In my new shop there are 8 foot twin T12 bulb fluorescent fixtures with
magnetic ballasts. They all are pretty old and some need new ballasts
and bulbs. I just won an Ebay auction for 10 new electronic T8 bulb,
ballasts. If I can score another 15 ballasts for what I got these for
I'll be in business. I need some bulb advice. Do I wany cool white
4100k bulbs, warm white bulbs, full spectrum bulbs, daylight bulbs?
It's pretty confusing.


I was thinking of
these....http://www.bulbs.com/products/produ...inventory=11157

What is everyone else using?

"joebass" wrote in message
ups.com...
In my new shop there are 8 foot twin T12 bulb fluorescent fixtures with
magnetic ballasts. They all are pretty old and some need new ballasts
and bulbs. I just won an Ebay auction for 10 new electronic T8 bulb,
ballasts. If I can score another 15 ballasts for what I got these for
I'll be in business. I need some bulb advice. Do I wany cool white
4100k bulbs, warm white bulbs, full spectrum bulbs, daylight bulbs?
It's pretty confusing.


I was thinking of
these....http://www.bulbs.com/products/produ...inventory=11157

What is everyone else using?


I use cool whites, but it's driven by cost more than anything else. With
luck, you can buy them for $3 each, and they do a good job for the intended
purpose. For a shop, full spectrum bulbs aren't really a necessity. If
you have too much money, they're probably the best choice overall.

Harold

joebass wrote:
In my new shop there are 8 foot twin T12 bulb fluorescent fixtures with
magnetic ballasts. They all are pretty old and some need new ballasts
and bulbs. I just won an Ebay auction for 10 new electronic T8 bulb,
ballasts. If I can score another 15 ballasts for what I got these for
I'll be in business. I need some bulb advice. Do I wany cool white
4100k bulbs, warm white bulbs, full spectrum bulbs, daylight bulbs?
It's pretty confusing.


I was thinking of
these....http://www.bulbs.com/products/produ...inventory=11157

What is everyone else using?

The other benefit of using full spectrum bulbs is you feel like your
outdoors in the sunshine rather than in a half lit shop.

On 21 Jan 2006 20:07:19 -0800, "joebass"
wrote:

In my new shop there are 8 foot twin T12 bulb fluorescent fixtures with
magnetic ballasts. They all are pretty old and some need new ballasts
and bulbs. I just won an Ebay auction for 10 new electronic T8 bulb,
ballasts. If I can score another 15 ballasts for what I got these for
I'll be in business.

As long as the new ballasts aren't regular Slimline (single pin) and
the old fixtures aren't High Output (bipin shrouded in an oval)...

Those ballasts will keep what you've got installed now running - but
if you are replacing any more, I'd suggest switching over to a F32T8
electronic fixture with mirrored reflectors to squeeze every lumen out
of each watthour you buy. They make "Tandem" 4-lamp fixtures that
have the same footprint and mount the same as a 2-lamp 8'.

Electronic ballasts will minimize the 120 Hz 'stroboscope' effects
that magnetic ballasts give on lathes and other rotating machinery.

And for a shop, I'd buy the clear plastic tube-guard sleeves for all
bulbs in open fixtures. Have one screw go -ZING!- flying off, it
breaks a lamp, and you get a glass shower...

I need some bulb advice. Do I wany cool white
4100k bulbs, warm white bulbs, full spectrum bulbs, daylight bulbs?
It's pretty confusing.

Cool White is the default and best value, and are just fine for
general area lighting. The Daylight or other color temperature lamps
with a high Color Rendering Index (CRI) rating are good when you need
to match paints and patinas. They blend the phosphors to have an even
spread of light across the spectrum frequencies.

'Warm White' 2700K and 'Kitchen & Bath' mainly exist to match
existing incandescent lamps inside a house, and are no help for shop
lighting.

There are some of really odd colors out there (6400K and higher)
that are mainly sold for 'color snobs' and motion picture and TV
production work. (They need to match the lamps to the film speed when
they're filming inside a house so they don't get an odd color tinge.)
And since they don't sell in volume, they charge up the wazoo. If
they want triple the price (or more) pass unless you /really/ need
them.

Especially with 8 footers, buy lamps by the case. They are more
likely to survive the trip, and you'll always need replacements.

-- Bruce --

--
Bruce L. Bergman, Woodland Hills (Los Angeles) CA - Desktop
Electrician for Westend Electric - CA726700
5737 Kanan Rd. #359, Agoura CA 91301 (818) 889-9545
Spamtrapped address: Remove the python and the invalid, and use a net.

"joebass" wrote in message
ups.com...
In my new shop there are 8 foot twin T12 bulb fluorescent fixtures with
magnetic ballasts. They all are pretty old and some need new ballasts
and bulbs. I just won an Ebay auction for 10 new electronic T8 bulb,
ballasts. If I can score another 15 ballasts for what I got these for
I'll be in business. I need some bulb advice. Do I wany cool white
4100k bulbs, warm white bulbs, full spectrum bulbs, daylight bulbs?
It's pretty confusing.


I was thinking of
these....http://www.bulbs.com/products/produ...inventory=11157

What is everyone else using?


The 5400K bulbs match "sun light" and I like the ones I have. The 6500K
that Home Depot sells are "sky light" have have way too much blue glare
IMHO. I only use the cool or warm whites if I don't have a choice of color
temps. I bought my 5400K tubes from MSC in a box of 25 which made the price
comparable to the cheapest tubes locally.

Steve.

What Bruce said.

And check out aperature bulbs to get even more light headed your way
instead of toward the reflector. These have a clear strip down the side
facing you, so the UV hits the far phosphors, is converted, and comes
out back at you, instead of passing through phospor to get to you.
Philips and GE make them, I think.

Also quantum splitting phosphors, if you really want performance. And a
hefty price. If they are even available. Or rare earth phosphors, which
are available.

I have an eight foot fixture at elevation six feet over my bicycle
project, with two Philips F96T12C50 Colortone 75 watt single pin tubes
in it. I love it. But we have sunlight coming in on the bike now, and
it's 8:17 AM, so that adds a lot.

If you're enclosed, I'd say daylight or full spectrum. Full spectrum is
more for plant growth, isn't it? The C number is C100 = daylight, I
think.

Doug

In article ,
Bruce L. Bergman wrote:


Especially with 8 footers, buy lamps by the case. They are more
likely to survive the trip, and you'll always need replacements.

-- Bruce --

I've been buying Phillips 5000 K 4-footers by the case for the last 20
years for the last 20 years and have saved a fortune andc always have a
replacement bulb handy.

--
Free men own guns, slaves don't
www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/5357/

And stay in a better mood - like outside. The Blue based bulbs are depressing.
Martin Eastburn
@ home at Lions' Lair with our computer lionslair at consolidated dot net
NRA LOH & Endowment Member
NRA Second Amendment Task Force Charter Founder



MKnott wrote:
joebass wrote:

In my new shop there are 8 foot twin T12 bulb fluorescent fixtures with
magnetic ballasts. They all are pretty old and some need new ballasts
and bulbs. I just won an Ebay auction for 10 new electronic T8 bulb,
ballasts. If I can score another 15 ballasts for what I got these for
I'll be in business. I need some bulb advice. Do I wany cool white
4100k bulbs, warm white bulbs, full spectrum bulbs, daylight bulbs?
It's pretty confusing.


I was thinking of
these....http://www.bulbs.com/products/produ...inventory=11157

What is everyone else using?

The other benefit of using full spectrum bulbs is you feel like your
outdoors in the sunshine rather than in a half lit shop.

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http://www.newsfeeds.com The #1 Newsgroup Service in the World! 120,000+ Newsgroups
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In article ,
Bruce L. Bergman wrote:

Those ballasts will keep what you've got installed now running - but
if you are replacing any more, I'd suggest switching over to a F32T8
electronic fixture with mirrored reflectors to squeeze every lumen out
of each watthour you buy. They make "Tandem" 4-lamp fixtures that
have the same footprint and mount the same as a 2-lamp 8'.

While we are on this subject, I'll need to light the new shop one of
these days, and "every lumen possible per watt-hour" is high on my list,
since I appear to be headed for generating my own power, due to
unreasonable connection costs from the local excuse for a utility. As my
eyes are getting old and creaky, lots of lumens are also going to be
needed, so the typical off-the-grid method of "dimly lit by a few
compact fluorescents" is not an option.

I had thought that metal halide might be the best solution, though the 5
minute or so startup is annoying - the shop ceiling is 11-1/2 feet high,
which is probably not high enough to run high-bay fixtures; but I have
seen a few claims that some of the newer fluorescents meet or beat MH
for watt-hours in to light out, and the near-instant start is definitely
a good thing...

--
Cats, coffee, chocolate...vices to live by

I just re-fit the nineteen twin tube, t12, mag ballast, 8 foot fixtures in
my shop with the t8, quad tube, 4' bulbs, elect ballast retrofit kits. No
more headaches from the mag ballast hum, no more interference with the am
radio, no more burnt out t12 bulbs seemingly every couple months etc. The 4'
bulbs are so much easier to handle than the 8 footers. The best part about
the retrofit kit is you don't have to unwire and de-mount the fixture shell.

My shop only has one small window, so I went with the daylight bulbs after
trying daylight and cool white side by side in a couple of fixtures for a
day. The improvement over the cool white T12 bulbs is really incredible. In
addition, I'm hoping the t4 bulbs will last longer than the t12's. This is
truly one of the few improvements to the shop that I can put in the "should
have done that a long time ago" category.

Wayne

"joebass" wrote in message
ups.com...
What is everyone else using?

In article ,
Ecnerwal wrote:

While we are on this subject, I'll need to light the new shop one of
these days, and "every lumen possible per watt-hour" is high on my list,
since I appear to be headed for generating my own power, due to
unreasonable connection costs from the local excuse for a utility. As my
eyes are getting old and creaky, lots of lumens are also going to be
needed, so the typical off-the-grid method of "dimly lit by a few
compact fluorescents" is not an option.

Try dimly lit by CF with powerful work lights only where you are
actually working.

--
Free men own guns, slaves don't
www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/5357/

On Mon, 23 Jan 2006 18:38:49 GMT, Nick Hull
wrote:
In article ,
Ecnerwal wrote:

While we are on this subject, I'll need to light the new shop one of
these days, and "every lumen possible per watt-hour" is high on my list,
since I appear to be headed for generating my own power, due to
unreasonable connection costs from the local excuse for a utility. As my
eyes are getting old and creaky, lots of lumens are also going to be
needed, so the typical off-the-grid method of "dimly lit by a few
compact fluorescents" is not an option.

Try dimly lit by CF with powerful work lights only where you are
actually working.

That works better if you don't really want to deal with buying and
hanging MH fixtures. You can also go with dimly lit with a few Metal
Halide High-bays for general light in a big barn or shop, and powerful
Fluorescent fixtures placed down low over each work location. And
separate switches for each area so you only light up the lathe or mill
when you are using them.

And the warm up and restrike time delays for Metal Halide or High
Pressure Sodium are only a problem if they're the only light source in
the room. A 100-watt quartz 'emergency lamp' is a common factory
installed option in many high-bay MH fixtures, and it turns itself off
automatically when the main lamp starts coming up to speed.

Or put a few fluorescent fixtures in strategic places to handle
this, or you can go Total Overkill and put in battery-backed LED EXIT
lights over the doors and battery Emergency lights...

Building codes are only a minimum standard, you are welcome to do
more. As a matter of fact I usually encourage it, as it's much
cheaper to do it right than to do it over.

-- Bruce --

--
Bruce L. Bergman, Woodland Hills (Los Angeles) CA - Desktop
Electrician for Westend Electric - CA726700
5737 Kanan Rd. #359, Agoura CA 91301 (818) 889-9545
Spamtrapped address: Remove the python and the invalid, and use a net.