I have a room in our office that has a high ceiling (28' floor to underside of ceiling) and it has industrial HID lighting that is bright but takes a long time to turn on. It is gives out a glaring white light.
We want to give the room a more cozy feeling and we don't need it that bright. Does anyone know of any Incandescent can lighting that we can hang from the ceiling? We prefer it takes bigger wattage bulbs, such as the PAR38 and etc blubs).
Some pics of our room can be found at
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and image2.jpg. We are looking for the can lighting in
If you want a cozy feeling, I would suggest maybe some wall wash lamps from the ceiling or maybe from the floor and then local task lighting. Leave the existing lighting for cleaning days when you want some bright lights.
In any case remember you are going to need two to five times the total wattage of incandescent lights to equal the light output of what you now have.
Save some energy and get a T-5 or T-8 fluorescent with a warm colored light. They make both 4 and 6 tube models with 32 watt bulbs that are incredibly bright compared to 1000 watt HID lights..
By the way, I forgot to mention that the room is used for meetings and gatherings. It is not a general office room. It should be bright enough for someone to read text off a page as they attend a gathering, but he/she is not expected to work all day in such a low light environment...
In your case, incandescent or halogen lighting would be a bad fit given its relatively poor efficiency (measured in lumens per watt) and the height of your ceiling -- remember, light output falls at the square of the distance, so a lamp suspended at 28 ft. is only one quarter as bright as one at 14 ft. and one-sixteenth as bright as one at 7 ft.
Watt for watt, metal halide lighting is four to five times more energy efficient than halogen and rated life, in most cases, is five to ten times longer. Thus, one of the questions you must ask yourself is how do I change these lamps when they burn out? Do you have convenient access to a man lift and are there any obstructions at floor level that would make it difficult to manevour it about? Also, assuming you're located in North America, do you have a 120-volt power supply to serve these lamps? Most HID fixtures operate at 277-volts in the U.S. and 347-volts in Canada, so you may not be able to utilize your existing wiring and switching, and pulling new wiring can be prohibitively expensive.
Personally, I would recommend you go with a high bay T8 or T5 fixture. You can easily swap these one for one with your existing HIDs (just make sure the ballasts are compatible with your supply voltage). The big advantage is that they're even more energy efficient than your current system and typically draw less power, with a corresponding reduction in your air conditioning load. In addition, they can be switched on and off at will and even hooked up to automatic dimming controls and occupancy sensors. The light quality would be notably better (e.g., a CRI of 86 versus 65 or 70 for traditional metal halide); there would be better light distribution and far less glare; no flicker and, most significantly, no annoying ballast hum. As an added bonus, lamp life can be as long as 40,000 hours versus 15,000 to
20,000 for HID, and lumen maintenance would be vastly superior (at end of life, the amount of light produced by a HID lamp is generally half that of its initial rating; by comparison, a good quality T8 can still produce 97% of its original output). Plus, you have a wide range of colour temperatures from which to choose, from 2,700K at the low end (incandescent like), to 3,000K (similar to halogen), 3,500K (neutral to slightly warm), 4,100 (cool white), 5,000K (daylight) and even
6,500K and 8,000K. Generally speaking, I find 5,000K a good choice in commercial environments, especially if you're located in a cooling dominate climate.
The single most effective thing you can do is to paint your ceiling a moderately light color. The harsh contrast between the lights, skylights, lighter floor area and the black ceiling is half the mood.
I work in theatrical settings and the second picture is obviously using theatrical lighting. In these settings the incandescent is used for only a few hours a day and is critical to the function of the space. Is this your case??
If not, then warmer color light can be gotten from fluorescents, without the large energy costs. There may also be some retrofit soulutions for your existing lamps.
If you still want the incandescent, such fixtures are easily available by order. Typically they use 250-500W halogen lamps and come in various beam angles. You will need someone to calculate how many of exactly which fixtures. So a knowledgable saleman or certified consultant is HIGHLY recomended. If you let us know where you are we may be able to help you locate someone.
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