63,000lm!! (Maybe) - Garage Lighting Content

Well I finally got around to hooking up my interior garage lighting last night. Ended up staying out there till midnight to get it all hooked up because I wanted to see it all lit up. There is a little cleanup of the cables left to do, and plenty of trash cleanup to finish up tonight. (ignore the mess...)

First off, here's what the lighting was before I started:

I decided to use 7 of these LED strips. They claim 15lm/led, 600 LEDs/strip * 7 strips = 63,000lm. (Spoiler: Once it's all hooked up, I'm a little skeptical of these claims...)

Starting to hang the strips. 2 down. Hanging each strip on its own truss.

Hanging them via plastic wire "staples". Since the plastic wire staples as they come have a lot more room than necessary for an LED strip (left in picture) I flipped the nails around (right in picture) to get a good hold on the LED strips.

All 7 strips hung! I am mainly lighting the one side of the garage with this project since that is the working area. The other side is primarily storage for Big Red, so it doesn't need too much light at the moment. I may hang more strips down the road so that all the trusses have an LED strip, because, why not?

For the power supply I used an old PC power supply that I had laying around. I didn't take pictures, each LED strip, came with an end for a DC power supply, I cut it off, stripped the wire and soldered on some old speaker wire to put an extension on each strip so I can bring them all into the central power supply.

When using an old PC power supply you have to jumper two pins on the main connector to make it think that there is a mother board attached or else it won't power on. In my case it was these two pins, but I think it varies depending on what type of power supply it is. (Google is your friend!)

Zip ties! Yay!

Originally, nearby to where I was doing this there was a light socket powered from the switch. My original plan was to take a couple adapters and just plug in my pc power supply that way, but then I decided better and took the light socket out and wired in an outlet in it's place.

I did it right! (Ignore the lack of faceplate...)

Wire everything together and it's time for the moment of truth. Let there be light!

That looks excellent

Trippy man.

Very cool. How is the glare?

Won't the lights interfere with a trolley hoist?

Cool! Looks like a garage from Tron.

Aaaand now I'm finding lots of uses for those LED strips around my house.

Woah, that's trippy. Looks kinda cool, and probably really good at reducing shadows. Pics always make it a little hard to tell, but it looks like a good improvement from where you started.

Hmm.....

May have to try this

That is one strobe controller away from being the best garage lighting I've ever seen- maybe hook it up with a microphone or something so that when you clank something with a hammer you feel like Thor!

Ian F wrote: Very cool. How is the glare? Won't the lights interfere with a trolley hoist?

Glare, I'd say is not bad. I didn't do much after setting it up last night because I needed sleep. I'm going to clean up and work on getting the sound system live tonight. So far I like it though.

No current plans for a trolley hoist, but I'm sure I could make adjustments.

gearheadE30 wrote: Woah, that's trippy. Looks kinda cool, and probably really good at reducing shadows. Pics always make it a little hard to tell, but it looks like a good improvement from where you started.

Shadow reductions seems pretty good! Since the strips don't reach all the way to the garage doors that end is slightly dimmer, but not really shadowy.

The lighting effect form these is so much different than from a light bulb, I think I like it, but it will take some getting used to.

STM317 wrote: Cool! Looks like a garage from Tron. Aaaand now I'm finding lots of uses for those LED strips around my house.

LED strip all the things!

One of my next projects is a custom red LED strip brake/turn light for the back of my truck.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ wrote: That is one strobe controller away from being the best garage lighting I've ever seen- maybe hook it up with a microphone or something so that when you clank something with a hammer you feel like Thor!

Well, next up is the sound system. Then I could keep these, and put us a second strip along each beam that has RGB LEDs and hook it up to a DMX controller... Haha. I am a bit of a lighting nerd...

You all would have loved the custom lights I did on my old Dodge Dakota. Unfortunately I didn't take enough pictures to do a write-up, and it is sold now, but it was so nice. I probably has 20 hours in that project. All new wiring, completely reversible, and 100% legal.

I would have speculated those don't put out the advertised lumens, too. I have use them a couple times and I though the same thing. But I love the 'Tron' vibe!

RossD wrote: I would have speculated those don't put out the advertised lumens, too. I have use them a couple times and I though the same thing. But I love the 'Tron' vibe!

I've thought the same thing.

My garage is 'only' 46500 lumens, but appears brighter.

I'm going to switch from T8 to LED tubes soon as the E36 M3ty ballasts keep blowing T8 bulbs. This has me a little concerned about the drop in lumens.

ProDarwin wrote:

RossD wrote: I would have speculated those don't put out the advertised lumens, too. I have use them a couple times and I though the same thing. But I love the 'Tron' vibe!

I've thought the same thing. My garage is 'only' 46500 lumens, but appears brighter. I'm going to switch from T8 to LED tubes soon as the E36 M3ty ballasts keep blowing T8 bulbs. This has me a little concerned about the drop in lumens.

I wouldn't be too worried about losing lumens with LEDs. They are certainly more reliable, and there are a bunch of alternative led suggestions in this thread.

Can you elaborate on how you connected the strands?

STM317 wrote: Can you elaborate on how you connected the strands?

As stated in the original post, I added an extension wire of speaker wire to the end of each strand to give it enough length to get to the power supply. Once they were all at the power supply I put all the positives together with a 12v positive (yellow) from the power supply and all the grounds together with a ground from the power supply. At the moment they are twisted and wire nutted, but later tonight I will be properly soldering them and tucking the wires.

In reply to AWSX1686:

Cool. I guess I got carried away in the pics and overlooked that part. Thanks!

AWS, could you add a link to the lights you used? I'd like to upgrade my 24 X 42 garage, but soooo many choices out there.

Thanks, Dan

In reply to 914Driver:

He did.

They need to rgb and you news to throw a rave.

ProDarwin wrote: This has me a little concerned about the drop in lumens.

I took down some T8 and T12 fixtures and put in the Costco LED shop lights and they're every bit as bright as the T8 fixtures they replaced. They seem brighter, actually, since they're instantly 100% brightness.

On the LED strips: that looks cool! But it doesn't seem as bright as the indicated lumens would imply and doesn't look quite bright enough to me in the photos. But photos are hard to judge by. I'd have to see it in person to know for sure.

Oh... just noticed you used a PC power supply. Good idea. Didn't even dawn on me they output 12V. Unfortunately, I tossed my old PC ages ago, but I'm pinging a computer buddy now to see he if has any extras in his stash of stuff.

The way the light would be even throughout the space means it doesn't need to be quite a bright. Plus, camera phones (at least mine) will automatically adjust for brightness and can make things dimmer than they actually are.

that looks good. Really good. I bought a strip of these a few months ago for the challenge car and haven't installed them yet. It might go in the garage above the work bench instead.

Great thought with the pc power supply too, I never considered that option.

RevRico wrote: Great thought with the pc power supply too, I never considered that option.

Thanks, they work great to power car amplifiers for subs too. At one point I had 2 10" subs at my desk.... Shook the whole second floor. Haha!

Ian F wrote: Oh... just noticed you used a PC power supply. Good idea. Didn't even dawn on me they output 12V. Unfortunately, I tossed my old PC ages ago, but I'm pinging a computer buddy now to see he if has any extras in his stash of stuff. The way the light would be even throughout the space means it doesn't need to be quite a bright. Plus, camera phones (at least mine) will automatically adjust for brightness and can make things dimmer than they actually are.

The odds are pretty goo that he'll have one. I get old computers in all the time being an IT guy, I usually strip the power supply, RAM, Hard Drive, and fans then take them and get a few pennies from recycling.

Yeah, pictures to make it hard to say for sure, and like I said I wasn't out there for long after they were running. So we'll see once I start working in it. They are definitely great if you have limited space. I will be putting a strip along my front porch to illuminate the stairs soon.