lighting - flourescent vs led ongoing debate

[landyacht]

Not really looking to throw in opinion one way or another, just going to muddy the waters a bit, and I didn't want to throw off one of the other ongoing discussions.
Did an installation at work and took some pics for comparison. Would have been nice to swap fixtures in the same room, and standardize camera settings etc, however I'm paid to work, not spend hours comparison shopping.

The first pic is a slightly oversize 1 car garage with 5 2x54w t5 flourescent fixtures (there will be 6 but one was freight damaged).

The second is a room of the same size (give or take a foot) with generic 7 x 5" potlights, and off the shelf LED replacement par 30 bulbs.

The third is a larger room (about the size of a 2 car garage) with 16 high end recessed lights with integrated led bulbs.

 

[landyacht]

More info (wanted to make sure the pics worked before I wasted more time writing).

All the ceilings are 8 foot. The garage has a full size glass man door, and a 2 foot wide floor to ceiling window. It was cloudy but bright when the pics were taken.
The rooms in the second and third pics have absolutely no natural light.

 

[kd3pc]

without cost of fixtures and bulbs, it is tough.

While I would love to have my 24x22 garage all LEDs fed by a solar array behind it - it is cost prohibitive and I only get 3-5 hours of direct sun a day, in the summer, less in the winter. The same 400watts of panels that did my entire 42' sailboat (not HVAC) are not as efficient on land.

Looks like 12-16 pot/cans plus $6-12 per bulb and added labor over the 6 fluorescents.

love the plywood garage, top to bottom and the fixtures.

 

[James-W]

I am using 100 watt CFL's in my garage and it works quite well for me. If I should happen to need more light in a specific area, I can always use a floor stand and attach a light to it to shine in the area where I need the light. I very seldom need to to do that, but it is available should the need arise.

I like the CFL's because they are easy to replace if they go bad. It does take a minute for the CFL's to warm up to full brightness, but that is not a problem. I go out to the garage, I turn on the lights, I walk over to the thermostat and turn up the heat, and by the time I do that the CFL's are pretty much at full brightness.

 

[landyacht]

I don't have exact pricing as we didn't supply the fixtures. The florescent and square recessed leds are Sistemalux - made in Canada with 5 year warranty. Exact pricing is vague, but the recessed florescents in the garage are reportedly about $280 each + bulbs. The recess leds are apparently $340 each. The 5" cans are available at HD - 6 for $50, and the par30 bulbs are $17 each. Realistically, the recessed t5s are nice, but You could do the entire garage with the 5" for the cost of 1 t5. Yes you only get 2 year warranty, but you even if you had to so the whole thing twice you'd be ahead.

I must say that the wood finish is awesome - oil stained finish grade ply. And you'd never have to hunt for a stud to hang something.

 

[landyacht]

CFLs were a great alternative when they came out, but ever since I saw the handling / disposal instructions for broken bulbs, I avoid putting them anywhere my kids will hang out. And since at our house, we all spend copious amounts of time in the garage that means searching for an alternative. I can tell you that the Sistemalux stuff is definitely out of my price range. Even if I crapped dollar bills I'd be hard pressed to justify that kind of cost.

 

[Platonic Solid]

Left Picture: F52T5HO lamps mounted in an 8ft ceiling perform exactly as expected = produce undesirable glare. I assume that choice was made in an attempt to make up for the low reflectance of plywood. Definitely a space that would have benefited from less lumens per fixture. Better plan would have been to increase fixture quantity and use F32T8 lamps. Band-aid fix = obtain lower transmittance lens or add diffusing film on top of existing lens.

Center picture: Looks correct for office environment, though not enough lumens for a garage.

Right picture: Bulbs protruding from recessed cans defeat the purpose of using recessed cans = eliminate glare. Also needs more fixtures to even out light distribution and reduce shadows.

 

[James-W]

CFLs were a great alternative when they came out, but ever since I saw the handling / disposal instructions for broken bulbs, I avoid putting them anywhere my kids will hang out. And since at our house, we all spend copious amounts of time in the garage that means searching for an alternative. I can tell you that the Sistemalux stuff is definitely out of my price range. Even if I crapped dollar bills I'd be hard pressed to justify that kind of cost.

We have a couple local places where you can take bad CFL's and turn them in for free. It is my understanding that at least some Ace Hardware stores, maybe all of them, will take them and dispose of them for you.

If you break one, that is a different issue and if you have kids I can see where it would be a concern.

 

[jd_77]

In my oversized 3 car garage I currently have the standard porcelain light bulb base. I have 4 total right now. 2 on the 2 car part and 2 on the deep three car part. I have 10' ceilings and fully drywalled walls. When they build my house they put 75 watt bulbs in and after moving in I put in 100 watt bulbs. After being in the house for about a year I just upgraded to 100 watt feit LED bulbs. The local Ace Hardware had them on sale. These are much brighter and and have better light coverage. Also my garage is 30-40 degrees during the winter and they light up at full brightness right away.

Now that I run LED bulbs I plan on adding 3 or 4 more light bulb bases closer to the garage doors(front of garage) next summer and then the garage will have full coverage and will be bright enough for me. Which is much better than my last garage with was a 2 car with only one 100 watt bulb.