Machine Lamp Recommendation?

That is because it is a Rotary Table !!!!! they are not known to harm people.

Brian,

I was being facetious. Normaly someone comes out of the wood work to point out that such practice, whether stationary or not, is not to be encouraged.

Keith

I have had recently a few rpm where the chuck at work , looks to be slowly turning backwards. It never happened when I had the pair of fluro tubes above the machine. But they got replaced with a pair of LED replacement for the twin fluro tubes. I talked to my son about it, and he said most likely, all the led's are turning off and on again with the frequency of the AC current. He explained that the leds are flickering like a single incandescent light. I took my Futaba optical tacho to work and it shows 3000 rpm, or 50hz reading. He said most leds will have a frequency that they work at, even driven from a dc source. So I tested our led torch and it varies from 25hz to 60hz . My wifes phone led shows no frequency however.

At home I have above my S7, the 5 foot LED equivalent of a duel fluro light. It is positioned so that the front lamp tube is on the centre line of the lathe . I have no shadowing to speak of. I also have an lep lamp on a flexi neck, for looking down inner bores. It sits inline with the tailstock and is about 1/2 a m back, so not in the way. It gives me more than enough light for everything. I only run in the low speed from the motor to the clutch, so max is like 700 rpm or so for anything I make. Any frequency of the light issues I have never noticed in my home shop.

I bought 2 of those sewing machine lights as in SOD's post. Potentially lethal, 2 very spindly wires up the metal Swan neck, one of which could be at mains voltage. Spent far to much time modifying them to run on safe voltage, should have binned them

I went with increasing the overall light level over all of the lathe, I prefer that to just highlighting the workpiece with spot type lights. So I fitted a LED cabinet strip light from Screwfix under the shelf above the lathe, works really well. The lights come in various lengths based on kitchen cabinet sizes and various wattage. What is really neat about them is they are linkable and come with a cable to connect them end to end so you can have a string of them, up to eight..? I think..? from one plug in to a wall socket.

Ron

Edited By Ron Laden on 05/09/2021 05:25:55

Not 'best practice' though, and leaving the key in an innocent chuck might turn into a bad habit. Although a key left in a rotary table chuck won't become a missile, they can jamb the table which might damage the gears if a slow-witted operator forces it.

The case for the defence! Nothing is as it seems. At present my workshop is unusable due to being full of empty boxes pending daughter leaving home*. Not possible to turn the mill on and it's being used as a shelf. Stuff had to be moved to take the photo.

Good news. My lathe's chuck key is almost idiot proof. It has bright red handles and an ejector spring ...

Dave

* Don't get me started on solicitors. Is it just me or are they all slow, expensive and error prone, happily performing entirely to their own satisfaction...

his chuck his choice

Some of them are very conscientious - ours nearly frightened us off the house we're now very happy in. Lots of moves going on round our way, and they seem to be overloaded, poor mommets.

I researched for a decent led light to fix to my lathe and couldn’t find one that I would be happy with. The workshop has five 4 foot led tubes which give a very good light so I was really only looking to illuminate around where the tool was working, I opted for a head torch which is led and rechargeable battery powered, it gives a brilliant area of illumination just where I want it and has the facility that if I need to switch off and conserve battery power I just wave my hand in the beam and it switches itself off, likewise if I want it on again I just wave my hand in front of it and it comes on again. I think I paid about £12 for it and it is certainly well worth the money, to recharge the battery just plug into a USB socket. Dave W

The IKEA lamp suggested is no longer available apparently. I got a similar looking one, but it’s pretty crap so I’m taking it back.

Re. Strip lights, I’ve got 4 in the garage. When the one over the bench packed up I replaced it with an LED item, which, although extremely flimsy, is very bright, and IIRC daylight corrected. Trouble is, replacing the other 3 is yet another job to do, and I just want to get on with building stuff rather than faffing about with lighting.

Assuming that you meant that you have replaced the entire single unit with a LED strip light, you still have the option of just replacing one or more of the existing three fluorescent tubes with LED tubes (the ones that come with a dummy starter to make the necessary change to the circuit).

I don't know whether the two types can be mixed on the same circuit (ie controlled by the same switch).

As I think has already been mentioned, the IKEA lamps were cheap and cheerful and I'm surprised they have been discontinued.

Yes you can have the replacement LED tubes and the old tubes on the one circuit, been doing that in the garage where I have 9 tubes as the old ones die I fit an LED

Birmingham Ikea allegedly have it stocked in black, but I'd expect others would do. Probably the lumens delivered by the bulb count for a lot - mine does 1000 at 13W.

I've found mine very compliant to delivering light to the point of interest, whereas however good overhead lighting might be, yer 'ead gets in way when trying to throw some light on what's goin' on at cuttin' edge...

As a slight aside, it is worth noting that LED tubes are not always a direct replacement for fluorescent tubes. If you have the slightly newer electronic ballast fittings then these need re-wiring. The LED tubes only need power to one end and the replacement 'starter' simply provides a link to get the power where it is needed. The ballast unit stays in circuit so must, I presume, consume a little power. So I think it is best to rip everything out and provide new wiring to one end of the LED tube as required.

John

Good to know, as this approach is very convenient; the replacement tubes seemed relatively expensive, however, compared with the new units when I last bought one but I suspect prices are in flux at the moment.

Journeyman:

Does it follow that an old unit with pre-electronic ballast is more suited to the replacement LED tubes?

Yes, to an extent but as I said I think it is better to remove the ballast unit completely whichever type of fitting. When replacing tubes in a kitchen fitting I found that all the internal wiring insulation had gone brittle and was flaking off. So checking and removal is probably a reasonable preventative measure. If the old style ballast unit remains in place it is consuming power, albeit little, so removing that is also good for efficiency. The only minor difficulty is re-wiring the tube fitting at the power end, most are not designed to be altered.

*** THIS POST *** may provide a bit more illumination.

John

Edited By Journeyman on 09/09/2021 11:46:36

Journeyman:

Thank you for the advice and link; I think it was that earlier thread that put me on to the replacement tubes.

Hi Dave W, are you able to post the link, if not please PM. Thanks

DaveD

Thanks all. Are we saying that fluorescent units - with a starter - can use LED tubes with no modifications?

How do you mount the jansjo lamp? The ones I can find are just a lamp with a swan neck that terminates in a usb plug. No apparent method of securing them apart from the plug.