New house came with LED “can” lights in garage

[Doug1]

I bought a new spec house that we heavily upgraded. The last thing I need to address is the lighting in the drive under garage. It has 8 foot ceilings and has “can” style puck LED lights in the ceiling. They aren’t really can lights and are the type of led lights that clip in the sheetrock, like most modern can lights. They don’t produce near enough light for a shop, as I want to use it, though it is sufficient for a garage. I want to replace them with better lighting. The garage is about 2200 square feet.

I haven’t been on this site in a few years, so I don’t know if this is a common problem with a well known solution or if I need to figure it out as I go. Maybe I need to replace every other row of puck leds with LED fixtures with longer bulbs? Anyone have any experience with doing this recently?

 

[PugetDude]

Just put (12) 10" recessed LED fixtures in the main bay in the garage bay in my new shop. 12' ceilings, they're evenly spaced at about 5' apart. Plenty of light. You can change the color and brightness on the fixture. Easy to install. I really like the flush mount and the 3K color.
RunBison brand on Amazon. Highest lumen output I could find. Used 8" in the rest of the shop, storage closets and and office.

 

[Steve W.]

I don’t have any of those in my shop, but we did install them in the living room, kitchen, dining room and family room in our recent house renovation.

Our ceilings are just a bit under 8’ and the lights are plenty bright for inside the house, but I can see how they might not be enough in a higher ceiling.

Spacing might make a difference. Mine are in a roughly 6’ grid. How about yours?

.

 

[mm08822]

Provide a dimensioned layout drawing first.

 

[Doug1]

I don’t have any of those in my shop, but we did install them in the living room, kitchen, dining room and family room in our recent house renovation.

Our ceilings are just a bit under 8’ and the lights are plenty bright for inside the house, but I can see how they might not be enough in a higher ceiling.

Spacing might make a difference. Mine are in a roughly 6’ grid. How about yours?

.

I’ll get some photos. They are spaced too far apart to give me the type of light I want. They are much closer together in the house, which has 10 foot ceilings. The garage has only 8 foot ceilings but the spacing is likely my problem.

 

[Doug1]

So the lights are approximately 12 feet apart from front to back and 15 feet apart from side to side. The funny part is inside the house, I have had to put LED dimmers in every room because of how much light those lights put out. We have a lot of glass in the house and 10 foot ceilings so it is very bright inside. The higher ceilings probably help with the effectiveness of the lights and there are no windows under the house.

Will be glad to get into this place and set my workspace up under the house.

 

[Shiftless]

The garage is about 2200 square feet.

First off, let me congratulate you on achieving the goal of having a VERY nicely sized garage/shop.
I suggest planning for zones so you won‘t need to light up the whole place as bright as you need for certain tasks. My garage is only 1/5 the size of yours and I set it up to light 2 zones, one zone lights up the main workbench and a 12 foot run of floor to ceiling shelves. The other zone lights up the whole middle area. I only use that zone if there is a project going on in the middle of the garage. Think of the concept of “task lighting”.

I‘d consider either flat panel lights or 4 foot twin tube led fixtures with diffusers.

 

[dscheidt]

I’ll get some photos. They are spaced too far apart to give me the type of light I want. They are much closer together in the house, which has 10 foot ceilings. The garage has only 8 foot ceilings but the spacing is likely my problem.

Absolutely. can lights project a cone of light down. the lower the ceiling, the less area at the working surface the cone covers. Places in the cone are adequately lit, but there are shadows and dark spots everywhere else. IN a shop, the plane you're interested in is often workbench height, which makes the dark areas bigger. To light a shop with cans, you need a lot of them. And then dimmers, because you have to install so many cans to cover the area, the overall light level needs to get turned down. So if you like the cans, you could add more. probably a lot more, but how many depdends on how you're using it, you might have areas where you don't need good light excpet at the floor, and others where there's a bench or machine, or lift.

Strip lights are probably the way to go for replacements, you can probably get to the junction boxes of the wafer to put in a proper box, and extend the cable, if there's not attic access, may have to do some drywall work. If you've got attic access, it's easier to move things around.

 

[Doug1]

Absolutely. can lights project a cone of light down. the lower the ceiling, the less area at the working surface the cone covers. Places in the cone are adequately lit, but there are shadows and dark spots everywhere else. IN a shop, the plane you're interested in is often workbench height, which makes the dark areas bigger. To light a shop with cans, you need a lot of them. And then dimmers, because you have to install so many cans to cover the area, the overall light level needs to get turned down. So if you like the cans, you could add more. probably a lot more, but how many depdends on how you're using it, you might have areas where you don't need good light excpet at the floor, and others where there's a bench or machine, or lift.

Strip lights are probably the way to go for replacements, you can probably get to the junction boxes of the wafer to put in a proper box, and extend the cable, if there's not attic access, may have to do some drywall work. If you've got attic access, it's easier to move things around.

No attic access. You drive in under the house

 

[dave*99]

No attic access. You drive in under the house

Pay close attention to your ceiling penetrations. Much of my garage is under the house like yours. Since there is living space above, my ceilings in the garage are double 5/8 type X drywall. If you remove lights, be sure to seal the openings.

In areas where my garage ceiling is 8', I have Lithonia 2'x4' CPANL panels. They make a full range of them. The 4000lm. units work well with 8' ceilings and the the 6000lm. are great where I have 12' ceilings.

https://www.acuitybrands.com/products/detail/920944/lithonia-lighting/cpanl-led-flat-panel/led-fully-switchable-flat-panel

 

[bdbecker]

I used that style of light in my garage and was really pleased with the result. As @dscheidt mentioned, the beam angle and spacing is the problem you are facing. The lights I installed in my shop with 8' ceilings were on a 60" grid and I used 16 lights to cover a 576 square foot space.

More details about how I came up with that spacing can be found here:

https://www.garagejournal.com/forum/threads/the-****-shack.332912/post-8192692

It's a bit of a long winded post covering a variety of topics, but the lights are the first thing discussed in the post.

 

[Doug1]

Pay close attention to your ceiling penetrations. Much of my garage is under the house like yours. Since there is living space above, my ceilings in the garage are double 5/8 type X drywall. If you remove lights, be sure to seal the openings.

In areas where my garage ceiling is 8', I have Lithonia 2'x4' CPANL panels. They make a full range of them. The 4000lm. units work well with 8' ceilings and the the 6000lm. are great where I have 12' ceilings.

https://www.acuitybrands.com/products/detail/920944/lithonia-lighting/cpanl-led-flat-panel/led-fully-switchable-flat-panel

I need to draw it all out and probably start with my work area and go out from there. I can easily double the can lights since they just sit in the drywall and the joists shouldn’t be hard to get through. I have an electrician coming to add 20+ outlets throughout the garage so when he does all that, I can have him double down on the lights while he is at it. We’re putting in a new sub panel for elevator, compressor, central air, etc, so it should be easy enough to add another light circuit or two. The area under neath the house is buildable so we will get it wired up to do whatever we want to do in there. I’m considering adding a stand alone garage, which would have proper ceiling height, etc. for my car lift and golf simulator.

Again, we bought a 80 percent complete high end spec home but had to redo most of the interior to our tastes so we’re just getting around to the back yard and any other possible additons there.

 

[Codyboy]

At least you have something to work with by having some wire in place already.

My first house back in 1992 (built in 1983) only had a single porcelain keyless fixture for a 2 car garage and no GDO.

I would probably go with 4ft LED's. Maybe 8ft'rs
Depending on spacing of can lights.

 

[tarbellb]

What's most important, looks, lighting, both? If you are ok with running surface mount lights then that's the easiest and most effective.

But if you are concerned about aesthetics then it gets trickier.

Also have you checked your power load? Do you have enough power on that breaker to add more, likely yes with LEDs but double check it's not lots of outlets too.

Easiest and keep the same look- replacing the current lights with bigger + higher wattage,
easy install, same look, not a ton more light tho.

Adding more can lights- gotta be careful with how the house was built and how you want to run those lights. The fact that they are fitting between your drywall means you likely can't run extra wiring between floor joist. Limited to joist bays.

My opinion- Replace the can lights with outlets, daisy chain some nicer low profile LED 4ft lights to outlets. basically what I did. Cost less then $300 installed in 2hrs, puts out great light

 

[dscheidt]

My opinion- Replace the can lights with outlets, daisy chain some nicer low profile LED 4ft lights to outlets. basically what I did. Cost less then $300 installed in 2hrs, puts out great light

Cord connected ceiling lights scream "this was done by a hack". They're fine if you're adding one over a workbench or something in an existing space, but doing a whole garage in them looks like ****. The vast majority of them are also cheap ****, made to sell as cheaply as possible, because the people who install them are either buying a couple as supplemental lighting that won't be used much or are highly price motivated. Replacing the cans with a surface mounted strip light, and running surface mount EMT to additional fixtures will be a much better solution, and minimize the amount of drywall work that needs to be done.

 

[tarbellb]

Great point @dscheidt

cord management is critical for aesthetics. Hard wiring them or finding a nicer surface mount option is a better solution

 

[readhead]

I’m still trying to understand how recessed lights were allowed in a rated ceiling. If there was ever a fire it might be hard to explain to the insurance company why a brand new house has such a major flaw.

Maybe I’m wrong and maybe the lights are rated but something doesn’t seem right.

 

[lmg]

Pay close attention to your ceiling penetrations. Much of my garage is under the house like yours. Since there is living space above, my ceilings in the garage are double 5/8 type X drywall. If you remove lights, be sure to seal the openings.

In areas where my garage ceiling is 8', I have Lithonia 2'x4' CPANL panels. They make a full range of them. The 4000lm. units work well with 8' ceilings and the the 6000lm. are great where I have 12' ceilings.

https://www.acuitybrands.com/products/detail/920944/lithonia-lighting/cpanl-led-flat-panel/led-fully-switchable-flat-panel

Garage to house walls, ceilings and doors are fire rated and should not be penetrated for that reason. This keeps carbon monoxide and other fumes from entering the home as well.

 

[cybrdyke]

They make fire-rated wafer lights. They're pretty common these days. No extra parts are necessary. They're denoted by having a red back, which is an indicator to the inspector.
Fire rated wafer

 

[BreeStephany]

When I did the lighting for my father's first shop, LEDs were just hitting the main stream market and were quite costly... so we just set cans every 4' above common work areas and then 8' O.C. everywhere else.

With white high gloss walls / ceiling and white melamine cabinets, it made it pretty bright. When we updated them with high output LED trims it was almost too much lighting if there is such a thing.

We had big halogen work lights in the shop but seldom used them, especially after the retrofit.

I would say find a similar puck with a high lumen output and just add additional fixtures evenly spaced between the existing locations.

You should be able to fish in conductors between fixtures this way with minimal, if any sheetrock damage.

Just my two cents.

 

[bdbecker]

...When we updated them with high output LED trims it was almost too much lighting if there is such a thing...

Your Dad's shop sounds a lot like my Dad's shop... bright white and blinding. Makes me anxious if I spend too much time in there.

While it seems counterintuitive, over-illumination is very much a thing. While too little is a problem, too much can also cause issues. That is why you often see ranges when referencing levels of recommended lighting based on the task being preformed. For example, the IES recommends 50-100 foot candles for an automotive repair area, whereas general welding has a recommended illumination level of 20-50 foot candles. How the light is provided also factors in to the equation, whether it be general overhead lights, or task lighting.

 

[Criss]

For my 30x60 shop, I used 68 6-inch, 5000k, 1050 lumen puck lights with a 110° angle, and even with those, I still need supplemental lighting for detailed work like reading numbers on dies, bits, soldering electronics, or small print on containers. If you're planning on using puck lights, make sure to plan for additional task lighting! Good luck! #Shop #Lighting #PuckLights #Workshop

 

[Carchie]

I bought a new spec house that we heavily upgraded. The last thing I need to address is the lighting in the drive under garage. It has 8 foot ceilings and has “can” style puck LED lights in the ceiling. They aren’t really can lights and are the type of led lights that clip in the sheetrock, like most modern can lights. They don’t produce near enough light for a shop, as I want to use it, though it is sufficient for a garage. I want to replace them with better lighting. The garage is about 2200 square feet.

I haven’t been on this site in a few years, so I don’t know if this is a common problem with a well known solution or if I need to figure it out as I go. Maybe I need to replace every other row of puck leds with LED fixtures with longer bulbs? Anyone have any experience with doing this recently?

Yeah those wafer LEDs are fine for “parking the car” lighting, not for actually working, you’re not crazy lol. Don’t bother mixing every other row, that usually ends up uneven and still meh. Easiest fix is just add real shop lighting, like 4ft or 8ft LED strip fixtures, aim for around 7k to 10k lumens total per 200 sq ft if you actually want to see what you’re doing. Keep the cans for general light, run the strips on a separate switch, way cleaner and you won’t fight shadows all day.

 

[hammlm]

Just put (12) 10" recessed LED fixtures in the main bay in the garage bay in my new shop. 12' ceilings, they're evenly spaced at about 5' apart. Plenty of light. You can change the color and brightness on the fixture. Easy to install. I really like the flush mount and the 3K color.
RunBison brand on Amazon. Highest lumen output I could find. Used 8" in the rest of the shop, storage closets and and office.

Hi there @PugetDude . I read your post with interest and the install looks good -- seems to be just what I'm looking for. Question, on the amazon listing, in specifications it indicates these are 277VAC, but other places the text says 120-277V. Would appreciate it if you could confirm you used them on a single phase (120/240) service in your installation. You might have 277 in your shop, so I just wanted to ask to avoid a return -- I'm planning to use them at home.

Many Thanks in advance!

 

[PugetDude]

Hi there @PugetDude . I read your post with interest and the install looks good -- seems to be just what I'm looking for. Question, on the amazon listing, in specifications it indicates these are 277VAC, but other places the text says 120-277V. Would appreciate it if you could confirm you used them on a single phase (120/240) service in your installation. You might have 277 in your shop, so I just wanted to ask to avoid a return -- I'm planning to use them at home.

Many Thanks in advance!

They work great on standard US 120V single phase; here is what I bought.

 

[hammlm]

@PugetDude Thank you very much. Just wanted to double check since the spec section only listed the 3phase voltage. Appreciate your reply!

 

[Criss]

They work great on standard US 120V single phase; here is what I bought.

These lights spec out very nicely!

 

[LOW1]

I have old fashioned can lites in my shop. I like them for general background lighting but need and have task lites above the workbenches. Perhaps you could tap into your ceiling lites and hang switch operated lites above where you will be working and/or need more lite.

 

[JohnX14]

The spacing is too far apart for OP's shop. There are brighter wafer lights, but they aren't doing to do much spaced 15' on center. You'd want closer to 5'. I'd probably leave the existing wafer lights (possibly replace them" and do some linear LED strips as others have suggested.

 

[hammlm]

Didn't want to start new post, and thought I would update here. Based on @PugetDude s post and his confirmation of the voltage on these Run Bison 8" recessed lights, I went ahead and ordered. Installed this weekend. Other than the huge mess I made, I'm quite happy with the project and very happy with the lights for price. The lights he recommended and installed were 10". I went 8" but if I had 12' of ceiling height, I would have went 10" like he did.

I installed 16 of the 8" cans, set them at the highest output and 5K color. Install was in a standard two car garage. I ended up making a 4x4 grid. The spacing is more or less 48" O.C. but one row is a little closer to 60" because of obstructions, etc. The grid is more or less situated in the center of the garage. Because I have one wall of toolboxes on one side, and a wall of storage **** on the other, the spacing works out. If I had the full width area to illuminate, I'd probably do a 5x4 matrix / grid, but there was no need to put lights over toolboxes and cabinets/bikes/etc.

All in all, I'm really happy with the lighting and the minimization of shadowing. I should mention I have a 9' ceiling in this garage. I put a small lift in, and raised the garage door right up to the ceiling. Because of this and to maximize lift-height, I took down my (numerous) T-8 fixtures that had been up for 13 years and I thought were perfect. This light is better and more even - I can see better, which becomes more important every year older I get.

I should mention that I set all the fixtures to the maximum output level and set the color setting to 5K which closely matches the 4700K lamps I had installed before.

I also installed two 0-10v dimmers to switch/control 8 of them at a time when I don't need "full operating theater" lighting. I started after lunch on Saturday and wrapped up Sunday night after dinner

If I ever get the dust and wreckage of the install cleaned up, I'll come back and post a completed photo, but thought I'd just post here for anyone searching in the future. Just a couple install photos:

 

[Sumboodie]

~40x50 with only 8ft ceiling must feet weird?

 

[R07AG]

Didn't want to start new post, and thought I would update here. Based on @PugetDude s post and his confirmation of the voltage on these Run Bison 8" recessed lights, I went ahead and ordered. Installed this weekend. Other than the huge mess I made, I'm quite happy with the project and very happy with the lights for price. The lights he recommended and installed were 10". I went 8" but if I had 12' of ceiling height, I would have went 10" like he did.

I installed 16 of the 8" cans, set them at the highest output and 5K color. Install was in a standard two car garage. I ended up making a 4x4 grid. The spacing is more or less 48" O.C. but one row is a little closer to 60" because of obstructions, etc. The grid is more or less situated in the center of the garage. Because I have one wall of toolboxes on one side, and a wall of storage **** on the other, the spacing works out. If I had the full width area to illuminate, I'd probably do a 5x4 matrix / grid, but there was no need to put lights over toolboxes and cabinets/bikes/etc.

All in all, I'm really happy with the lighting and the minimization of shadowing. I should mention I have a 9' ceiling in this garage. I put a small lift in, and raised the garage door right up to the ceiling. Because of this and to maximize lift-height, I took down my (numerous) T-8 fixtures that had been up for 13 years and I thought were perfect. This light is better and more even - I can see better, which becomes more important every year older I get.

I should mention that I set all the fixtures to the maximum output level and set the color setting to 5K which closely matches the 4700K lamps I had installed before.

I also installed two 0-10v dimmers to switch/control 8 of them at a time when I don't need "full operating theater" lighting. I started after lunch on Saturday and wrapped up Sunday night after dinner

If I ever get the dust and wreckage of the install cleaned up, I'll come back and post a completed photo, but thought I'd just post here for anyone searching in the future. Just a couple install photos:

Would love to see how it looks finished!