AWSX1686 wrote: My plan is to run a few strips of these hooked up to a PC power supply... 2835SMD LEDs are quite bright, especially on strips like these with 600/strip.
I think I've been hanging out on here too long. I had the same idea a couple days ago.
dculberson wrote: Costco has a nice shop light with two LED 4' tubes on it for $25 or so each. I bought a pile of them. They're very low profile (1.5" or so high) and can mount flush against the ceiling or hanging on chain or wires. (Short wires provided.) They plug in but you can also hack the plug off and wire nut it in if you're willing. (Use a strain relief.) On the web site they show a 2-pack for $60 but I think they're cheaper in store. https://www.costco.com/4%E2%80%99-Linkable-LED-Shop-Light-with-Pull-Chain,-2-pack.product.100284402.html They're very bright and are unaffected by cold and are instant on. I'm a fan.
This, all day. Costco had them on sale for $20 each last month, I'm kicking myself for not buying more.
calteg wrote:dculberson wrote: Costco has a nice shop light with two LED 4' tubes on it for $25 or so each. I bought a pile of them. They're very low profile (1.5" or so high) and can mount flush against the ceiling or hanging on chain or wires. (Short wires provided.) They plug in but you can also hack the plug off and wire nut it in if you're willing. (Use a strain relief.) On the web site they show a 2-pack for $60 but I think they're cheaper in store. https://www.costco.com/4%E2%80%99-Linkable-LED-Shop-Light-with-Pull-Chain,-2-pack.product.100284402.html They're very bright and are unaffected by cold and are instant on. I'm a fan.This, all day. Costco had them on sale for $20 each last month, I'm kicking myself for not buying more.
Well, the good thing is that it's Costco, so they'll probably be on sale again soon. The bad thing is that it's Costco, so they may disappear forever next week. 
By the way, if you ask this question on Garage Journal, you'll still get a bunch of people insisting that you need T8 floursescent fixtures, with spreadsheets and lumens and everything to back this up. I don't get it.
captdownshift wrote: In reply to Tom Suddard: At that point, regarding the amount of lighting per a sq. ft. it seizes to be a garage and is known as a grow operation
Fun behind-the-scenes tidbit: Our shops have to be exceedingly bright in order to photograph projects well. A flash can only do so much, so in order to get the best photos we have to go pretty overboard on our shop lighting. What looks "normal" in the magazine is the result of white paint everywhere that isn't visible in the garage, and a ton of light.
I walked into my garage last night and one of my T12 8' bulbs was out. I think I've got a spare, but I ordered a roll of those LEDs to try out. What the heck. All my fluro fixtures are 40 years old and are losing their ballasts one after the other.
The florescent lights in my shop have been begging for death for some time. Between ballast dying, confusion over what kind of bulb each fixture needs (cause scrounger) and the PITA of disposing of the 4' long mercury filled tubes. I welcome our new LED overseers!
Another vote for the Costco LED's. At $20 for the whole fixture it was hard to beat. Recently went to my parents place, I guess I never realized how dark it was after the sun went down. Went from five sad 4ft fluorescent lights to twelve of the Costco LED's. Now its super bright and my parents can see and therefore work a little more comfortably.
Five gallons of high gloss white paint and 6 candles...
On a 20X20 two car garage I went with 4' 4 bulb flourescents X 4. It is good but not great, kinda wishing I would have gone with 6. I'm gonna paint the unifinished drywall flat white and see what it does.
In reply to Tom_Spangler:
By the way, if you ask this question on Garage Journal, you'll still get a bunch of people insisting that you need T8 floursescent fixtures, with spreadsheets and lumens and everything to back this up. I don't get it.
T8 lamps put out a lot of lumens, and it's easy to make them look good Vs. LED substitutes on paper. But they are not very efficient at getting those lumens where you want them, since a good deal of light is scattered and wasted. A well designed LED fixture can direct those lumens to where they are needed, with more useable light despite a lower lumen output. Unfortunately, LED manufactures are all over the place on what their fixtures are equivalent to. Some are underrated, some claims are outrageous.
My experiment went pretty well, read about it here!
whoa....Tron Garage
Grtechguy wrote: whoa....Tron Garage
Is there one type of these LED strip lights to get? There are like 75,000 hits on amazon for LED strip lights. Any to avoid? How do they compare to a standard 4' x 2 florescent light? How many "feet" of these LED strips would be the same as one 4'x2?
I have 8' Menards cold and damp service (because Michigan) fluorescent fixtures in my garages. so far 15 years on the house garage and 12 or so on the back with no bulb changes. Some are close to needing a change.
Dr. Hess wrote: Is there one type of these LED strip lights to get? There are like 75,000 hits on amazon for LED strip lights. Any to avoid? How do they compare to a standard 4' x 2 florescent light? How many "feet" of these LED strips would be the same as one 4'x2?
These are 2835 size LEDs (claim to be some of the brightest.) and 600 LEDs per strip. They claim 15lm/LED, but I think that's high. I may experiment with some other LED sizes. Hard to say what would be equivalent to a 4'x2' florescent light.
looks the same for eight bucks.
So, when they are on, it looks bright? Bright enough to work? That's the standard.
Dr. Hess wrote: This one: https://smile.amazon.com/Flexible-Non-waterproof-Christmas-Decoration-Daylight/dp/B00HSF65MC/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1485445314&sr=8-6&keywords=led+light+strips looks the same for eight bucks. So, when they are on, it looks bright? Bright enough to work? That's the standard.
That one only have 300 LEDs/strip not 600. Also that one is not waterproof, the ones I got are.
It's bright, like I said it's a different kind of lighting, but I think it will work well. Should be enough to work from.
OK, looked like they were both 300 when I didn't look close enough. Damn dyslexia. I wonder what the real current draw on the strip is. The full on spec for the smd2385 is 0.2W each, near as I can find, so that would be 120 watts for the 600, or 10 amps. They are recommending a 60 watt power supply, or 5 amps. I suppose they have some current limiters in there to drive the things at less than their full potential. The Easy Button is to buy the $10 PS for each strip, which puts it at $23 per strip, or about the cost of one LED replacement for the 4' florescents. 60 watts of LED should be pretty bright, I would think.
When I finish the RAV4 "upgrade," I'll have room to get to where I need to add some lights.
In reply to Dr. Hess: Buying the power supplies separately makes it $23/strand. Buying this combo pack, makes it under $20/strand
I like the idea of using a computer power supply. I do wonder about running out of available wattage on the 12V rail of the supply though. Seems like AWX's setup is working alright. Single supply for under $30 is appealing.
I have one of their power supplies for another project, I may test and see if one strip on their own power supply is brighter than the strip next to it being powered by the computer power supply running 6. I would think the computer power supply is sufficient though...
OK, for a sawbuck, I'll give them a try. I needed some more licorice anyway.
In reply to AWSX1686:
It might be informative to know max amps and nominal pulled by a full length strip.
The label on the computer power supply should tell you max amps available for the 12V side of the supply's outputs.
I went and pulled up a brand of power supply I've used before on Newegg. Check the amperage for the 12V side; https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817194126
41 amps! That's great. But that's a pretty decent looking supply. Let's try another one; https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817148053
32 amps. Which is actually less than what the company seems to recommend per the sizing of their suggested supplies. So it's probably worth looking into.
Well we ended up going with the linkable 4' LED lights for my dad's shop. We ran the conduit yesterday/last night, wired everything up, put the breaker in & hung up 2 of them... Definitely impressed. Planning on doing 12 of them total, which by my calculations should basically make that place light up like the freakin sun. thinking about installing spotters on the ground where the lift is going to go, but not sure yet. Won't know whether they are necessary until the lift is in (in about 2 weeks)
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