Garage Lights

ShakingHorizons

ShakingHorizons

New member
Currently I have a standard 2 car garage (drywalled, no paint) with a "modge podge" of a few random T12, a flood light, and a 4' T8 fixture on the ceiling of my garage. As you can assume, this is not an adequate environment for looking over cars and inspecting them thoroughly.

I was thinking of using 2 - 8' T8 fixtures that I could mount on the ceiling running from the front of the car to the rear on each side (1 on each side), and mount 3 - 4' T8 fixtures running width wise the opposite way. The cost would be a minimum of $120 in materials (fixtures and bulbs).

The other (more costly) way would be to run 8 1600 Lumen LED Flood lights along the ceiling, but I am concerned about shadowing. The cost would be a minimum of $180 in materials (sockets and bulbs).


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Can anyone think of a better way, or do one of my ideas sound like the way to go?
 
For my needs in a bigger 2-car garage that is totally finished drywall painted white, I used 14 - 4 foot dual tube T12 daylight bulb fixtures running end to end in 2 rows across the garage.. They would be in line as a car would be parked in the garage..

I also had some extra 4 foot 2 tube fixtures along the side walls to help get light down there better if you were working on one side of the garage and needed light on the side closest to the wall where it will be darker..

When I moved from there I left all those lights up,, thinking I could just do it again in another garage, to find that they no longer sold T12's and had gone to T8's, so now I have 16 of them in a box in one of my containers, waiting to be installed sometime soon, in a new location..

I believe if you search, you will find a lot of information from a few people who went LED lighting and it I had to do it again, I would try this out, but make sure to balance it so its not so intense and you lose some ability to see defects in some colors...

I will always use at least 3 types of lights - the standard T8, LED and the good old trusty 500watt halogen on stands.. Some guys here have modified photography light stands and even some 500watt halogen stands to fit LED bulbs successfully, on this Forum so search that out, ok ?
Good luck !!!
Dan F
 
LED all the way. takes time for your eyes to adjust. once they adjust, your work will improve. if the swirls are out under LED, the paint looks even sweeter under direct sunlight.
 
AndrewBigA said:
LED all the way. takes time for your eyes to adjust. once they adjust, your work will improve. if the swirls are out under LED, the paint looks even sweeter under direct sunlight.
Click to expand...
I agree LED are much brighter and use much less enegry
 
I have 4 ,6 bulb t8 fixtures with LED bulbs in a 16 X 24 shop and 4 Led floods down the center. More than enough.
check out 1000 bulbs.com
 
Thanks for the replies everyone. I have modified my original post to include more information about the garage.

Regardless of the route I take, I plan on purchasing 4100-5000K bulbs.

I only have room on the ceiling for lighting, so I will have to use stands to supplement the side lighting.

On another note - how does everyone feel about the new T8 LED bulbs?
 
I spent a lot of time reading online and this is the most useful info I've found to date. I know everyone says LED is more efficient, but that's not entirely true. The thread is from a lighting expert and contains a spreadsheet with all the figures for you to build far better lighting fixtures that what you can buy in the stores. Be sure to note the lumens per watt on the LED vs. Florescent. ;)

The Best Light Fixture Ever! - The Garage Journal Board
 
RaskyR1 said:
I spent a lot of time reading online and this is the most useful info I've found to date. I know everyone says LED is more efficient, but that's not entirely true. The thread is from a lighting expert and contains a spreadsheet with all the figures for you to build far better lighting fixtures that what you can buy in the stores. Be sure to note the lumens per watt on the LED vs. Florescent. ;)

The Best Light Fixture Ever! - The Garage Journal Board
Click to expand...

Thanks, Chad !!! You're the Best !!!
Dan f
 
Stokdgs said:
Thanks, Chad !!! You're the Best !!!
Dan f
Click to expand...

I can only take credit for re-posting someone Else's hard work. ;)


The figure that is most interesting to me is the lumens/yr for the money. The high upfront cost of the LED makes them the worst buy over the life when you look at it that way. The 2 lamp lumen output figures are lower for LED too, though they are more efficient then most of the florescent. Interesting stuff and it makes deciding what to go with a lot easier. :)
 
Ace Led Work Light With Stand (3PL-TP-DF-24W) - Portable Worklight - Ace Hardware

I use this and I can't begin to describe how much better this is than even shop LED lights on the ceiling. I can put this right up to the paint, change the angle, shine it in from the doors etc. This will literally show scratches you would never ever see in the sunlight or with a ceiling light LED or not. Speaking from experience as we've experimented with various LED lights. For $100 It's the best deal I've seen for lighting and what detailing requires.
 
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