wrote

I wouldn't like these to be my sole source of light in a shop. LEDs
I
can see getting at some time, but the little curly bulbs do fine
with
enough size and wattage.

I have a hard time with folks when I do a kitchen or bathroom and we
get to lights. Cooking and food prep under the really white, high
Kelvin LEDs can yield some pretty strange results as they distort
the
color band so badly. Makeup application isn't very good as the skin
tones take on a definite whitish/blue tint.

Folks want the light the higher Kelvin bulbs bring as they don't
want
to pay for a couple more cans in the ceiling. For me, I don't want
my
cabinets, tops, and floors to look washed out. Nor do I want them
to
see the color distortions that could make them unhappy with their
new
room.

And in a shop, I can't even imagine how ticked off I would be if I
didn't know that and I was doing staining/coloring/finishing in my
shop with that heavy dose of chromatic blue instead of something in
a
more normal color range. Imagine finishing something in your
brilliantly lit shop with the hot white bulbs and then putting that
piece into a more warmly lit environment. *ouch*
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Life goes on.

As I read Robert's post above, I'm reminded of my experiences in the
High Intensity Discharge lighting business.

Incandescent lamps provide good color rendition, but are horribly
inefficient (approximately 18 lumens/watt), and less than 1,000 hour
lamp life.

Around 1940, fluorescent lighting was introduced at a Worlds Fair.
These lamps offered improved efficiency (approximately 60 lumens/watt,
longer life, but at a price, lousy color rendition.

Everything looked "washed out".

This resulted in lamps with names like "daylight", "cool white" and
"warm white" to name a few.

Next came the High Intensity Discharge lamp sources, Mercury,
Multi-Vapor (Metal Halide), low pressure sodium, and finally
high pressure sodium (Lucalox).

Mercury had the same color rendition problems as fluorescent,
but with a 24,000 hour lamp life, found a home in street lighting and
high bay industrial applications.

Multi-Vapor provides higher output (80 lumens/watt),
good color rendition, but has relatively short life.

It has found a home in sports stadium and car dealership lighting
applications.

Anyplace where good color rendition is required and short life is
acceptable.

Low pressure sodium does not provide a complete color spectrum
and had limited success in Europe and the USA for roadway lighting
applications, but has basically become non-existent in the last
15-20 years.

Which brings us to high pressure sodium (Lucalox).

High pressure sodium (Lucalox) offers high output (100 lumens/watt),
long life (20,000 hours), and high lamp efficiency.

High pressure sodium (Lucalox) does provide a complete color
spectrum; however, there is and abundance of red and yellow hues
which is very close to natural sun light, but some people find
unacceptable.

Again, most of the applications are industrial, parking lot and
roadway.

And now we have LEDs entering the market facing the same color
rendition acceptance problems faced by all the preceding lamp sources.

It's a case of what comes around goes around.

It will be interesting to see where LED lamp sources will go.

Lew