Shop light recommendations

deaner

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Have a 40x60 shop with 16' ceilings. Right now have twelve, two bulb, 4' florescent fixtures. Not impressed with the light at all, and the bulbs are starting to burn out again. Looking at led options for better light. Has anyone had experience with the new LED's? Debating between 8' tubes and those big five wing things
 

drew562

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Have a 40x60 shop with 16' ceilings. Right now have twelve, two bulb, 4' florescent fixtures. Not impressed with the light at all, and the bulbs are starting to burn out again. Looking at led options for better light. Has anyone had experience with the new LED's? Debating between 8' tubes and those big five wing things
My 2 car garage has 5 of these. Very bright. You can get way bigger ones too. I’ve had them for three years. Never had one burn out yet. IMG_5072.jpeg
IMG_5071.jpeg
 

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maxwell

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I retrofitted our shops with this style of high bay LED. I was quite impressed and I didn’t put that many. I’ll have to check the specs because I didn’t order them and it seems like there’s quite the variation in power etc



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zal

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We changed our fluorescent bulb fixtures to something similar to Maxwell in our machine shop. Less fixtures, more light output. We rarely use the light on the lathes anymore.
 

lilduke

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If you want flush mounted they have 4 foot flat panel led lights.


There is options.
 
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ABMax24

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Just watch color temperature, 5000-6000k can be pretty blue, mine are 4000k or 4500k and give a nicer white light.

Mine look like a fluorescent fixture, and even have the diffuser. I have 6 in my garage which helps minimize shadows when working on stuff.

I'll never go back to fluorescent, LED is way better.
 

lilduke

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On my lights you can switch the color of light with a little switch
 

deaner

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I found someone amazon that seem perfect. Really reasonably priced too. Might be a little oversized at 180w each x 12 of them? That's a fair bit of power draw for lighting hey?
 

lilduke

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Id say, ive never seen a 180 watt led. Sounds like stadium lights haha


How many lumens?
 

lilduke

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12 of them should give you about 250,000 lumens.

Could LIght up a ball park with that lol
 

sledn

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I use these 8’ LED strip lights on all ceilings under 16’. They spread the light good and are priced nice. UFO style are great for high ceilings, but like the old T5 fixtures, they don’t spread the light on lower ceilings.
 

S.W.A.T.

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I retrofitted our shops with this style of high bay LED. I was quite impressed and I didn’t put that many. I’ll have to check the specs because I didn’t order them and it seems like there’s quite the variation in power etc



7e99a278886e4bd5b34364e9dd91996a.jpg



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This right here. I had ordered a bunch of these a few years back. The one in my pole barn is 60,000 lum. Daylight in there when that switch comes on
 

deaner

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The 12 lights I have now are 6000 lumens each and the lighting sucks bad.....so guessing I could go 2-3x more lumens. I did a quick search and found a recommendation for 300 lumens per square foot. That's 600,000 lumens, or 50,000 per fixture! Seems kind of crazy. I'm going to aim for around 20k per fixture I think unless someone with more knowledge has better advice
 

ZRrrr

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I use these 8’ LED strip lights on all ceilings under 16’. They spread the light good and are priced nice. UFO style are great for high ceilings, but like the old T5 fixtures, they don’t spread the light on lower ceilings.
I've considered these as well. Good to read a report from someone on here.
 

Tchetek

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I prefer the linear style Highbays over the UFO’s.

The linear fixtures spread the light better. UFO’s typically have a more spot light beam pattern.

My biggest suggestion is purchase from a reputable supplier that will be around long enough to honour the warranty.

Ask for the fixtures data sheet. If they can’t provide one the fixture is likely a lower quality china import.

we have seen some LED products with over a 50% failure rate after 5 years. Also have used Others options that have had very few failures.


Linear style below But this price is high compared to what we buy them for from our local supplier.

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Tchetek

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The 12 lights I have now are 6000 lumens each and the lighting sucks bad.....so guessing I could go 2-3x more lumens. I did a quick search and found a recommendation for 300 lumens per square foot. That's 600,000 lumens, or 50,000 per fixture! Seems kind of crazy. I'm going to aim for around 20k per fixture I think unless someone with more knowledge has better advice
16 feet is the lower limit we would use a high bay style. It’s not really high enough to get the full spread out of the fixtures.

20000 ish per fixture lumens is a good range. More than that would be too intense for the mounting height.

300 lumens per sq foot is really bright. Great for precision fine work ancc do manufacturing. But 500 lumens per square is still pretty bright. Great for storage warehouses etc.

Lots of fixtures are starting to have dip switches that can dim them down a couple settings if needed. Also adjust colour.

but we go with 5000 k all the time for shops and warehouses.
 

mur190

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I’m runnin 2 of these ones from home hardware at the front of my 24x26 11ft wall. Old man has 9 of them in his 36x40 12ft wall shop and they have been great, can usually pick them up on sale. Same thing we got sick of T4’s bulbs and ballasts then had some bad luck T5 lifespan.

 

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deaner

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I prefer the linear style Highbays over the UFO’s.

The linear fixtures spread the light better. UFO’s typically have a more spot light beam pattern.

My biggest suggestion is purchase from a reputable supplier that will be around long enough to honour the warranty.

Ask for the fixtures data sheet. If they can’t provide one the fixture is likely a lower quality china import.

we have seen some LED products with over a 50% failure rate after 5 years. Also have used Others options that have had very few failures.


Linear style below But this price is high compared to what we buy them for from our local supplier.

View attachment 282042


The only thing about buying from a legit electrical outfit vs amazon is there is such a huge difference in price. You can buy a 20k lumen fixture for around $20 each. Even with a high failure rate a person is still farther ahead. It's almost as cheap as buying t8 bulbs for my current fixtures. As long as they don't burn my shop down!
 

Tchetek

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Hexagons or bust bro!

It’s the going thing now a days!
 

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