Light upgrade
 

Recently, with the change of seasons, I find myself pulling my drop light over to the bench to see what I am doing anytime after 4pm. This drives me nuts, as I usually really get things moving around noon, and there I am, searching for a light source. I decided to upgrade the lighting in the garage, so I can still work in the afternoons and with the door closed, if needed. Doing this, I found that our garage is NOT a 2 car unit, it is slightly over 18ft wide, and around 24ft deep. I decided to upgrade, and keep it simple, as this is a rental, and I will remove everything when we decide to leave.

I used 4, 48in twin T8 light fixtures from home depot($28/ea) with 6500k tubes(daylight). The wiring isn't quite to code, but trust me, there won't be an issue unless for some reason, the owner calls in an inspector. That would mean he is selling, and we would be leaving anyway. Needless to say, the wife and I are impressed:cool: I may go back after the holidays and add a 2ft under shelf unit over the bench, but for now, this is a much needed improvement.

For anyone struggling with lights, I highly recommend looking into fluorescent upgrades like this. I could have gone with less, but I would have likely added more at some point. I have seen some guys on lighting sites using 12 of these in a 24x24ft garage. I would need some SPF50 to work in that garage:banana:

WOW! With my dad complaining more and more about the lack of light is his workshop (and especially with me starting to move down there) I might look into that as a holiday gift!

Looks great, yota!

That does look much improved. Do I also spot a 1984 or 85-ish rm 125 or 250?
Vintage bikes and atvs are great.

Good eye nick, its actually a '96 RM80. Bought it cheap with a burned top end and leaking water pump. Fixed it all except for carb and front pads. If you look closer, you might spot my first 2 wheels sitting on the shelf. One day I will put it back together, or use the engine in another project.

@Fox. Take some time and research light fixtures. You can get them cheaper, but they use sub par or outdated ballasts. I chose these because they use an electronic ballast, guaranteed to light and not flicker down to 0 degrees. The other fixtures use the older magnetic ballasts, that tend not to light under 60 degrees, and create a lot of interference and bleed over in cell signals and radios. That won't work for me, as I have pandora streaming anytime I am in the garage, and will likely be working in the garage throughout the winter, if I can a decent heater.

ooooww. still a run little bike.

garage lighting upgrade has been on my to do list a long time. i have 4 incandescent floods for a 24x24 garage. its a real task to replace any that burn out that are over the project cars (10 foot ceiling) and there are a ton of dark corners. For heat i use a grainger-sourced 220V dayton electric mounted up in the corner. I only turn that on when i know i'm going to spend the entire day working in there--energy hog, but it heats the place up quickly.

Those incandescent bulbs probly eat a lot of juice, too. I like the cold, if you can call florida winters cold, that is. I might not even need heat since I am always out in the elements as it is. If I did, I might source for a small space heater for the bench area. I can not wait till the holidays are over so I can resume building and utilize the new lights.

Do you recall the model #?