New Shop Lighting

[Iggy913]

Ladies and Gentleman,

I'm almost finished with a 36x36 shop next to my home, this was a long awaited dream of mine that is finally a reality. I had a few questions on lighting that I'm hopeful for some answers/advice on:

The shop is a square at the 36' dimensions I mentioned above. I have an 18'x9' door centered on the front with two 3'x5' windows along each wall, each window mounted about three feet from the corner and about three feet off the floor. The ceilings are 10' high for the first four feet on the sides, then go up at a sharp angle to 14' high across the middle 18' of the shop. This was done so I can install an automotive lift. Picture a vaulted ceiling.

Using some of the online formulas to achieve a good lighting scheme, I was going with 100 foot candles per square foot x 1300 square feet gives me 130,000 lumens, does that seem right?

I was originally looking at Barrina LED lights off Amazon, they are 8ft LEDs with 8500 lumens each, by the math I would need about 16 of these fixtures to achieve the 130,000 lumen rating the calculation states.

First off does anyone have any experience with these lights, they are awfully cheap, however appear to get very good reviews? I can't post a link to them as I'm a new member, but if you search "Barrina LED Shop Lights" you'll see what I'm referring to.

Secondly with the higher 14' ceilings and I going to lose more light and require additional fixtures?

I was initially going to buy two of the 10 packs which should give me about 170,000 lumens of light.

For layout, I was thinking of making three runs across the higher part of the ceiling which measures out to be 18'x36' with each run consisting of four of the 8ft tubes and each run about 4.5' apart. This would utilize 12 of the 20 fixtures. For the remaining 8 I was going to space them evenly around the lower 10' ceiling, which would give me two on each side.

I had also planned to run multiple switches in case this was too bright, and/or I don't mind buying more at this price point if I need it.

Sorry for the long post, just excited and want to make this right the first time.

 

[cybrdyke]

You're going to need someone to do a lighting layout for you. Where you went wrong was using foot candles x square feet to get total lumens. It doesn't work like that. Not sure where you got that info, but....
Also, you just spent a jillion dollars on a new shop. Dont mess it up by buying the cheapest stuff you can find on Amazon. Get some good commercial grade lighting and you'll be way ahead in the long run.
Good luck,
CD

 

[Iggy913]

Thank you for the reply. I did some more reading and the fine folks Prolighting were able to quickly make up a lighting design for me and price quote. For what it's worth they recommended 160,000 lumens distributed across 20 fixtures. It was a little more than I was planning on spending but I'm a firm believer in the "buy once, cry once" philosophy. I figured the Amazon stuff was not the best option, thank you again.

 

[cybrdyke]

Outstanding!
CD

 

[whtbaron]

My lighting is a combination of LED's and T-8's because LED's were still very expensive when I started, but I would go all LED today. Light placement also plays a very big role in usable light. Before I went farming I painted cars for a few years, so you can see my sidelighting is influenced by my time in the spray booth. If all the light is coming from above and you are working under a hood, you are working in the shadow. Side lights help eliminate that. The 30' x 40' area with the 14 ft walls is lit with 4 flourescent fixtures and 5 LED's and I'm very happy with it. Bouncing the light off the white metal walls also makes it much brighter.