• It's time to cast your vote in the January 2025 Turning Challenge. (click here for details)
  • Conversations are now Direct Messages (click here for details)
  • Congratulations to Alan Weinberg for "Elm Burl Bowl" being selected as Turning of the Week for January 27, 2025 (click here for details)
  • Welcome new registering member. Your username must be your real First and Last name (for example: John Doe). "Screen names" and "handles" are not allowed and your registration will be deleted if you don't use your real name. Also, do not use all caps nor all lower case.

Lighting for turning

John Torchick

John Torchick

Joined
Jan 24, 2010
Messages
3,058
Likes
905
Location
Cleveland, Tennessee
A while back, the wife and I were in Big Lots. We needed some light bulbs so we took a chance and bought a three pack, $6.00, of GE LED bright stik, soft white, bulbs. I put one in the lamp at the head of the bed as I read before I sleep. Talk about bright! Brightness on the package is 800 lumens; 60w replacement at 9w. We robbed the bulb for a photo session on something else. The 60 watt bulb we put in the lamp needed a match to see if it was lit. There was a big difference. Thought I would pass this along.
 
I have 2 four foot led fixtures in my basement shop. One above the bench and one above the lathe. Absolutely excellent lighting! I'm going to put up at least one more maybe 2 more of these down there. My whole house is getting switched over to led. They may cost more but they cost less to run and they seem to last forever.
 
For a few years I’ve used an 24” LED light bar on the front of my Saab
(Weekend trips to the cottage are on small dark roads with lots of deer. And occasionally it’s fun to show off your lighting power to the big, badass pickups who drive around with all their lights on.

So I thought why not try that on the lathe?

I got a 12” light bar and made a mount, added a 12 VDC transformer. All for about $75.
That’s 180w of CREE bulbs. And it stays cool.

It’s great! But very directional. So any I,perfections show up as shadows, which I find advantageous.

Do these work?
https://www.diyphotography.net/building-a-crazy-1000w-led-flashlight/
 
Last edited:
Pickups aren't the only inconsiderate people on the road around here. On the other hand, I followed a car at dusk that didn't have any lights as required by DMV law.
 
I switched over to the 100 watt LED equivalent Daylight bulbs from the big orange box store. They use only 13 watts and give off almost 1600 lumen of light. I have two over my lathe shining. I also have a 4 ft florescent work light over the lathe for general shop lighting. So far it's working well.

20181106_130938.jpg
 
I had a factory representative stop by my office last week and demonstrated a food grade LED system that comes in 4 foot sections that plug end to end and has a line voltage plug that powers the run of LED light modules. These were about the size of a T-8 lamp totally enclosed in a hose down rated polymer housing that can be hung with a wire or chain or surface mounted. It seemed to be a well built system as he bounced it off the floor a few times to demonstrate the integrity of the housing and lens.
 
I'm semi-retired and spend a lot of hours in my shop. I calculated electricity savings would pay for a retro-fit T8 led bulb in something less than 1-1/2 years. After that, with the number of T8's I have it will reduce my monthly bill by $15-$20. I'm buying the type of LED's that don't require a ballast so I eliminate another cost. I bought a case of 6,000K bulbs but the last batch was 5,000K. I like the 6,000K slightly better.

The light above my lathe is a 70 year old made in the USA articulated arm Dazer. It sports a one of those new 100 watt LED bulbs. I would not trade it for any of the new lathe lights. It has a huge range of movement, and since its completely overhead, there is no obtrusion on me while turning.

DSCF0557.JPG
 
Larry Copas said:
I'm semi-retired and spend a lot of hours in my shop. I calculated electricity savings would pay for a retro-fit T8 led bulb in something less than 1-1/2 years. After that, with the number of T8's I have it will reduce my monthly bill by $15-$20. I'm buying the type of LED's that don't require a ballast so I eliminate another cost. I bought a case of 6,000K bulbs but the last batch was 5,000K. I like the 6,000K slightly better.

The light above my lathe is a 70 year old made in the USA articulated arm Dazer. It sports a one of those new 100 watt LED bulbs. I would not trade it for any of the new lathe lights. It has a huge range of movement, and since its completely overhead, there is no obtrusion on me while turning.

View attachment 27059
Click to expand...
Great light!
 
If you guys are looking for light, check these out.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00NXBMDEY/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I've replaced all of my fluorescent lights with these including two over my lathe. The difference is truly amazing.

As Larry said you the ballast from your existing lights and retro fit these in.

Another plus is they are a plastic tube. No possibility of breaking glass bulbs.

They're a little pricey, but I doubt you will ever need to replace the..

Dick Hob
 
For those buying budget LED shop lights, be aware that some are over 4000 lumens but many are just 3600 lumens. I can see the difference between two different ones that I purchased (and which have the same color temperature of light). My old eyes also prefer the bluer, 5000K temperature rather than the 'warm white' or midrange temperature colors (2500K to 4000K), probably because of increased contrast.
 
dickhob said:
If you guys are looking for light, check these out.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00NXBMDEY/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I've replaced all of my fluorescent lights with these including two over my lathe. The difference is truly amazing.

As Larry said you the ballast from your existing lights and retro fit these in.

Another plus is they are a plastic tube. No possibility of breaking glass bulbs.

They're a little pricey, but I doubt you will ever need to replace the..

Dick Hob
Click to expand...

Hi Dick, did these lights come with the non-shunted tombstone or did you have to purchase them separately?
 
I bought a 4 inch diameter magnet at Harbor freight for $4 and glued it to the bottom of a $5.99 40 Lumen LED goose neck desk lamp from Walmart. Instant magnetic base light for $10 I also use the magnets to hold the lathe wrenches to the head stock. I use the magnetic parts cups to hold small parts, like the inserts for the live center.
 
I have this KJR Aurora LED light from Ken Rizza- Woodturners Wonders and it's the best light I've used.
kjr_aur_led_lat_lam_2015_flip.jpg
Strong magnetic base, very strong gooseneck that stays where you put it, and a lamp life of over 30 years turning 8 hours a day.
 
Larry Copas said:
I'm semi-retired and spend a lot of hours in my shop. I calculated electricity savings would pay for a retro-fit T8 led bulb in something less than 1-1/2 years. After that, with the number of T8's I have it will reduce my monthly bill by $15-$20. I'm buying the type of LED's that don't require a ballast so I eliminate another cost. I bought a case of 6,000K bulbs but the last batch was 5,000K. I like the 6,000K slightly better.

The light above my lathe is a 70 year old made in the USA articulated arm Dazer. It sports a one of those new 100 watt LED bulbs. I would not trade it for any of the new lathe lights. It has a huge range of movement, and since its completely overhead, there is no obtrusion on me while turning.

View attachment 27059
Click to expand...
You can buy more turning stuff with the money you save! Thanks for the post and I like the mounting on the DC piping.
 
Lots about lighting here. Just think, if it wasn't for Thomas Edison, we would be watching TV by candlelight.
 
The Illuminating Engineering Society www.ies.org has a large amount of resources available for designing lighting systems. Shop lighting can be a challenge and many times mistakes are made without anyone realizing the problems they can create. Task lighting at each machine is usually required when precision work is preformed on a daily basis or when the age of the operator increases in age. The biggest mistake made in shop lighting is the difference in illumination levels at the task location and general illumination in the shop area. If you exceed a 20% differential in illumination you will incur eyestrain from yours eyes needing to refocus when looking at the task and then looking away from the task. After a number of hours in this environment many people will incur headaches and eyestrain from the constant change in illumination levels. For the average woodturner this would not be an issue, but for the serious woodturner that spends hours each day at the lathe this can be an issue.
 
Mike, I sold lighting for a while and understand what you are saying here. Thanks for the information. My thing is the lighting makes my knee hurt.;)
 
The biggest problem that I see in "lighting" these days is the ROI on the system precedes all other aspects of the project. It usually falls back to the lowest common denominator for the design, the fewest number of luminaires putting out the largest amount of illumination. This usually provides bright spots and dark spots throughout the workspace. A quality lighting system should provide an evenly balanced light levels throughout the work space with maybe a 5% to 10% differential in the illumination levels. Many of the cheaper LED's on the market today provide no diffuser or lens over the LED source which basically punches light down under the luminaire with little light spread in the work space. Older luminaire types would use diffusers, lenses and reflectors to spread the light coming out of each luminaire. The trend these days is to eliminate the cost of these items and lower the quality of the luminaire to provide a competitive product that provides a large amount of lower quality light. Indirect lighting or diffused lighting is easier on the eyes when you spend hours each day working under artificial lighting.
 
Having a magnetic light on a wood shelf requires a bit engineering and I felt I needed a new second light on the lathe and the old one is low power led. I found a sewing machine light on ebay for about $20 and you can supply whatever LED you want. It does not have a plug to facilitate the mount which was a simple cantilever for me. It does have a switch mounted on the top . Flex is rather stiff and needs a little breaking in.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Sewing-Mac...rentrq:158fb6f41670ab1cdd3e6e14fffa8509|iid:1
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top