light placement with garage doors?

[lqchar]

Our garage doors haven't been installed yet and I just realized that they will be covering nearly half the ceiling when open. I understand the opener will have some sort of light on it. However,, I'm wondering what folks do about the hanging lights in the front of the garage considering the garage doors? Are they just wired closer to the ceiling so they are behind the doors when they are open (and on the ceiling)?

 

[Falcon67]

My 8' fixture over the door is flat on the ceiling - 3 1/2" tall, door clears the ceiling by 4".

 

[kd3pc]

I went with low profile, LED, surface mount (painful - two people install) and made a cardboard mockup to make sure the door cleared them. They were that close.

Behind those, towards the house, is a standard 8' fluorescent fixture that has OK light, came with the home build.

 

[CJ7VFR]

Do you have enough room on either side of each door to mount the lights? In my garage, I had the same issue when the doors were open.

I did something similar to what ducksface mentioned about mounting them on the rails. Instead of mounting them directly to the rails, I mounted my shop lights just a few inches outside of the garage door rails on each side of each door. I hung them on chains so when the doors are open, the lights are actually below the surface of the door.

This worked great for me. My garage is not finished, in that all of the joists/rafters and wall framing is exposed. I don't have any drywall on the walls or ceiling, so attaching my shop lights was pretty easy.

Jim

 

[lqchar]

You build a bridge using the bottom of your door rails.
This bridge ties one door rail to the other.
You then mount low profile lights on that bridge so the door does not block your lighting.
If you do it correctly you'll lose less than 3 inches of clearance to the floor.
If you want to do it so aestheticly it works better, sheath the entire bottom of the rail so your door goes in to what is now a pocket. It's a fifty dollar project. Mount your lights to the cover/sheath. Your door disappears when open.

The sheath works best with an 8500 torsion bar mount opener.
The bridge works with any opener.
Or you can mount lights directly to the door and use a slightly modified automatic take up electrical reel as power.

Or you can hang four foot Sam's club led lights from the bottom of the rails themselves. Less than four inches deep, you can't park under the rails anyway...see that eagle? See the gray Fluorescent fixture attached to that rail just to your right of the Eagle?

Lots of things to do.
I have done EVERY one of the suggestions above.

The other lights are troffers, flush mounted. Trim was added to the sides to match the Craftsman gray.
Easy clean, diffused, low profile, easily rearranged if the layout changed in the shop. These will probably fit under your door if you go the standard route.

Or you can just measure your clearance above the door and buy lights that fit, blocking half of your lights when the door is open. That's the standard thing to do. There is no reason to be standard except for cost.

Great suggestions. Thanks to all. Duckface, do you happen to have a picture of the sheathed pocket for the doors? That sounds intriguing...

 

[Shiftless]

How often do you need to have high levels of light at night in the front of the garage when the garage door is open?

I have a 20 foot deep garage so when the overhead door is open at least 2 of my five 4 foot twin tube LED fixtures are blocked on that side. I don't consider this a problem at all. If I need light in the front of the garage, I just close the door.
In a different climate where guys like to work summer nights with the overhead door open all the time, I suppose it would matter more.

 

[rburke65]

In my 2 car garage with a 16'x7' door, I have an eight foot flourescent fixture mounted ON the top section on the door. I have light when the door is up or down. Don't ask me to post a picture....sorry....I'm old! Ha! Fixtures is centered on the door, wired ith SO cord and run to the one side....stapled.....then a loop about 4' long and then it goes up into the ceiling junction box. Is it code..?....don't know......don't care so save the comments. It's been this way for 25 years. If you are uncomfortable, don't do it.

 

[-kruizer66-]

You build a bridge using the bottom of your door rails.
This bridge ties one door rail to the other.
You then mount low profile lights on that bridge so the door does not block your lighting.
If you do it correctly you'll lose less than 3 inches of clearance to the floor.
If you want to do it so aestheticly it works better, sheath the entire bottom of the rail so your door goes in to what is now a pocket. It's a fifty dollar project. Mount your lights to the cover/sheath. Your door disappears when open.

The sheath works best with an 8500 torsion bar mount opener.
The bridge works with any opener.
Or you can mount lights directly to the door and use a slightly modified automatic take up electrical reel as power.

Or you can hang four foot Sam's club led lights from the bottom of the rails themselves. Less than four inches deep, you can't park under the rails anyway...see that eagle? See the gray Fluorescent fixture attached to that rail just to your right of the Eagle?

Lots of things to do.
I have done EVERY one of the suggestions above.

The other lights are troffers, flush mounted. Trim was added to the sides to match the Craftsman gray.
Easy clean, diffused, low profile, easily rearranged if the layout changed in the shop. These will probably fit under your door if you go the standard route.

Or you can just measure your clearance above the door and buy lights that fit, blocking half of your lights when the door is open. That's the standard thing to do. There is no reason to be standard except for cost.

Wow... nice looking garage ducksface

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk

 

[James-W]

When my overhead door is open the first row of lights are above the door so we get no usable light from those 3 lights. But if we have the overhead door open it is daytime and we are getting natural sunlight in the garage thru the door so it doesn't matter.

 

[wssix99]

Our garage doors haven't been installed yet and I just realized that they will be covering nearly half the ceiling when open.

If you think about this a little more, it may not be a problem for you.

You only need light on the back half of the garage if you are doing work in the garage at night/dusk with the door open.

If you live in a cold place, you aren't going to do this because you'll be closing the doors to keep the heat in. If you live in a warm place, you aren't going to be doing this because you'll be closing the doors to keep the bugs out. (There are also nudist mechanic scenarios, but hopefully that's not an issue here.)

So, I don't think you'll really miss those lights for the short time the doors are open unless you plan to work in the garage on warm days with the doors open and put up some sort of screen material over the openings.


Some people put windows in their doors partly to let light come down while the doors are open. Also, if you go with a high lift track (if you have the ceiling height) the door doesn't come out in to the room nearly as far as a normal track and it may not even cover your light. (depending on placement)