Rewiring a large house as part of a redevelopment project

Has the OP changed their name?

Sorry for the confusion - I occasionally do this. Husband and I share the same computer and I forget to logout so it posts under his handle unless I reply from my phone.

Living apart can't help....

It's a fine line crossing from junction 4 at Edgware in London where we used to live to Junction 5 at Watford in Herts.

Oh well, at least we're still connected by our old uni login IDs

ey143 said:

I mention spot lights as most houses I have seen (new builds or remodeled ones) tend to have them.

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Yeah, you see lots of them - because they are the current fad. Impractical for their primary function, but trendy to have.

The problem is that you cut big holes in the ceiling, then fit a luminaire which is purposely designed to light up the floor underneath and not the rest of the room. Now if you spend your life working on the floor then that might be a good thing, but personally I don't. I suppose if you paint the floor white so it reflects the light up then it would help - but not for seeing the top of anything.
That is why you seldom see a single downlighter - you need a whole array of them because their coverage is so crap.

For function, it's hard to beat a ceiling mounted pendant light - or more than one in a larger room. Unless you screw it up with a stupid choice of shade, they provide relatively even illumination that reflects off the walls and ceilings - so you can have the light on, and even if you are in your own shadow, it'll probably provide useful light.
Contrast with a "good" downlighter where if you stand in the wrong place, your <whatever> is in darkness and the harsh light causes reflections in your glasses.

Builder told me that keeping them 1m apart is a good starting guide.

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Yes, that tends to be the guidance - and gives you a clue as to how rubbish they are. It doesn't take long before you need a lot of lights - a friend of mine has 10 in his kitchen and 15 in the living room, neither are particularly huge rooms. Of course, in the kitchen he also has under cupboard lights to make the worktops usable because the downlighters are useless for that.
Not long ago each fitting would have had a 50W halogen bulb in - so that's 1/2 a kilowatt in the kitchen, and 3/4 kilowatt in the living room, to provide lighting that's arguably less effective than a single 100W bulb in a pendant. In his case, they are 7W LED fittings.

SimonH2 said:

Builder told me that keeping them 1m apart is a good starting guide.

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Yes, that tends to be the guidance - and gives you a clue as to how rubbish they are.

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... and/or a clue to the fact that most people seem to think that all downlights are still small-beam-angle 'spotlights'. A single 60° downlight will usually illuminate an area 1.75m-2m in diameter at worktop/table level, and something approaching 3m in diameter at floor level, albeit illumination is not necessary evenly distributed over the whole area. 120° LEDs are far from difficult to come by these days, and they put the figures up to about 5m diameter at worktop level and approaching 9m diameter at floor level. I'm not suggesting that one would try to illuminate a room with one of them, but one certainly should not need umpteen. The greatest potential problem is probably the lack of direct illumination of the ceiling - which, as you say, pendants are so good at - but some people don't actually like highly illuminated ceilings.

I'm not a great fan of downlights myself, and have very few in my house, but I do think they get a lot of unnecessarily 'bad press', particularly given what technology is now available.

Kind Regards, John

Agreed. I have 120 degree spot lights in my parents house after replacing the 60degree ones and they made a world of difference in terms of lighting up the whole area.

ey143 said:

Agreed. I have 120 degree spot lights in my parents house after replacing the 60degree ones and they made a world of difference in terms of lighting up the whole area.

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Indeed - but you are tending to illustrate and perpetuate the misunderstandings by describing 60° lights, let alone 120° ones, as "spotlights" . A true "spotlight" typically has a beam angle of 25° or less.

Kind Regards, John

JohnW2 said:

The greatest potential problem is probably the lack of direct illumination of the ceiling - which, as you say, pendants are so good at - but some people don't actually like highly illuminated ceilings.

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I suppose a lot depends on the function of the room.
For a "working" room like a kitchen, it's by far the best way to get widespread, even, (relatively) shadow free illumination of a large area. For a lounge watching TV then it's a different matter - but then having a downlighter is equally (or IMO worse) as it's a bright "point source" in your peripheral vision.

Personally, my preference for somewhere like a kitchen would be a flouro tube (with electronic gear these days) of length appropriate to the size of the room - but I know a lot of people absolutely hate them.

JohnW2 said:

but you are tending to illustrate and perpetuate the misunderstandings by describing 60° lights, let alone 120° ones, as "spotlights" . A true "spotlight" typically has a beam angle of 25° or less.

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Yes, these wide angle lights are floodlights.
But their use then brings in another problem - while they illuminate a wider area, it also means a very bright point source that's in your peripheral vision a lot of the time.
And something I'd never considered before I was wearing glasses full time, such "harsh" light sources do tend to cause glare in a way that diffused sources don't. As you move around, at head height you are in and out of the lit zones, so further distraction.

I would never install a fluorescent on display in my own house (ok there's some in the loft but that doesn't count).

There is such a vast range of LED lighting options now that I don't really see the excuse to use flurrys.

My parents are having me make something like this for their kitchen, it has both the advantages of a pendant, and downlights. Will need to be done well to not look nasty though

Iggifer said:

I would never install a fluorescent on display in my own house (ok there's some in the loft but that doesn't count).

There is such a vast range of LED lighting options now that I don't really see the excuse to use flurrys.

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Yeah, I've got them in the loft - just plain cheap magnetic gear and exposed tubes, as you say, it's "utility" for that. I'll admit I'd probably look as some LED alternative these days - but I'd still be looking for something with a similar output to a flouro tube in terms of direction etc.

My parents are having me make something like this for their kitchen, it has both the advantages of a pendant, and downlights. Will need to be done well to not look nasty though

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Ooh, I like that - as you say, needs care to not look 'orrible. High ceiling needed as well I think for it to look right. It's given me ideas though - I think my missus might not like you now

Yea I'm planning on spreading it out a bit more, braided black flex (no point using anything else in a kitchen) and probably squirrel cage esque lamps.

They have a C shaped kitchen in an open plan kitchen/diner, so this way I can get light to all the places they need it (open sided worktop, above the sink etc) hopefully without any shadows.

These guys seem to do some nice stuff. I do hate how overpriced 'vintage/retro' looking stuff is because it's 'cool'

I was going to warn you of the eye- nay, pants-wateringly high price of those types of lamps.

Iggifer said:

I would never install a fluorescent on display in my own house

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Depends how you define "on display". If all you see is a circle of etched glass with a narrow white powder-coated ring around it, flush to the ceiling, is that "on display"?

I find you can always see the lamp with fluorescents, even with etched glass, but LED equivalents of 'nice' fluorescent 2D type fittings are waaaaay better