 180 and everything looks like it lines up, but there weren't enough threads extending through the tab to get the thumb nut to bite. Looks like a project I whipped together in a high school metal shop class.

The nice "fired iron" finish is, alas, only spray on. It stops at the exterior edges of the cage, where there is an abrupt transition to something in between "scratched/poorly painted" and "bare metal." This is what I expect from a sub-$100 Hudson Bay lamp from the local big box.

Lastly, the mounting is novel but funky. The lamp comes with a mostly traditional looking round crossbar (aka mounting plate), except that it has two threaded tabs projecting out that accept screws vertically, from the top and bottom edges of the backplate. With a typical mounting arrangement, the crossbar is secured to the electrical box, and the lamp is then tightened snug against the wall, easy-peasy. Here, the crossbar has to be shimmed away from the wall (I used small washers between the plate and the stucco) to get all the holes to align. AND there's simply no way to snug this light up against the wall. For what purpose? I don't know -- the aesthetics of no cap nuts on the face of the backplate? I was lucky, and got this right on my third shot. Minor annoyance.

It's a shame that Troy seems unaware/unconcerned that many people installing this lamp are also the purchaser/homeowner. Details like inconsistent finish, finicky mounting, and wonky glass tabs make me feel like I got ripped off, even if they're details every guest at our house will never notice. The ill-fitting tail is the biggest sin.

For all that, I still think it's a beautiful piece that I hope to enjoy long after my displeasure with the price to value ratio fades from my memory.

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