I'm about to replace the lighting in my kitchen. Just took out a set of 10 down-lights and want to replace them with 3-5 pendants. The ceiling is down, so new fittings can go anywhere. Suppose someone presented you with this situation (a blank room, L-shaped, 5x5m in size with a 2x2 corner nibbled out, benches round edges and middle) and said "install some lights for me in good locations". How would you decide where to put them? I'm more interested to hear about the processes and criteria people would use than suggestions about my specific case. (Assume I haven't got a zillion quid to pay for an architect and CAD-based 3-D simulations!)
Well WATT a splendid question me ol china. You use a FILAMENT of the imagination to design the lights. DISCHARGE your thoughts on to paper first then draw the layout. LOW ENERGY means you need to eat or you wont think straight. LOW PRESSURE to get the design done at a leisurly pace, HIGH PRESSURE if you need to move quickly. SWITCH to halogen in RECESSED periods ie when the ECONOMY is low. Are you a pole vaulter? No, I am a German....but how did you know my name. RSS
there are two considerations .general lighting and task lighting general is just that general purpose usually overhead ie an array of spots or a central pendant task lighting is where for example in a kitchen you would light worktops etc or in a room where a reading light would be needed or a mirror light in a bathroom. What you are doing is general lighting I would use a pendant centralish one a third of the way there and the other round the corner generally you space multiple lighting equal distances apart the ones at each end half that space from the end you also keep them in line and looking neat rather than being strict about dimensions ie if a room/corridor is odd shaped lights look better in straight line than following walls etc. where you get into this sort of thing is where you are using multiple fittings typicaly nowadays LV downlighters(or maybe mains) . With pendants you just bang one in the middle of the room. they are old fashioned and unchanged for years,inefficient etc but the lamps are cheap and your missus could change one.
With pendants you just bang one in the middle of the room. they are old fashioned and unchanged for years,inefficient etc but the lamps are cheap and your missus could change one. I'd disagree about pendants being inefficient mate, You get a wider spread of light - important for 'General Lighting' and you can always use energy-efficient lamps. With halogeon downlighters the light-spread is poor since it is narrowly focussed, they run very hot, and you have to have between twice and three times as many to get a similar level of light throughout the room.
and then once lighting is acheived, mesure light levels at light point, then directly below (point a) and then so far along (point b), to ensure lighting is adequate, or don't bother because its a little silly
I'd use Tommas Edisons original cotton filament bulbs which are kept on 24 hours a day in his old house & have never burnt out. They have been going almost 80 years non stop. Talk about built in obsolencence in modern bulbs.
Agree totally with TT's comments. I am amazed just how many 'down lighters' I install to replace one solitary 60 watt BC. Last week I installed six 50 watt GU10 to replace one 60w BC - I was called back in ".. a bit disapointed.." says the punter "... can you put the centre light back in (the 60w BC) please?" After installation to room WAS brighter as TT says it's the angle of dangle that matters. If I had any principles at all (i.e. not need the income) I would, refuse to fit halogens. With careful planning and use of good old 60w BC's/ES you can achieve far better results for a fraction of the power consumption.
Thanks for the comments - and for reinforcing my own prejudice against downlighters. The other bummer on them is that with so many (there's a dozen in the room) one or other of the bulbs is always blowing and we seem to spend more time changing them than using them.
And another thing about recessed down lighters is when ya eventually get fed up with them (as we all do in time) what then? If ya lucky they can stick up new plaster boarding and skim over the old (with al its large holes), if that's already been down once then down comes the ceiling, what 'joy' that is. And all in the name of some fashionable lighting system.
You could consider track or wire systems. Not everyone's cup of tea aesthetically, but do give you the flexibility to move lights around to experiment. I have an Ikea "washing line" of 5 x 20W halogens strung over the island in my kitchen and they provide very good task lighting. The transformer sits on top of one of the kitchen cabinets and the lights are attached to two parallel wires strung between opposite walls. Some of the systems include ceiling supports which allow the wires to turn a corner.