Finally starting... let the adventure begin.

Boswell said:
I do this in my kitchen and living room where I have fixtures that aim the light at the ceiling and I get reflected light in the room. As you say, great for no shadows and a nice soft lighted area

I am not sure I would want to do that for my shop.
1. I don't want to have obstructions 4ft down from the ceiling.
2. I don't want to loose the volume of light that gets lost in the reflection.
3. painting (and maintaining) a bright (white) ceiling in a shop environment seems challenging (not a problem inside my home/living area)
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4ft down from the ceiling is still about 12-14 ft from the shop floor so I'm not worried about that. But I do wonder how much light would be lost...
The ceiling is already white from the insulation up there, but I'm not sure how that would be affected / change over time by shining light on it.

Meanwhile, making progress...
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Positioning the fixtures so the light is projected toward the ceiling will facilitate contamination (dust/debris) collecting on the fixture lenses. Dirty lenses will reduce lumens projected. Do you want to create the overhead maintenance task of periodically cleaning the lenses?
 
IMHO, To only bounce the light off the ceiling will probably give poor results in a shop environment. I am currently building (I'm a contractor) a luxury home, the great room has a full vaulted ceiling with cross beams every 6', track lights are mounted to the top and bottom of the beams some pointed up to wash the ceiling some pointed down to provide direct light, both use flood heads of the same wattage. If only the up lights are on, it does give an even light, albeit rather dim. It's fine for entertaining but no way bright enough to work by. If only the down lights are on, there is much more usable light but does vary due to the hot spots. If both are on, the room is fairly well lit but still only suitable for detailed work, directly in the hot spot of the light.

In my own shop, a low ceiling basement, I have LED A19 style bulbs roughly spaced every 3'-4' X & Y, this gives adequate area lighting but I need to supplement with task lighting above each machine and work area.
 
ArmyDoc said:
He doesn't say in the video (or I didn't hear it) but the lights he linked in the description are 250w 35k lumen high bays. He used 8, guessing about 16 ft apart... not sure how high up.

From what I've read, 150W 20k lumen is what I need for ~16-18 ft. I'm planning on 8 for the main area + one for the welding area.
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Doors are 14 foot high for a gauge. He spaced them evenly between the end walls and each other. At 80 feet that comes out to 20 foot spacing.

Ya he ran the higher wattage than I had in the link I shared, but that is my wish list. I think for a shorter ceiling I will end up with the 150wt units would be fine. Add to that any special task lighting over specific equipment and that should be more than enough in my mind.
 
@ArmyDoc, you might actually benefit from reading the IESNA illumination manual. Your proposals are not only covered, they can be calculated and modeled using the tools in the book. My copy is 101 MB, so I can't upload it here.

So here's a teaser for selecting lighting:
 

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pontiac428 said:
@ArmyDoc, you might actually benefit from reading the IESNA illumination manual. Your proposals are not only covered, they can be calculated and modeled using the tools in the book. My copy is 101 MB, so I can't upload it here.

So here's a teaser for selecting lighting:
Click to expand...
Nice. Where could I get that? I am familiar with the recommendations for lx/fc. And the lights often have central and average lux valuse by distance from the fixture, but I haven't seen any thing about how bouncing off a whit ceiling would affect it.
 
Papa Charlie said:
Doors are 14 foot high for a gauge. He spaced them evenly between the end walls and each other. At 80 feet that comes out to 20 foot spacing.

Ya he ran the higher wattage than I had in the link I shared, but that is my wish list. I think for a shorter ceiling I will end up with the 150wt units would be fine. Add to that any special task lighting over specific equipment and that should be more than enough in my mind.
Click to expand...
20ft ? 4 lights evenly spaced would give you 5 spaces - 2 between wall and lights, and 3 between the lights, so 80/5=16ft.
I wasn't sure of door size, but if 14 then they are probably 18 ft high? I like the amount of light he has...
I'm leaning towards one light in the center of each bay and one on each beam. That would be ~ 12.5 ft a part, but mine will be lower probably 14 ft if mounted right to the ceiling purlin, so hoping 150w will be good for me. That would be 9 lights (dont need one over office) that could all be run on one 15 amp breaker too.
 
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