Dodgy eyes and extra workshop lighting

My eyesight is not as good as it was when I installed 4x fluorescent ceiling mounted strip lights some years ago in the workshop so I intend buying one of these 30w jobs (or similar) to fix to the ceiling and brighten up the bench area. I have already tried a 10w version but it needs to be brighter. I think a 50w unit might be a bit OTT.

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I can have it in cool white or warm white – not sure which to choose for best results. Any recommendations?

The flood will be sighted as indicated at top LH corner of pic and will need to illuminate the bench area to the right of my bar stool.

Rik

I once went overboard with installing strip lights in a small operating room which lead to headaches from the heat and glare. LED strips would avoid the heat and it may well be that your tubes are aged and not as efficient as when new. Have you considered a head mounted lamp with/without magnifier?

pgk

It's surprising just how much difference you get by painting the ceiling white. The cheaper foil plastic bubble insulation rolls are even better.

+1 for Dave's suggestions.....

At my clock club (EFHC) we have just recently replaced all of the flourescent tubes with LED tubes....it was straightforward conversion neding just the removal/bypass of the units own wiring. The light is vastly better/brighter and electical consumption about one quarter or previous. The tubes we chose are 'daylight' being about 6,400 degrees K....no flickering, no headaches, no humming, just clean, wide, even white illumination.

Working at home, I have for the past 18 months been using LED 'pearl' bulbs which have ES 25mm fit caps and would never go back to tungsten, especially not halogen. In fact, I have thrown away all lamps, lights and anything with an uneven or specular light throw....it's plain white daylight colour, flat lighting from now on and MUCH better it is!

For demanding turning jobs I put the pearl bulb ovefr the work and a piece of white paper on the bed of the lathe immediately under the workpiece.....surface detail is clear and edge profile also easily watched etc. Daylight light is the best for me as any 'colour' tends to upset my old eyes by converting the workpiece colour and spoiling my tired view.

Edited By Bob Stevenson on 09/09/2021 12:04:22

There is a really good article on workshop lighting on this site. Have a look in the setting up a workshop section of the worshop tab and it's in there.

As Bob,I find warm white = dull, fine for watching tv and low blue is good for bed time, but the detail seems less to me for a workshop.

I think you should be considering some worklights in addition to your background lighting. With ceiling lights you are always going to shadow the work to an extent. Have a experiment with some adjustable lights on stalks around your vice area. Really you need light in front of you when working on a piece in the vice or on the bench. For illuminating scribed lines when cutting in the vice a small metal mirror on an adjustable stalk works well. You just move it around until the reflected light catches the line just right. For more general lighting I have had good results in my kitchen with LED panels like these

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A couple where you are thinking of the flood light may suit better, they are far more diffuse as they generate light from a much greater area. What you don't want is a mix of very bright areas and much darker areas. Really bright compact lights do tend to generate a lot of glare from reflections.

Hope some of these thoughts are usefull to you.

regards Martin

Blue is the last thing you need before bed, it disturbs your sleep wake cycle by messing with the melatonin expression delaying the onset of drowsyness.

regards Martin

Greetings, I recently had all the fluorescent fittings replace with LED tubes, which is a big improvement, with much reduced running costs.

Well worth doing.

Regards

BrianB

One thing that is well worth a consideration is having a chat with your optician. I had better add I deal with a local family firm.

I had lens put into my safety spec's which were tailored to my workshop requirements. Normal everyday glasses are for seeing the No 51 bus coming away off. In the workshop the furthest thing away from me is a maximum of 2 m. Thus my main safety spec's are adjusted for this distance which gave a chance to improve the Varifocal close-up portion. Until I asked the question I was unaware that these lenses are available in two standard ranges.

These new glasses made such an improvement that I asked if he could do another pair which were for bench work with a focal range of about 300-350 mm. I can now sit at my workbench and see things a lot clearer. Without the need for magnifiers and illuminated lens, which I had been using before.

Regards

Gray,

Edited By Graham Meek on 09/09/2021 15:26:40

I went over to cool light LED tubes about a year ago, I have two on from the light switch and a third and fourth that I can switch on/off independently once the first two are on if needs be. I do have LED lights on both the lathe and mill, in fact I could do with a second on the mill to eliminate shadow, I did the conversion to the existing fittings, a straightforward job as the tube came with a dummy starter and uses pretty much all the existing wiring. Well worth doing!