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Costco WinPlus Utility Lights in new garage

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Bamafan

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Costco Feit LED lights are currently popular due to their low, low sale price, but we decided to go with their WinPlus LED Utility Lights for our new carriage house. We think they look more finished, and they have great motion detectors that automatically turn them on when you go in the garage (though I had to experiment with the settings a bit).

We got these for $29 each. They are 4000k, 3800 lumen fixtures that are highly configurable. They come with all kinds of hardware including chains, brackets, hooks, and caps if you choose to hardwire them like we did.

The portion of the garage with these lights is ~22' x 25'. The ceiling is 12' high. We configured the lights such that they would not be blocked by the lifts we will install next month. The floors are epoxied with a high gloss finish to maximize the light bounce. We had planned to install 9, but we had to replace one with an LED recessed can since our door comes within 1" of the ceiling.

The garage isn't quite finished yet, but we're getting close!
 

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Bamafan

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Just a private garage. The lifts will be for car storage so I can fit 4 cars in a 2 car garage. I will do minor maintenance but nothing like an engine rebuild.

As installed, the lights are many times brighter than those in any neighboring garages. But I might need the add more once I see how it looks with cars on the yet-to-be-installed lifts. I purchased several "spare" lights (for this reason and also because I am unsure about the long-term druability of these lights).
 
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Platonic Solid

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gayler - 90 to 100 L/W is typical for an F32T8 2-Lamp strip light with an instant start electronic ballast. Naturally there are better and worse performers which usually coincides with price and quality of lamps, ballasts and fixtures. Keeping in mind that getting those lumens where they're useful isn't as efficient as most LED fixtures/lamps. Thus, as far as useful light goes, a fluorescent fixture is likely about the same efficiency as the OPs LEDs except LED is so much better in cold temperatures.

An LED fixture housing of the type that Bamafan purchased should be yielding at least 130 L/W by today's standards.

The low budget LED retrofit tubes on post #1 of the best light fixture thread are from 120 L/W to 148 L/W.
 
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Platonic Solid

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Bamafan - Posting a few pics of the fixtures construction would be interesting. I'm curious if there's an obvious reason for the low efficiency.
 
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gayler

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Platonic Solid said:
gayler - 90 to 100 L/W is typical for an F32T8 2-Lamp strip light with an instant start electronic ballast. Naturally there are better and worse performers which usually coincides with price and quality of lamps, ballasts and fixtures. Keeping in mind that getting those lumens where they're useful isn't as efficient as most LED fixtures/lamps. Thus, as far as useful light goes, a fluorescent fixture is likely about the same efficiency as the OPs LEDs except LED is so much better in cold temperatures.

An LED fixture housing of the type that Bamafan purchased should be yielding at least 130 L/W by today's standards.

The low budget LED retrofit tubes on post #1 of the best light fixture thread are from 120 L/W to 148 L/W.
Click to expand...

Thank you for the explanation! I really need more light in my garage, but cant afford high quality fixtures. I'm probably better off adding a few more cheap fixtures for now and save up to get high quality led's later.
 
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Platonic Solid

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gayler - Assuming you have F32T8, F40T12 or similar 4ft medium bipin strip light fixtures now. Suggest rewiring them to use ballast bypass LED tubes.
 
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gayler

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Platonic Solid said:
gayler - Assuming you have F32T8, F40T12 or similar 4ft medium bipin strip light fixtures now. Suggest rewiring them to use ballast bypass LED tubes.
Click to expand...

Looking at Amazon I see many different listed. Can you recommend some to me? I have a 30x40 garage with 9ft ceiling sheetrock ceiling and OSB walls.
 
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cybrdyke

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gayler said:
How does that compare to 4ft two bulb T-8 lamps?
Click to expand...

A standard 2 lamp T8 fluorescent fixture is 83.5 lumens per watt, ASSuming that you get all those lumens into your space (but you dont).
Strip fixtures are only about 75% efficient (or worse) in getting the lumens out.
So, if we wanted the REAL truth, fluorescent T8 is 62.5 lumens per watt.
CD
 
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walta

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Bamafan I installed several of the same fixtures in my home. If you do not want to use the built in sensors you can disable them by disconnecting the 4 wires going to the sensor board. Doing so will reduce the start up delay by about 50%.

Walta
 
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Bamafan

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walta said:
Bamafan I installed several of the same fixtures in my home. If you do not want to use the built in sensors you can disable them by disconnecting the 4 wires going to the sensor board. Doing so will reduce the start up delay by about 50%.

Walta
Click to expand...

Thanks. I have disabled the "dim" feature through the switches but I think I'm going to like the motion sensor-based "on" and "off" feature now that I have it set for 30 minutes. I can approach the garage or come down the stairs from the bedroom and the lights come on in anticipation of my arrival.

HOWEVER, I originally set the "off" timer for 30 seconds. Bad idea. It was like Christmas in the garage as various lights were blinking off every 30 seconds and I was running around waving to keep them going. Live and learn...
 
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walta

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Please be aware the motion sensors different than most in that they will detect motion thru the ceiling and wall. So if the lights have power and you enter a room over the garage the light will turn on, or walk in the hall within 8 feet of the garage door I will see the light come on thru the windows.

Walta
 
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Bamafan

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walta said:
Please be aware the motion sensors different than most in that they will detect motion thru the ceiling and wall. So if the lights have power and you enter a room over the garage the light will turn on, or walk in the hall within 8 feet of the garage door I will see the light come on thru the windows.

Walta
Click to expand...

Yes, they use a wi-fi signal. I read about that before purchasing them. They allow you to adjust the sensitivity of the sensors. Right now the row closest to the stairwell comes on when I am on my way down the stairs (which I like) but they don't come on when I'm walking around upstairs (which I wouldn't like). I had my wife walk around outside to ensure they weren't blinking on every time she moved out there.
 
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