GARAGE TECH: Lighting

[Tommy R]

Okay, so the new garage has merely "adequate" lighting. It's a standard 2 car garage and has three overhead flourescent fixtures, each with 2x48" bulbs. It's okay, but my last 2 car garage had 8 of these fixtures (the way God intended) and in comparison, this one is....well....a cave.

There's a good thread on the topic here on corner-carvers, but I'd also like to ask the peanut gallery here for their thoughts.

Offhand, I'm thinking of going with 8 more of the 2x48" bulb fixtures. I would like them to be mounted solidly to the ceiling as opposed to hanging, but am concerned about heat build-up causing ceiling scorching or worse. Worst case, I'll just mount them with as short a "danging height" as possible since my garage ceiling is relatively low.

It also appears there are varying levels of housings. Some have no reflective side panels like the one below. I don't like this 'cause it would seem they'd be much easier to break if you're not careful.


Then there are these like I had. I've wacked these a few times accidentally in my old garage and they never dropped a bulb on me.


And there's these kind, but I'm afraid the covers would block too much light:


One last thing. What are the benefits to an electronic ballast?

Tommy

[Redwood]

Re: GARAGE TECH: Lighting

I'll refer the fixture questions to Fair, McCall, etc. since they've installed them. I can help though. Electronic ballasts reduce energy use and also allow the lights to run cooler (i.e. less chance of scorching). I did a little more research and found up to 40% savings in energy costs vs. electromagnetic flourescents. Sooo, I'd recommend it.

[Tommy R]

Re: GARAGE TECH: Lighting

Well, that's what I did. Yesterday I picked up 8 fixtures, each of which has dual 48" tubes. It's the same setup as I had in the old house. The new house has three of these light fixtures mounted already and I'll likely keep a few of them to put over work benches and such, but hopefully on a different circuit (or I'll keep the pull string intact).

Thanks, SeanT. Your comments echo what my research also showed. Oh, and the bulbs I picked up were T8 "Cool White" (it's all Lowe's had).

T

[Tommy R]

Re: GARAGE TECH: Lighting

Oh, and the fixtures I bought aren't on the Lowe's site, but they most closely resemble a higher end version of the middle fixture above and, yes, they definitely CAN be directly attached to the ceiling and don't need to be hung.

T

[Fair!]

Re: GARAGE TECH: Lighting

pics: http://vorshlag.smugmug.com/gallery/2328990#121842564


Before lights... it had 2 freagin 60W bulbs covering 1100 sq ft. No bueno!

Yep, this is one of the first things we did when we moved into the new place...


Me, hanging the 48" fixtures


TOO... MANY... WIRES!


a little man-@ss for Tommy...





I want to add another full row of THAT MANY MORE lights at the back, by the doors. It gets darker over there. Up by the workbenches its VERY bright. Rooms with 12'6" ceilings need more light than normal.

edit: these are "bright white" T-8 bulbs, not "cool white". Different color temprature, supposedly "closer to sunlight"?? i dunno

[John in Houston]

Re: GARAGE TECH: Lighting

Okay... assume that one had never wired up a string of lights. Said person as a junction box with a 60w lightbulb attached to a wall switch. Is it as simple as converting that box to a junction box and then wiring all of the additional lights to it?

Any on-line primers for doing this? I... sorry.. said person doesn't want to get blowned up

[Fair!]

Re: GARAGE TECH: Lighting

Okay... assume that one had never wired up a string of lights. Said person as a junction box with a 60w lightbulb attached to a wall switch. Is it as simple as converting that box to a junction box and then wiring all of the additional lights to it?

That's all I did... probably hooked way too many lights (26 * 48" 40W T8 bulbs!) into the two lightbulb feeds on this switched light circuit... but its worked for over a year and never tripped a breaker.

Any on-line primers for doing this? I... sorry.. said person doesn't want to get blowned up

The picture gallery I posted shows you most of what you need to know - the supplies, the order of installation, etc. You just need help with the wiring? That's the easy part.

This is easier to show in person than to explain on the interweb... if you didn't live in the freagin great white north! Ask local racers if they have any electrical skillz and offer free pizza and beer to come help you one afternoon. The right help makes this a snap. And the experienced guys tend to produce no "magic smoke".

edit: Make sure that you use the 8' fixtures with 4 x 48" T8 bulbs per fixture. The 96" bulbs are a ROYAL PAIN to transport to your house and don't really save you any money.

[Tommy R]

Re: GARAGE TECH: Lighting

The 96" bulbs are a ROYAL PAIN to transport to your house and don't really save you any money.

You mean 96" bulbs?

T

[John in Houston]

Re: GARAGE TECH: Lighting

You just need help with the wiring? That's the easy part.

Yup.. just the wiring. Single bulb outlet that I want to run 6 lights off of. 4' with the 4-T8s each.

I have exposed rafters, so I already know how I need to run the wires to be code compliant... just need to know how to actually wire-up the boxes from the source to each of the outlets (probably 4 outlets for 6 lights).

[Fair!]

Re: GARAGE TECH: Lighting

You mean 96" bulbs?

T

What? Who?

I fixored it!

[Tommy R]

Re: GARAGE TECH: Lighting

I won't speak for amperage loads, but as far as wiring goes, I think all you really need to do is connect all "positive" leads to one another and the same for the "negative" leads. Then wire that to the switch or existing gangbox. IIRC this is what we did at my old house and it never tripped a breaker.

Tommy

[McCall]

Re: GARAGE TECH: Lighting

Tommy, you got the 4-48" blub T8 fixtures correct? Just making sure. I've always bought them from Depot. They come in a big brown box. Also, you might want to take the "cool light" T8 bulbs back and get the "Daylight" ones. Depot carries them. They are a bit more expensive but damn if they aren't bright. You gotta wear shades in my garage

As far a wiring and putting the lights together, it's pretty easy but of course I can do it better than I can explain it. Basically start with balast, which is offset to one side. Determine which sets of yellow/white wires is longer and run those all the way out to the far end and snap them in place. Then do the same with the shorter yellow/whites on the opposite end. Then snap in the middle metal plates and run a blue/red wires to middle, one side and then other. Don't forget to figure out where you are going to feed your power source into the fixture and punch out the appropriate tab hole.

Mounting was easy as pie. Get some of those nylon sheet rock anchors. They are the ones where you self-tap the nylon portion into the sheetrock and then screw in the metal screw after the fact. Each holds like 50lbs each and make the job a snap. Just hold the light up to the ceiling, mark your holes. Install the nylon anchors; put the light back up and screw in the metal screws. Do 4 per light and it's never coming down. You will though need to wallow out a few of the holes on the light fixture itself as they are a bit small.

Good luck!

[duck]

Re: GARAGE TECH: Lighting

I went the lazy man route and screwed in a clear 300w incandescent into the existing socket with a motion activated switch. The switch was rated as handling 500w but it burnt up anyway. Replaced it and eventually the bulb. I had a 250w laying around that is still going. I guess I've had the pair for ~5 years now. Of course, it's not as good as mounted flourscents for working on stuff but you can see to get around. I do have one 4-bulb unit that can be flush mounted but it's just leaning against the wall for now.

[Tommy R]

Re: GARAGE TECH: Lighting

So far I've got all the walls with two coats of unmolested semi-gloss white. With just the three bulbs currently in my garage I have to say it's pretty dern bright. I'm hoping to get the ceiling painted tonight and then within the next few days I'll get the lights up. I won't have the biggest garage in town, but it sure will be nice when it's all done.

BTW, it took two coats of paint for full coverage without using Kilz or a primer. And I used this for the walls. You suction paint into the handle and use a trigger to squeeze it out as you paint. I really like it!


Tommy

[Hunter]

Re: GARAGE TECH: Lighting

its going to be a tanning bed when your done