Brigher LEDs to replace my T-8 fluorescents in the shop
joeleonetti
| Posted in General Discussion on
This past weekend I replaced a few of the T8 fluorescent bulbs with LED bulbs and went from 1800 lumens to 3000 lumens (both in 6500 K range) per bulb. Ideally, I’d like something even more lumens if possible. Do any of you have a good source for brighter LED bulbs? I did a quick online search and it isn’t very helpful. Figure I’m not the first woodworker to do this. Many thanks for the help.
Replies
I am guessing you have 4' bulbs. The highest I saw on Amazon was about 4100 lumens. I have ~6000 lumens but I have 8' fixtures. I got multi color temperature GE from Lowes. The brightest setting (6000K) was actually too bright and harsh and I opted to set it to 5000K.
Andy
I took out the old fixtures and went with flat panels. Brighter, plus the quality of light is much nicer. Diffuse, soft, almost shadowless instead of a billion shadows from a bunch of point-source LEDs.
Not sure where you are located but I picked up daylight 5000K temp and 4000 lumen tubes at Menards. They are made by FEIT Electric.
Amazon lists a number of shop lights for sale rated 10,000 and even 13,000 lumens. I got 9- 10,000 lumen lights and I no longer wish for better lighting
I went with direct wire T8 LED units. No more bad ballasts or flickering bulbs. Power is about half, same light.
You might want to think about more bulbs. AliExpress sells things you can screw into a lightbulb socket that splits out into several sockets.
Thanks all for the feedback. The biggest challenge with Amazon is it's unclear if they are just plug in and use as is. The first that I bought at Lowe's didn't plug in and work. I returned them and got a slightly different looking set at the end (same manufacturer) and they worked. I've thought about LED panels. Right now it's a cost thing - just added another 240 V 30 amp circuit in garage for a dust collector that resulted in my needing to get a new sub-panel. Put a bigger dent in my savings for a dust collector which I need to get this year. I've been lucky with these fixtures of the last 10 years and no flickering fluorescent bulbs.
Amazon has the feature to ask a question about a product. Aside from too many people answering "I don't know" to your question, you may get a response from the vendor, which tells you they support their product. And you may get a response from another customer who was doing the same thing you want to do. Be careful there, sometime those answers can be misleading.
I recently replaced the two 8’ twin tube fluorescent fixtures in my garage shop with LED fixtures. After research and deliberation I ended up with four 10,000 lumen plug in fixtures from the orange big box and couldn’t be happier — plenty of bright white light and low cost:
https://www.homedepot.com/p/Metalux-SHP-4-ft-128-Watt-Equivalent-10000-Lumens-Integrated-LED-White-Shop-Light-4000K-CCT-4SHP10040R/319852351
I've had good luck with these plug in fixtures (linkable) from Rockler: https://www.rockler.com/5000-lumen-linkable-4-led-shoplight
Thanks. I don't know why I didn't think to check Rockler for lights. Will also check Woodcraft.
Thanks. Finding whole fixtures is turning out to be easy. Ideally just need the bulbs.
Direct wire need different end caps.
In your first post the bulbs shown in the picture are direct replace for fluorescent bulbs. That means the ballasts are still there, you just swap bulbs. This is a quick change but you still have the ballasts in the circuit and they will eventually go bad. The better solution is to elimint4e the ballasts and go to direct wire LED bulbs. Remove ballasts. To rewire, one side of the bulb is unused, no wire, just use the current end cap and cut wires to it. On the other end you will need new endcaps, To connect the power wire, black, will go to one terminal, the neutral, white to the other one. If you have multiple bulbs in fixture, just jump to appropriate terminals. The power required will drop from 32w for fluorescent, to 20w for direct replace, to 14w for direct wire. Do it now, save yourself having to do it in the future.
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Just wanted to give an update. Ended up just buying more of what I had shown in the top. Amazon and others make it a bit unclear on the plug and play, lumens, color brightness. 15 min up and down ladders and done.
After I use my bandsaw for a while (and the planer a bit), I will have a better idea if I need to add more lights in the shop and that point I can address the bigger picture.
I was also happy that I found a fellow woodworker who was happy to be given the still perfectly fine fluorescent bulbs for their use.
I got rid of 26 bulbs along with the ballasts when I switched mine. Glad to see them gone, need more room for wood!!
There is never enough room for wood; that is for certain.
It is worth putting this question to an electrician.
There are many commercial options which are very bright but which may not be so readily available to the public at large.
You don't know what you don't know after all.
Hi Rob. I had electricians at the house putting a second 240 V line and another 120 V line in the garage. Additionally, had more lighting directly over the bench. I didn't want to change out all the overhead fixtures (cost issue at this time - more I spend now means longer till I can get the dust collector which I need for the new bandsaw). What I'm doing with bulbs is aligned with their suggestions.