After reading Joe Fugate’s excellent clinic about scenery I understand that the right type of ligths in the layout room is VERY important.
My room is 4 x 4 m. And the only light I have now is a ugly 40 W in the middle of the room, and I can’t see anything at all. It’s really terrible. [banghead]
What is the best thing I can do to get really good lights for my layout? I want to have lights that remind me of Bond in Colorado a sunny day like this picture.
This is a completely new area for me so I need all help I can get.
Well the fact you have an outlet in the middle of the ceiling is an imprtant step. Next you should trace it back to the breaker box and determine what amperage it will handle. That will be your limit for lights. With a 9’ x9’ room I think most of us would get a couple of Flourescent lights and mount them on the ceiling using the light bulb recpetacle to plug them in. they make a screw in device that changes a bulb socket to a plug outlet. Then you could use a cube tap to plug in the lights. You could also substitute track flood lighting around the room using the bulb socket for power. If you really want to replicate sunlight you will need to talk with a lighting store and will probably wind up with Halogen lights. Don’t overlook the heat factor as incadescent bulbs can create a lot of heat. Someone will probably say that what I have recomended regarding plugging in the lights to the bulb socket is a potential fire hazzard but that is why you keep the total amperage under the breaker amperage and a worst case scenario to me is one of the plugs falls out due to gravity and you need to plug it back in. Laying the cords on the floor is a different story.
How far is the layout from the ceiling? I’m a big fan of low wattage incandescents for layout lighting (15W and 25W), but they only work well if you can get the lights within 18" or so of the layout.
The layout room is around 94" from the floor to the ceeling (240 cm). And my layout is between 62" and 43" from the ceeling. The lowest yard is 62" from the ceeling and the highest point where I’m planning to have a mine is 43" from the ceeling.
Funny you should ask this just now… I’ve just come back from 3 hours sorting out my local taxes. (This is “on topic” honest)! I have damaged eyes so that I can’t stand lots of fluorescent tubes. They turned some off so that I could see… toward the end some of the staff were commenting that they felt good… not the usual end-of-the-day headache.
So the lighting you put up with at work has a direct effect on your Railroad hobby… and your overall health. Too much light… especially too much light of the dwrong kind is bad for your health in general and your eys in particular.
Simple solution… and I’ve seen this work in practice… get tubes changed to “daylight white” and add at least one tungsten halogen filament (ordinary light bulb) per room… the different lamp breaks up the frequency of the tube light… light/seeing/colour all depend on the frequency at which particles move. (Same as sound to your ears but to your eyes).
Now that affects two other things… your perception of colour and what happens with “colour” under different light conditions.
The simplest example that is at your fingertips is to print off a hard copy of the picture of Bond, Colorado and hold it next to the picture on your screen… you will have completely different effects.
Solution… spend loads of $$$$$ getting professional expertise or experiment on what works out for you. Your basement / trainroom will almost certainly be different from everyone elses… just how long since you painted the ceiling last will change things… and you will not have noticed… not even if you are a smoker and the ceiling is stained.
FIRST thing to do if you are working on your lights/wiring… do it with the fuse out/breaker tripped out (removed if possible)… AND put a label on the box telling people not to turn it back on (it hurts)!
As ndbprr says ALWAYS keep your loading below the rating of the fuse/breaker.
I am afraid to get to the intensity of lighing in your picture you will need a lot of light bulbs, a lot of watts, and a great deal of heat (not unlike the desert area of the picture). Flourecent tubes in the right “color temperature” are the most efficient light source because the light eminates from the length of the tube and will give you more lumens (light) per watt of electricity. The problems with this light source is that it cannot usually be dimmed and brightened for dawn, dusk simulation. Nightis not a problem, after all off is off!
Incandescent lights can be used to dim to dusk and night. They are however each a single point source and produce significantly more heat than flourescents to deliver the same amount of light ( which could be a good thing in Sweden durning the winter). There are a number of “reflector type” lamps that can be positioned and angled to direct the maximum light on to your layout or a scene on the layout. A good reflective overhead will also help put the light produced where you want it.
I have used flourescents mounted on the ceiling for present over my layout, but I think that I may follow Joe’s lead with the incandescents mounted in the facia area right over the layout with a dimmer device to bring dawn to day to dusk. This will be wired into its own circuit as I don’t believe in the screw in plug convertors which may not even be available in Sweden.
HTH
Will
Electro,
Joe probably has the ideal method of lighting using a valance and ordinary incandesent light bulbs. This method provides a good light coverage and helps to eliminate many shadow problems.
However, if you do not want to put this much work into it, I would recommend track lighting that you can buy at a building materials supply store. It is not all that expensive (in the States) and is very easy and fast to install. The main advantage to track lighting is you can move your lights for the best effects and as your layout changes.
You can buy a fixture for track lighting that mounts on your existing light’s wiring box. Then all you have to do is mount your lighting track using screws into the ceiling joists. Make sure you buy flood and not spot bulbs and mount the track out a bit from your layout instead of directly on top of the layout to give a good flood of the area
Although I have both florescent and track lighting, I only use the florescent as extra work light (other than painting). I prefer the more natural light of the standard incandescent or halogen bulbs. Yes, halogen bulbs are hot but you will get much more light (lumens) from a 75 watt halogen than a 75 watt standard incandescent.
I’d mix the types of lights. The idea of mixing high temperature (color) flourescents with a couple of incansescents is good, as the flourescents will flicker at the line frequency, but the incandescents won’t.
Metal halide lamps give very good color rendition, but they’re physically big and pricey. The low voltage halogens are good, as they too have pretty good color and won’t drive you out of the room from heat, plus they’re small.
I am installing the new compact fluorescent bulbs, 11w, every 2 feet along the layout. The color is very close to incandesent (warm white) and at a local “Dollar Store” I can get the bulbs for $1 each. These are rated at 15,000 hours life! I had two double tube shop lights in the space for over twenty years. That gave me 160w of lighting that was terrible in that space. They were replaced with 17 11w compacts that give excellent color rendering at a total of 187w. The other advantage is that the old loights were on any time I was in the basement. Now the layout lights are only on when I am directly working on the layout or running trains. Much less time. There is one other flourescent fixture over my work bench. I just changed the bulbs to 4100K warm white. What a difference in color! I am ordering UV sleeves for all the old flourescent tubes that I will continue to use.
I am about half way through the project now and will post some photos later. The only problem with flourescent bulbs is that they do give off some UV radiation which will in time cause color fading. The newer compact type has also reduced the UV output so that I am not too worried about that. Mine are not the dimmable type, and if you go with dimmable flourescents be aware that they require a different type of dimmer than can be used with incandesents.
The cheapest and most flexible approach is to install standard porcelain sockets and then pick the bulb of choice. Screw-in florescent bulbs (non-dimmable) are both economical and run very cool. The dimmable florescents are 5 times the cost of regular incandescents, but they run very cool, are dimmable, and last many times the standard life of an incandescent bulb!
Going with track lights or tube florescents will cost you at least twice as much as installing screw-in sockets.
As for loading on your lighting circuit, you are NOT allowed by code in most States, to calculate your fixtures for full loading. What this means is, a 15amp circuit, using #14 gauge wire, fused/breakered with a 15 amp fuse/breaker, can handle 120V X 15A = 1800 watts, however, you must de-rate by 20%, which means that you figure your max loading at 1440 watts. This is done on all circuits as a safety margin. So add up all the wattages that you will have for lighting, and if it is greater than 1440 watts, add a second lighting circuit.
Yes, and yes, EL. There are cheaper flourescent fixtures with no big plastic diffuser (lense) over the whole thing like in your picture; just two long tubes in an open box, of sorts.
I am afraid that I have to agree with you and say that Joe’s earnest advice will not work with your room layout. Two flourescent fixtures, about 80-100 cm apart, centre fixture to centre fixture, will be about right. If you were to have a valance, then Joe’s method makes a great deal of sense…what IS it about him an light bulbs, anyway? [:D]
Yes, as Selector has already said.
What I like about these is the flexibility of being able to direct your light anywhere you want it. You can add as many lights to a light track as you need providing you stay within range of your wiring specs. Remember, all you have to do is buy a track light accessory that replaces your light fixture. You just remove the light fixture and wire it in its place. The track slips in and locks into the new fixture. You can add more tracks as needed by just inserting into the ends of the existing ones.
I guarantee that you will like incandescent lighting much more than florescent as far as the looks of your layout goes. Your colors will be much more vivid and life- like than any kind of florescent. I started out with florescent and spent a lot of money trying different types of bulbs, but wasn’t happy with any of it. Finally, I put up the track lighting with halogens and I am very pleased with the difference.
