Upgrading from Incandescants to T8's

[mryyc]

Hi, my first post here, so forgive any ignorance. I've been working a lot more in the garage lately and have been relying a lot on portable halogens for light. My garage is a pretty typical build for my area, attached, and a single 15A circuit doing two duplex outlets I use for my shop tools and small compressor and two incandescent fixtures on the ceiling controlled now by a motion sensor switch I installed a few months ago after too much fumbling in the dark.

I'm looking to install some 4' T8 Fluorescent fixtures, likely 4x for my 20'x20' garage. My garage is insulated with vapor barrier, but that's it, no wallboards on the ceiling. My question is this - would I be better off going the route of converting the incandescent outlets into some standard receptacles and buying plug-in T8 fixtures - or would there be a benefit to hard wiring the new fixtures in?

I'm leaning to converting to receptacles and adding 2 additional once (4 total) so if the 4 fixtures don't give me enough light I could continue adding in additional ones.

Appreciate any opinions!

 

[matt151617]

It's only slightly more work to convert the incandescent's to standard outlets and plugging in T8s. The big advantage to this is easy replacement of a broken light. You can also easily pull the whole light off the ceiling to replace bulbs. Also, you can make it 4 outlets.

 

[kbs2244]

Convert your incandescent sockets to the ones with an outlet and then plug your fluorescents into them.
Since they typically come with a six foot cord you get to move your fluorescents around to the places where you work.

 

[Brendanf]

Not sure where your located but if your in a cold climate you might want to invest in HighOutput flourecent fixtures for your garage. They will be bighter for sure but they also won't take nearly aslong to come to full brightness on a cold winters day.

 

[regguy1]

I had 3 bulbs in the garage before doing some finishing on the interior, I added some 48" T8's. See photos and videos in this thread:

http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=140674

What a difference in the amount of light in there

 

[matt151617]

I put it the Utilitech 48" T8 fixtures from Lowes. Electronic ballast, plug-in, black colored. Can't go wrong for $13. For the price of one decent light you could put 4 of these in. I put 12 total and all work perfect.

For bulbs, the price you'll pay per bulb difference is huge when you buy a 48 pack. For 12 bulbs bought in 2 packs, I would have spent the same buying the case of 48.