Craft room lighting project

[bfromcolo]

Thanks in advance for any help, and your patience if I cover a lot of old ground.

My wife wants me to update the lighting in her craft room. This is a 16x16 ft with about a 9 foot ceiling all purpose space, currently lit with a florescent ceiling fixture (4x40w) and she has at least 4 other task lights in there at her work stations. It does not get much natural light as the one window is under our back deck. Her request was to have really bright studio lights, "like the sun". Like I said she does crafts in there, sewing, painting, quilting, art stuff. Lighting that is really bright and shows natural colors is important.

I guess I am leaning towards a halogen track system, but thought I would seek input here. I have some experience with LED bike lights, so I know I can get the brightness but I fear this light would be too white to provide accurate color rendition.

Thanks again.

 

[bfromcolo]

No one has any thoughts huh? Oh well...

Researching this further I am thinking I might replace the insides of the existing T-12 4 tube fixture with a 6 T-8 tubes and electronic ballasts. Tubes with high CRI ratings are available so hopefully this will be a good upgrade in light, both total output and CRI.

 

[Ken_McE]

I am thinking I might replace the insides of the existing T-12 4 tube fixture with a 6 T-8 tubes and electronic ballasts. Tubes with high CRI ratings are available

I'd say your plan is sound.

 

[SafetyBob]

I put a number of t-8's in the garage with 6500K tubes. The difference you cannot even talk about because it transformed the garage from a difficult place to work unless it was daytime to you can do critical painting in the dead of night without fear. You might also consider undercounter too, if that is appropriate in the room.

Bob E.