Shop lights

[Mojonito]

Need some recs on lights. The flourescent ballasts finally went out in my metal shop. I am looking to replace them with 8ft leds. I want to see if anyone has recommendations. I found these which seem to be great bang for the buck:

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Lithonia-Li ... /320752349

I have found higher lumen lights but at three to four times the price. I am going to start out with four but I may do 8. It has 75 watt fluorescents now (not sure if t8 or t12) but it always could use extra light. It is BIG. Thanks!

[Tom]

Don't get those lights!! Very long story, but when we built my garage, we spec'd (and paid for) a higher-end, one-piece shop light. Unbeknownst to us the electrician substituted those HD light instead to save money. I honestly never even noticed. About a month after moving in, I had my virtually brand new 2018 991 Turbo S in the garage and, as captured by the security cameras, one of these lights just dropped off the ceiling for no reason and did a number on the rear wing and engine lid of the turbo s. Those lights are a two-piece design that just clip together with cheap sheet metal tangs. After the first one fell, we inspected the others and plenty of them were on the verge. We ended up using packing tape to hold them together long enough to order one-piece replacements. You could probably get creative with sheet metal screws to make sure it doesn't come apart, but I would never put those up again without some way to prevent the lower part from falling off.

[blueline]

To Tom's bad experience, I'll add that in general you get what you pay for. All else being equal, I'll willingly pay three times as much for something that offers superior performance and lasts five times longer. I have no use for the buy today and throw away later today product mentality. Gotta look closely at some of the items sold at big box stores.

High quality commercial grade lights are going to be superior in many ways, safety being maybe the most paramount, but as you've already pointed out, they will be considerably more expensive. However, they should be more dependable and give better, more even light.

Another thing that you might want to look into is the color temps of the whatever LED's you end up buying. 5000k in LED's is pretty bright and it's a bluish bright white that can be harsh. It seems brighter than regular 5000k Daylight florescent lamps. Some are ok with that but others don't care for it, me being one of them. I don't know about 8' strip lights, but there are some LED fixtures that are Kelvin temp adjustable. If not adjustable, you can still find fixed color temps at different levels from warm to cold.

[blueline]

I'm still a fan of 4' x 4-tube T-8 fluorescent fixtures with diffusers. Plenty of soft even light with a minimum of shadows or unlit areas. Old tech for sure but they get the job done. Electronic ballasts are a bit of a chore but still relatively easy to change out if one fails.

PXL_20230102_223410996.jpg (3.37 MiB) Viewed 1239 times

[Stormy_Monday]

I like sunlight bright LED lights. I put two of these in the garage when we redid it earlier this summer. I used an electrician we have been using for a number of years as he was starting his business, Him and his dad are motorheads so the synergy is there. I don't recall the brand, but not Lowes or Home Depot.

[996C438]

I have 4 ' LED lights in my man cave garage . Bought them off ebay and been running for 5 years now . I have 15 of them mounted on the walls near the ceiling . I also have three mounted above my lift.

I use conduit clamps as backup to the cheap clamps that come with the lights . Zero chance of them falling down . Mine are 5k and bright white . I am very happy with them .

I have 12 ' ceiling height . I am thinking about adding additional lights at roughly 4 ' from the floor to provide light closer to work level . If I do I will use the LED strips again .

[Mojonito]

Don't get those lights!! Very long story, but when we built my garage, we spec'd (and paid for) a higher-end, one-piece shop light. Unbeknownst to us the electrician substituted those HD light instead to save money. I honestly never even noticed. About a month after moving in, I had my virtually brand new 2018 991 Turbo S in the garage and, as captured by the security camera's, one of these lights just dropped off the ceiling for no reason and did a number on the rear wing and engine lid of the turbo s. Those light are a two-piece design that just clip together with cheap sheet metal tangs. After the first one fell, we inspected the others and plenty of them were on the verge. We ended up using packing tape to hold them together long enough to order one-piece replacements. You could probably get creative with sheet metal screws to make sure it doesn't come apart, but I would never put those up again without some way to prevent the lower part from falling off.

Damn. I wanted to buy locally rather than ship because it’s such an awkward package i know they will get damaged in transit. I’ll see what the local fixture supply has available. This is exactly what I wanted to hear.

[Mojonito]

To Tom's bad experience, I'll add that in general you get what you pay for. All else being equal, I'll willingly pay three times as much for something that offers superior performance and lasts five times longer. I have no use for the buy today and throw away later today product mentality. Gotta look closely at some of the items sold at big box stores.

High quality commercial grade lights are going to be superior in many ways, safety being maybe the most paramount, but as you've already pointed out, they will be considerably more expensive. However, they should be more dependable and give better, more even light.

Another thing that you might want to look into is the color temps of the whatever LED's you end up buying. 5000k in LED's is pretty bright and it's a bluish bright white that can be harsh. It seems brighter than regular 5000k Daylight florescent lamps. Some are ok with that but others don't care for it, me being one of them. I don't know about 8' strip lights, but there are some LED fixtures that are Kelvin temp adjustable. If not adjustable, you can still find fixed color temps at different levels from warm to cold.

These seem to be the best I can I find.

https://www.rcalights.com/wp-content/up ... heet-1.pdf

That pdf is for the symmetric lights. I would get the shl lights because they are going to hang about 6 ft from the ceiling and I don’t care for the cave effect from lights that are directed completely downwards.
Any opinions on 4K vs 5k?

[Mojonito]

I am interested in the led lights because I can link multiples if I don’t have the amount of light I am looking for.

[blueline]

To Tom's bad experience, I'll add that in general you get what you pay for. All else being equal, I'll willingly pay three times as much for something that offers superior performance and lasts five times longer. I have no use for the buy today and throw away later today product mentality. Gotta look closely at some of the items sold at big box stores.

High quality commercial grade lights are going to be superior in many ways, safety being maybe the most paramount, but as you've already pointed out, they will be considerably more expensive. However, they should be more dependable and give better, more even light.

Another thing that you might want to look into is the color temps of the whatever LED's you end up buying. 5000k in LED's is pretty bright and it's a bluish bright white that can be harsh. It seems brighter than regular 5000k Daylight florescent lamps. Some are ok with that but others don't care for it, me being one of them. I don't know about 8' strip lights, but there are some LED fixtures that are Kelvin temp adjustable. If not adjustable, you can still find fixed color temps at different levels from warm to cold.

These seem to be the best I can I find.

https://www.rcalights.com/wp-content/up ... heet-1.pdf

That pdf is for the symmetric lights. I would get the shl lights because they are going to hang about 6 ft from the ceiling and I don’t care for the cave effect from lights that are directed completely downwards.
Any opinions on 4K vs 5k?

Color temps are subjective choices. Work spaces tend to be in the 5000k and higher for better visibilty but 4000k would be ok I think. If you want brightness, 5000 is good but I wouldn't go over that unless it's an industrial space.

There are a lot of examples online but the problem there is that you cannot tell exactly what it will be like until they are actually mounted in your space. Ideally, you'd be able to visit an enclosed space lit entirely with fixtures of one specific Kelvin temp with neutrally painted light walls and no outside natural lighting so that you could see if you liked the brightness and color temp. It would then be easy I think to decide whether you wanted to go up or down from whatever Kelvin those lights had.

The difference between say, 4000 and 5000 is obvious but still subtle. I think 5000 is good but 4000 would probably work fine too. Your wall color and ambient light from windows plays into everything too.