LED ceiling lights - how many

[Sam Gangee]

For a kitchen measuring 4m x 4m in area, how many LED ceiling lights would you need?

For example, with ceiling and walls and kitchen units all white, would it be enough to fit, say 5 x 7 Watt LED lights (equivalent to 5 x 60 Watt halogen)?

This type of thing:
http://www.satcure.co.uk/accs/LED_lamps.htm

Also, would it be feasible to cut 5 holes and somehow thread the cable between them then connect to the existing wiring, which currently goes to a single 100W fluorescent tube?

And, finally, do these LED lamps get hot? Any safety considerations?

Oh, and is it OK to fit them myself or does "Part P" come into this?

Thanks for any advice.

 

[ericmark]

For a kitchen we often have more light than any other room of the house. Mine has 2 x 58W tubes which cast hardly any shadows. So since yours is smaller then likely with discharge lighting one tube would be enough. Comparing my living room with CFL and then LED then I would say around 20W of LED lighting would be required if that lighting is well used and even spread so likely two 7W pendent lights would be enough but four 5W would be better as the spread would be better.

However if you want to use spot lights then it's mainly down to where they point plus the spread of light. So 30 degrees at say 1 meter from lamp to counter then each lamp will cover around half a meter so you need a lamp every 1/2 meter. So 4 x 4 = 6 x 6 lamps (non at wall) so around 36 lamps if your not going to bounce the light off other surfaces. With so many likely 1W each would be enough. To reduce the number you need to reflect the light off light surfaces and we tend to have dark floors so to aim at walls you need pods to get the angle required. So likely the best is a mixture one central lamp maybe something like to 2D with plenty of spread and strip lights under counters to light areas the body would cast a shadow on.

This lamp

takes Edison screw bulbs so you could easy fit a 10W LED which would likely give you both the amount of light and the spread required.

My son has a very small kitchen and he fitted 5 x 7W 50mm GU10 LED's and when I went there to help with the central heating I had to use my bicycle touch to read the display on the boiler. His kitchen is around 1/4 of the size of my living room which has 10 x 2W LED's in two standard Chandeliers and is far brighter than my sons kitchen even though it is both bigger and has less power.

I do use GU10 lamps I have 4 in my bedroom. Two on the ceiling in pods aimed at dark corners and one each side of the bed to read with but the main light is a standard 11W CFL. The spots are good for what they are designed for lighting a book or a picture on the wall but useless for general lighting.

Some of the lights you link to can be aimed it would depend on if they will move enough to light the walls which one would hope are white.

As I said I have two GU10 lamps on the wall behind the bed. If I turn these lamps instead of aimed at bed aimed at the white ceiling it really lights the room.

Yes it comes under Part P but it's not notifiable so you can do it yourself without costing an arm and a leg to notify.

Likely beams will get in your way to wire using something like this

does allow you to cross beams and does allow the lights to be aimed at surfaces which will reflect the light.

I remember all those years ago when Habitat was around fitting lighting track which was so easy to fit and get many lamps aimed just where one wanted. Likely still sitting in my loft unused.

But Habitat in Chester is now being re-done clearly will not be Habitat once finished now it seems Ikea has taken over and no where near as good.

 

[Sam Gangee]

Thanks for the comprehensive reply!
The lamps have a 45 degree beam, not 30 degree, but I can extrapolate. Ceiling is about 8 foot so I'll have to do a bit of calculating.

A track system is worth considering, although I don't really like the appearance. I prefer the lights to be more discreet. If I have to run cable through beams I can probably bash a few holes, drill through, thread the cable then make good the ceiling. Hmm, but with my plastering it'll probably end up looking a bit lumpy!

Probably easier just to replace the entire plasterboard ceiling. It won't need many sheets.

 

[ban-all-sheds]

If you want to light up a room you might like to consider using lights which are designed to light up rooms, not ones which are actually designed to not do that.

Recessed lighting can be OK, but only in large sizes.

The little 2" diameter ones came out of the retail display market, where they were originally appropriated from semi-professional film projectors designed to throw a narrow beam of light onto a screen and were used to throw small pools of light onto individual items. That's why a common term for them is spotlights?

They are actually specifically designed to not be any good for providing general room illumination.

I often refer to them as torches, and if you look at the business end of a Maglite you'll see a marked similarity to an MR16 lamp. Fiddling with the lamp technology does nothing to address the problems of the format.

In places like kitchens, bathrooms, WCs, possibly hallways and landings where you just want unobtrusive efficient lighting that just gets on and does the job, something like this is ideal:

Or, for kitchens in particular, there's a lot to recommend good old tried and trusted fluorescent strip lights.

They don't have to look like this:

For example these:

And these are all from one maker.

[EDIT] Possibly discontinued now, but if you look at the products from commercial/architectural lighting makers you'll probably find all sorts of interesting fittings. [/EDIT]


Fluourescent lights can be dimmed. If you find one you like which isn't dimmable, look to see how easy it would be to replace the ballast with a dimmable one (which you can often find on fleaBay).


When looking for lights look at specialist lighting shops and websites - cast your net wider than the limited range of cr*p they have in the sheds. As the old saying goes, if all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. And if all you do is look in DIY sheds everything that isn't hideous looks like a small downlighter.


In terms of basic technology, as well as fluorescent and LED, look into magnetic induction lamps, dielectric barrier discharge lighting (Osram have been sitting on their Planon technology for b****y years, which is a shame), and Electron stimulated luminescence.




If you want LED, again go for larger sizes, e.g. the Thorn BaseLED.




Or as you seem happy to replace the ceiling, you could set LED panels in so that they are flush. Nowadays they come in all sorts of shapes & sizes, no longer just the standard office-suspended-ceiling-panel format.

http://images.google.com/images?q=led+panel+light

 

[Sam Gangee]

Wow, that's given me something to think about.
So those 45 degree LED lamps are still "spotlights" in your opinion?
I thought they'd give a fairly even spread.

 

[davelx]

This is what I have in my kitchen and they are still available:

http://www.universal-lighting.co.uk...uct&filter_name=SB-1405-67-PL&product_id=1392

it works very well indeed.

 

[JohnW2]

Recessed lighting can be OK, but only in large sizes. ... The little 2" diameter ones came out of the retail display market, where they were originally appropriated from semi-professional film projectors designed to throw a narrow beam of light onto a screen and were used to throw small pools of light onto individual items. That's why a common term for them is spotlights?

That is indeed 'where they came from' and the narrow beam angle ones were, and still are, called spotlights. However, in the years since then, much wider-angle ones have been developed, which cannot reasonably be described as spotlights. I don't see that there is an inevitable link between lamp size and beam angle - one can get large ('spot') lamps with narrow beam angles, and, as I said, small ones with wide beam angles.

Kind Regards, John

 

[cam1989]

The Thorn BaseLED has a slightly warm colour temperature. As you've said your units and walls are white, you might be better off with a cooler temperature.

 

[Sam Gangee]

Yes, I don't want a hot ceiling.

And, finally, do these LED lamps get hot? Any safety considerations?

 

[ban-all-sheds]

The Thorn BaseLED has a slightly warm colour temperature. As you've said your units and walls are white, you might be better off with a cooler temperature.

3500° not enough?

 

[ericmark]

I have just 2W and 3W GU10 LED lamps (other than the silly 0.58W) and when I came to compare the 2 and 3 watt I found spread was the same. And also at the edges of the spread the light output was the same. But in the centre the light output of the 3W version was much better than the 2W version.

It would seem the 2W produced an even light over the spread but the 3W did not with most of the extra light being concentrated on the centre area.

There is nothing in the spec which shows this is the case and that is where the problem lies. Be it 2 or 10 watt or 15 to 45 degrees how much of the light is concentrated at the centre and how much is even spread is not published.

So using GU10 MR16 lamps is simply pot luck and until you try and use then you have not a clue about the spread.

 

[ban-all-sheds]

And, finally, do these LED lamps get hot? Any safety considerations?

Not particularly, but they are extremely intolerant of the heat which they do produce, which is why you'll often see cooling fins on them. And why you must pay attention to any instructions regarding spacing.

Which prompts a question none of us have thought to ask yet. What's above the kitchen ceiling? Another room, or a flat roof?

 

[Sam Gangee]

Is "NUETRAL" in your picture the same as "natural white" on the page I linked to, because that's the one I was going to use?

And are there any safety considerations if I fit 7W 45° angle LED lamps in the ceiling? Do they run hot?

 

[cam1989]

Ban, we had these installed in a recent project. The difference between these at 3500K and other LEDs on the project was very noticeable.(4000K)

 

[Sam Gangee]

Above the ceiling is a bedroom floor of tongue & groove. I haven't checked the gap recently but it's as deep as the wooden cross beams. At least 100mm.