The time is drawing nearer to intall lighting for my layout. However being a maintnence man for a large truckstop ,you would think it would be easier to plan. Im surrounded by at least 20 different styles of lighting and it is truly adding to my confusion.
Room Size 11 by 13
Track Plan refer to Western route of the Boston&Maine MR track plan data base
modification little bit in industry area to more reflect 1995
Location Central Pa Mountains Buffalo Line (Conrail)
Thoughts photo quality lighting? valance? flouresents prefferd (sp) placement? wattage? type of bulb? scenery fading from UV?
Any thoughts on lighting the room/layout would truly be appreciated
I have a small bedroom sized layout and am happy with my 7 small flourescent fixtures. I bought the small fixtures like the kind that mount under kitchen cabinets so I could arrange them along my mainline. I also installed a small valence to conceal them from a distance. If you go with flourescent be sure and buy lights with “electronic” ballasts, they cost a little more than regular flourescents but have no hum or flicker to them.
you know IM at same spot ,was going to use flourescent then thought about dimming and am now looking at track lighting ,cheap kits @ lowes &HD look nice …so its down to hot but able to dimm or cool ,low power consumtion no dimm , Im leaning towards track light …JW
I have an 11’ x 9’ room and use five 48" twin fluorescent fixtures to light the layout. However, I use full spectrum (greater than 5K) bulbs in them. They cost a little more (about $5.00 a twin pack). This makes it as if its almost in day light. Also they don’t fad the colors of the layout like regular bulbs do. One other plus is my photos don’t come out yellow. I really like em.ratled
Actually, there are two issues you need to consider:
Lighting the layout room
Lighting the layout
Lighting the layout room is a different bird than lighting the layout. The room needs an amount of lighting that makes you feel comfortable and safe being in the room and working on your layout.
Layout lighting requires careful planning with regard to shadowing and amount of light. In no case can you achieve any good layout light with a single source at the ceiling. If your layout is of the along-the-wall- type, build a valance to disguise the lighting fixtures.
Another possibility is using rope lights with a small valance. They are able to bend and curve as needed to concentrate more light in a specific area. Also they can be on a dimmer. Jeff
I have looked at the flexable halogen lighting kit at HD. I found I can replace the halogen bulbs with flourscent bulbs. This should cut down on the power used and also cut down on the heat that the halogen bulbs produce.
I used recessed cans with 75W daylight flourescent bulbs. The light is much brighter without the yellow that you normally get with normal can lighting. For home resale purposes I went with the recessed lighting over flourescent light boxes. The flourescent take a little longer to warm up to get to full brightness and it took me a little while to get use to them, but now I’m happy with them.
The best thing to do is use a mixture of both fluorescent lighting and incandescent. A lot of guys light the layout as mentioned by another poster by the use of track lighting. I picked up a whole bunch of it for next to nothing from my old company and purchased the rest from Lowes for a very good discount. I didn’t care what the lights themselves looked like as long as they worked. One thing I would advise though is if you are going to use track lighting try using low wattage bulbs. Those things can get unbelievably hot, so hot they actually can raise the tempter of the room. I was just reading an article about that sort of problem and the author replaced the bulbs with those curly fluorescent ones. Almost the same brightness and a lot less heat and energy use. Also if you have the room for it consider using a valance to hide/direct the lighting on to the layout. I regret not doing that on the main section of the new layout but will install them on the tow outer sections. I helped a friend install his and I could not believe the difference it makes.
Unfortunately most of us think about lighting after the fact, when it should be one of the first things you do but we live and learn I guess.
