Shop lights - Page 1

Posted: 5/28/2020 7:13:27 PM EDT

Bought our new place 2 years ago 60*40 detached garage with 14' ceilings. There are currently 11 8 foot florescent lights and a few have gone out. I do not have a step ladder big enough to work on them. Would you look at led replacement tubes or change out the lights completely? I would like a couple ceiling fans, so I'm leaning towards hiring the whole job out. Cost isn't a huge issue, because if I do it myself I'm looking at buying a big step ladder or renting a lift.

Posted: 5/28/2020 7:33:16 PM EDT

[#1]

Look up the cost to get the retrofits vs replacing them with new fixtures.

Posted: 5/28/2020 7:36:19 PM EDT

[#2]

Yep. Run the numbers.

I went with replacing the bulbs with some I got off Amazon. LEDs at 5000k. Ditched the ballasts in the process. Great results for me.

Ceiling fan sounds good, though.

Posted: 5/28/2020 7:46:38 PM EDT

[#3]

Quote History

Quoted:
Yep. Run the numbers.

I went with replacing the bulbs with some I got off Amazon. LEDs at 5000k. Ditched the ballasts in the process. Great results for me.

Ceiling fan sounds good, though.

View Quote

Are the tubes as good as new fixtures? I remember trying one a few years ago and it wasn't great.

Posted: 5/28/2020 8:02:26 PM EDT

[#4]

Ditch the lights and put in LED's. I just took out the old 8 ft. fluorescents ( 2 separate fixtures, 4 bulbs ) and replaced with LED fixtures. Incredible what a difference it makes. Easy fix.

Posted: 5/28/2020 8:19:40 PM EDT

[#5]

I put in 36 of these in my 24 x 36, on a 24 inch spacing (conveniently each rafter.)

Claimed lumens for each fixture are 8640 which may be optimistic but I've certainly meet my target of a minimum of 100 foot candles.

Attached File

Don't bother with the old fixtures.

The 8 foot units are really light, mount with three screw in clips and can be chained together if you like (I didn't). I ran conduit and four circuits in a staggered fashion so I can run 9, 18, 27 or 36 lights.

The lights come with a pigtail, a short and long daisy chain cable, so I got 3 prong plugs for them off of eBay. I figure it was worth the time to run outlets so that in five years when LED output doubles I can pull stuff down and replace it.

ETA: If you can rent a lift, do it, otherwise a scaffold with wheels on it makes things easy. I used two ladders and it was only a modest pain in the ass with 10 foot ceilings.

Posted: 5/28/2020 8:23:44 PM EDT

[#6]

Walmart has hyper tough 4 foot ones that are like 12 bucks of you get them on sale, I have a 3 Car garage and they work great I have 6 total . Only drawback is they don’t daisy chian so I had to run a messy Christmas light gang cord(10 outlets on it,
Max 750 watts total, I used 500 with my current set up) above to a surge Protector that I use as light switch.

Posted: 5/28/2020 10:17:48 PM EDT

[#7]

Quote History

Quoted:

Are the tubes as good as new fixtures? I remember trying one a few years ago and it wasn't great.

View Quote

New tubes usually come with new tombstones so the only thing you are really saving is the housings, wiring and the aggravation of hanging and wiring in new ones. 10 minutes vs 30-45 each.

Posted: 5/28/2020 10:19:22 PM EDT

[#8]

Quote History

Quoted:
I put in 36 of these in my 24 x 36, on a 24 inch spacing (conveniently each rafter.)

Claimed lumens for each fixture are 8640 which may be optimistic but I've certainly meet my target of a minimum of 100 foot candles.

https://www.ar15.com/media/mediaFiles/103022/C4FC629F-E464-4A10-95FC-3C0EDA736470_jpe-1402986.JPG

Don't bother with the old fixtures.

The 8 foot units are really light, mount with three screw in clips and can be chained together if you like (I didn't). I ran conduit and four circuits in a staggered fashion so I can run 9, 18, 27 or 36 lights.

The lights come with a pigtail, a short and long daisy chain cable, so I got 3 prong plugs for them off of eBay. I figure it was worth the time to run outlets so that in five years when LED output doubles I can pull stuff down and replace it.

ETA: If you can rent a lift, do it, otherwise a scaffold with wheels on it makes things easy. I used two ladders and it was only a modest pain in the ass with 10 foot ceilings.

View Quote

I have a similar set of lights except in 4' lengths. Shop around on Amazon, some sellers have "coupons" you can add to get them pretty cheap. They all likely come from the same factory.

Posted: 5/28/2020 10:20:09 PM EDT

[#9]

Just saw these at Sam’s. 4 ft linkable. 5000 lumens. $19.98 each.

Sorry for the sideways pic.

Posted: 5/28/2020 10:24:12 PM EDT

[#10]

Quote History

Quoted:
Walmart has hyper tough 4 foot ones that are like 12 bucks of you get them on sale, I have a 3 Car garage and they work great I have 6 total . Only drawback is they don't daisy chian so I had to run a messy Christmas light gang cord(10 outlets on it,
Max 750 watts total, I used 500 with my current set up) above to a surge Protector that I use as light switch.

View Quote

I used these too. I replaced my ceiling light with a four gang outlet so they are still switched.

Posted: 5/29/2020 12:34:53 AM EDT

[#11]

I installed all LED lights in my shop last year.
Amazing. So bright. I can basically do gunsmithing work anywhere in the bldg the light is so good.
Only downside is when I go out at the end of the night Im blinded for a few seconds...

Posted: 5/29/2020 9:40:35 AM EDT

[#12]

There is a huge thread over on garagejournal all about LED and converting existing fixtures. I would stay away from the plug and play 4 ft fixtures because, well they look like shit. I'm not a fan of all the plugs and since you already have the fixtures it easy to retrofit with LED's and use what you have.

You will want a lift for 14 ft ceilings.

https://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=278420

Posted: 5/29/2020 12:47:00 PM EDT

[#13]

Costco Feit shop lights go on sale for $20 routinely

Posted: 5/30/2020 8:27:00 AM EDT

[#14]

Quote History

Quoted:
There is a huge thread over on garagejournal all about LED and converting existing fixtures. I would stay away from the plug and play 4 ft fixtures because, well they look like shit. I'm not a fan of all the plugs and since you already have the fixtures it easy to retrofit with LED's and use what you have.

You will want a lift for 14 ft ceilings.

https://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=278420

View Quote

I figured a lift would be best, especially with 8 foot long bulbs. I might call a couple electricians, I would really like to add a couple ceiling fans in there.

Posted: 5/30/2020 12:41:17 PM EDT

[#15]

I got rid of my linear fixtures and replaced them with pendant style lights (circular). Mine are about 12' up. Each one floods a HUGE area. Of course, use multiples to raise the light level and smooth out the pattern.

The new fixtures are much better than the old fluorescent bulbs and their fixtures everywhere. I do not miss the old fixtures AT ALL.

Posted: 5/30/2020 1:59:10 PM EDT

[#16]

48 inch ones are often at a better price point.
Mostly driven by volume.

I use mainly 48 inch LED tubes now.
The tubes have COB LEDs in them every few inches.

Posted: 6/7/2020 9:25:39 PM EDT

[#17]

Quote History

Quoted:

Are the tubes as good as new fixtures? I remember trying one a few years ago and it wasn't great.

View Quote

They're as good as the LED Lamp you buy, the fixtures are just there to send 120 Volts to the lamps on either one or both ends. Buy a good quality LED like Hyperikon, preferably double-ended and ALWAYS DIRECT WIRED TO BYPASS THE BALLAST and I can't imagine a single reason anyone would replace fixtures instead of lamps.

LED Complete fixtures are basically 1-time, disposable purchases whereas 8' or, better yet, tandem 4' fixtures are as easy to replace as relamping the original fluorescents. When the lamps dim, die out or you want to change color temperature or any number of reasons, just swap them out.

Posted: 6/8/2020 12:41:28 AM EDT

[#18]

Quote History

Quoted:
I installed all LED lights in my shop last year.
Amazing. So bright. I can basically do gunsmithing work anywhere in the bldg the light is so good.
Only downside is when I go out at the end of the night Im blinded for a few seconds...

View Quote

Solution to that is two light circuits. :)

I yanked out the janky-ass 2-gang (outlet + switch), replaced it with a 4-gang. Outlet, in-wall timer for exterior lights, PIR/occupancy sensor for inside "night lights", and a switch for the big lights.

The little lights on PIR are just enough to not trip over shit, and not blind you.

where the LED tubes provide plentiful shop lighting.

Mostly 4ft, couple of 2ft fixtures. Linkable, hard-wired or plug-in. Not the cheapest, but I can actually see what i'm doing on the toys and won't have to buy a bulb in here ever again.

Posted: 6/8/2020 10:41:07 AM EDT

[#19]

I have about 55 fluorescent light fixtures in my garage, each containing two or three bulbs depending on location.

Last week started replacing the bulbs with led drop in tubes from Costco. So far I'm happy with the results. Had too many fixtures to deal with removing the ballasts. Bulbs use less than half the electricity than the old florescents and are a bit brighter.

Posted: 6/8/2020 10:34:16 PM EDT

[#20]

Quote History

Quoted:
I have about 55 fluorescent light fixtures in my garage, each containing two or three bulbs depending on location.

Last week started replacing the bulbs with led drop in tubes from Costco. So far I'm happy with the results. Had too many fixtures to deal with removing the ballasts. Bulbs use less than half the electricity than the old florescents and are a bit brighter.

View Quote

You don't need to actually remove the ballast for any reason, all you need to do is remove the cover and remove the ballast from the circuit with a few simple cuts and connections. The benefit of this 1-time procedure is that you remove the failure prone and unnecessary ballast while increasing efficiency- permanently. If the lamps you used are gtg for ballast bypass it's not too late.

Posted: 6/17/2020 12:20:02 AM EDT

[#21]

Something to keep in mind is your flo tunes radiate light 360 degrees, and a lot of led tunes are only 110-130 degrees. Will result in a noticeable difference in the light spread in your space, especially if the housing layout spacing isn't ideal. You can find led tunes that have 270-280 degree beam spread if you look for the specs.

Posted: 6/18/2020 10:40:12 PM EDT

[#22]

Home Depot sells two packs of new LED tubes for $20 that come with new tombstones (one end powered, the other just for physical support). I used them to rewire the dual tube fixtures in my kitchen and laundry room. I can't remember the name right now but I can post it later.

I thought about first trying them in my garage but my garage was a mismatch of all sorts of different fixtures. A combination of 4' single and double tubes and 8' single and double tubes.

If I had matching fixtures, I probably would have just rewired them and I am NOT handy at all

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