Garage lighting

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Aspen03

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I'll be updating storage options in the garage with an overhead shelving system and want to redo the lighting as well. What do you guys use? I plan to work back into doing more detailing jobs in my spare time, saving for a new place again, I have dedicated lighting for that but still looking for general light up the whole garage fixtures.

I saw some lights Costco had by a brand name of Koda. They had some decent features such as being linkable, dimmable with 4600 lumen max brightness, a diffused cover which is nice...my current ones are just generic open T12 flourescent and are awful if you happen to look up. They weren't too bad, $60 for a twin pack. I'd never heard of them before but from what I see the reviews are pretty good.

I may do lights on the walls in a couple of spots if space permits, it would be nice to be able to flood the inside of a vehicle w light while working.

I have 2 dedicated circuits in the ceiling so there is plenty of power to go around. The house used to have in wall/window ac units and power ran for them and once the central air went in the circuits became available for other use.

Here is what I looked at:

https://kodabuilt.com/products/koda...-light-with-motion-sensor-and-remote-lm030008
 

riphip

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My brother uses those in his big shop & they are bright. LEDs I believe. Very low power usage so you can use a bunch on a circuit.
 

Trainmaster

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The newer LED lamps are great with two cautions. Like most Chinese junk, quality varies and it's difficult to evaluate. A buddy replaced all the tubes in his shop with LEDs and in a year they all shopped working. I have several that are five years old and are great. You also must check that they are UL or otherwise underwriter listed. If not, when they burn your house down, your insurer may deny coverage depending on your state laws.
 

Vancouver Bob

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Aspen03

Aspen03

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I've read through quite a few of the reviews. The only ones that concern me are a few that reference a negative impact to wifi on certain 5Ghz channels. I have close to a full smart home with dozens of lights, sensors, etc. Most of it is hub/zigbee based but all media is streamed and 5ghz performance is extremely important to keep everything running smoothly.

The motion control is a convenient feature though I see it having minimal value for my use case and my outlets where they would plug into are switch controlled so if need be cutting power is easy.
 

riphip

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I would not get the motion control if possible. I have an electronic 3-way (5ghz) lamp that goes thru the motions all night if I do not unplug my laptop. My brother's shop has the cheaper fixtures w/o the motion sensor.

We changed to LED lighting in my old 650K warehouse in 2019 and they paid for themselves in 8 months running 24/7. We did have motion on 1/3 of those.
 

ManUpOrShutUp

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Sam's Club has some great Honeywell LED worklights, but they were a bit pricey last I checked.
 

Tom Tulloch

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Check out some of the screw in LED cobb lights. I have a few in my barn and they are super bright. 500 watt equivalent uses 60w.
 

Going_Going_Gone

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I replaced all of the fluorescent lights with LED panel lights from Home Depot. They are pricy (around $100 per) but they do an outstanding job of lighting up the whole garage(s) and hardly use any electricity. I have four in our two-car and two in our one-car. Given their cost, I replaced then in stages. In addition to the light output, they can be set for three light colors and they do not flicker when cold.
 

GlennSullivan

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I replaced all of the fluorescent lights with LED panel lights from Home Depot. They are pricy (around $100 per) but they do an outstanding job of lighting up the whole garage(s) and hardly use any electricity. I have four in our two-car and two in our one-car. Given their cost, I replaced then in stages. In addition to the light output, they can be set for three light colors and they do not flicker when cold.
Question about the fixtures you used.
I currently have 2 4 foot 2 bulb fluorescent fixtures in my 2 car attached garage, which does not provide sufficient light.

Each bulb in each fixture is 40w putting out 3200 lumens for a total of 6400 lumens per fixture / 12800 for both Fixtures.

The fixtures you linked above are rated at 4000 lumens each, so it looks like I would need 4 fixtures to get where I want to be.

Do you know if they offer a higher output version of this fixture?
 
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