blasterman
Flashlight Enthusiast
- Joined
- Jul 17, 2008
- Messages
- 1,802
I help run a busy restaurant/sports bar/night club, and we've started a project to retrofit our lighting. Up to now our maintenance staff have been the, uh, lighting engineers, which has resulted in a mish-mosh of cheap incandescent and nasty industrial fluorescent. My goal has been to restore some 'ambience' and deliver more direct lighting to dinner tables, bar tops and booths at minimal cost. However, we have tall ceilings and can't can't use drop lighting of any kind due to obstructing our large projection screens.
At first I decided to use 35watt, 10degree Halogen/Solux bulbs track mounted close to the ceiling in the large dining area because they deliver the desired CRI, color temp and directionality without too much excessive 'orange'. However, after experimenting with various LEDs in the 1-3 watt range I *think* I might be able to do this with LEDs, but lack the depth with electronics to make a firm conclusion and need some advice.
I tested some various chinese 3watt LEDs, and even though they delivered the required light out-put, their CRI sucked in both 'neutral white; and 'warm white' varities. I was about to give up when I tried a warm-white K2, and found a CRI and out-put level just good enough to possibly do this. However, I need to know if I can translate my tests into a real world light fixture, or, if there are some other 3watt LEDs in warm-white (I'd prefer to avoid RGB mixing to reach a good CRI) I should be looking at. Cree is very popular on this forum, but again, I need a very good warm-white CRI that is at least equal to the K2. One option I've considered to meet my color requirements in perhaps mix a neutral white with an amber on each spot, but I'll explore that option only if standard warm-white LEDs can't cut it.
My test was crude, but basically I powered a K2 emitter with three AAA generic alkaline batteries in series, hooked the rig to the ceiling, and used an L2 optic 10degree diffuser. This resulted in a light cone that was on the lower end of the lumens we desired, but still acceptable. What I would need to make this project work is to power 6-8 LEDs per fixture at no less than the lumens I was kicking from the K2 test. What would I need to drive this (specs) and should I be looking at other options?
At first I decided to use 35watt, 10degree Halogen/Solux bulbs track mounted close to the ceiling in the large dining area because they deliver the desired CRI, color temp and directionality without too much excessive 'orange'. However, after experimenting with various LEDs in the 1-3 watt range I *think* I might be able to do this with LEDs, but lack the depth with electronics to make a firm conclusion and need some advice.
I tested some various chinese 3watt LEDs, and even though they delivered the required light out-put, their CRI sucked in both 'neutral white; and 'warm white' varities. I was about to give up when I tried a warm-white K2, and found a CRI and out-put level just good enough to possibly do this. However, I need to know if I can translate my tests into a real world light fixture, or, if there are some other 3watt LEDs in warm-white (I'd prefer to avoid RGB mixing to reach a good CRI) I should be looking at. Cree is very popular on this forum, but again, I need a very good warm-white CRI that is at least equal to the K2. One option I've considered to meet my color requirements in perhaps mix a neutral white with an amber on each spot, but I'll explore that option only if standard warm-white LEDs can't cut it.
My test was crude, but basically I powered a K2 emitter with three AAA generic alkaline batteries in series, hooked the rig to the ceiling, and used an L2 optic 10degree diffuser. This resulted in a light cone that was on the lower end of the lumens we desired, but still acceptable. What I would need to make this project work is to power 6-8 LEDs per fixture at no less than the lumens I was kicking from the K2 test. What would I need to drive this (specs) and should I be looking at other options?
