58w utility room tube

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Care to take some bets? Under cupboard florries in my kitchen get a lot of use and must be over 20 years old. ;-)

[Dave Liquorice]

Use as in hours continously on or use as in switched on for 5 minutes then off, maybe several times an hour for 10 hours/day. The tubes of this thread were being killed by many switching cycles and use of a switch starter.

[ARW]

Not so long ago I guided someone how to change a fluorescent tube to LED in a Mazda Netaline. The T8's would not strike which I suspect was due to a lack of mercury and no ballast.

I assume that you know the Netaline, if not enjoy this link.

Now that one really does need a 360 deg beam.

Cheers

[Dave Plowman (News)]

They get switched on an off a lot. And left on for long periods too. Possibly the most used lights in the house.

[Harry Bloomfield]

The original illumination for the room, was just a completely inadequate lamp-holder with a 100w bulb. I swapped that back in around

1985 for one one of those circular fluorescent fittings, which had been pulled out of the kitchen. When that failed after a year or two's additional use, I replaced it with the 58w 5' fitting, then later made it occupation switched.

The end wall of the utility, had what used to be a coal store at the other side of it, with its own separate door. As we had never used coal, it didn't really serve any useful purpose, too deep and narrow.

I decided the best use it could be put to was as an extra pantry. I cut a doorway (no door) through from the utility, removed and bricked up its existing door and added a series of shelves at both sides of what had been the two ends of the space. You walk in from the utility, then there are floor to ceiling shelves to both your left and right.

I then added 6x washing lines running the full length of the utility and extending into the new pantry, added a fan and a dehumidifier, to turn the whole into a drying room. The lines cross the 5' fitting at right angles. The utility has a sink, worktop, dishwasher and washer drier in it at one side, then an upright freezer at the other. It can become very congested with lots of washing being dried. I originally used ordinary washing line, run between a series of substantial hooks screwed into wall mounted blocks, which kept snapping, then shock cord. What ever I used it broke or stretched, the ceiling height in there is low, so they needed to be tight to prevent droop when loaded. A few years ago, I changed it for plastic covered stainless rope - no more breakages or drooping lines.

The drier is no longer used, the lines can take a much larger load, get things mostly dry over night and it is much cheaper to run the fan and dehumidifier than the drier. The fan and dehumidifier are essential to dry the washing and keep the humidity in the room down to low values. The dehumidifier's condensate is plumbed down into a drain.

Getting back to the lighting, it needed to be at right angles to the lines and offering a wide spread of light, to get through the drying clothes when the lines are loaded up.

[Mathew Newton]

It will likely not surprise you that I thought it was a car!

It's a ceiling-mounted lightsaber...

[tabbypurr]

An electromagnetic ballast cou;d be put in the ceiling void & the resistance dropper bridged.

NT

[dennis]

8<

You only need L&N to one end of a LED tube. The other end is usually just a short between the two pins. There are a few which have L&N at opposite ends but they are pretty rare AFAIK.

[ARW]

Not in this case - Concrete ceilings and conduit.

But yes it could be done most of the time.