This worklight idea started with a 99 cent LED bulb posted in the Lowes Deal Alert & Discussion thread by streamer
20 years or so ago I got plenty of these florescent work lights on subsidy. They were like $5 each, ran cool, no harsh shadows but the bulbs were sensitive to shock. Replacement bulbs were costly, but I happened to get a few at Office Depot of all places on clearance for $2. That helped keep them going for awhile but every once and awhile a ballast goes. No fixing that, hence this LED conversion.
The original work light with florescent bulb.
This is the display of 99 cent LED bulbs at Lowes. At my store this was limited to the quantity in this display. Of course they sold thru quickly and they are not available at present. I spoke with the manager and they will be bringing out more stock as part of their Black Friday event. I assume all of the other Lowes will have them too. Each store should have plenty, but when they’re gone, thery’re gone. My store has 912 ready to go.
These bulbs are 750 Lumen, warm white.
For my mod I will be using 3 of these bulbs and this.
That tool in my hand is called a “Hawk” and drywall tapers use it to plop a load of drywall compund on it when they tape the seams. Expensive ones use Magnesium for the top plate, this one uses Aluminum and it is 13” square. I got it on clearance for $5 at Lowes with the intention of using the Aluminum plate. Where else can you get .090 Alunimum stock for $5 a square foot?
I first took the old light apart and ripped out the socket and ballast (driver) I threw those away
Then I cut the Aluminum to size. I used less than half so I could do this again with another light in the future.
I took 3 of the 60W equivalent bulbs and “disassembled” them for their parts.
During this part I will be working with LED bulbs for the home, but notice how I purposely use flashlight terminology as I progress. :bigsmile:
First step, “dedome” the bulb with a hacksaw.
The “star” with 15 emitters. There is an electronic component onboard that looks like an FET but on the internet it is described as an LED driver. #SM2082D
This light has a “hollow pill” Tucked down by the base is the “driver”
The “driver”, 2 pics. One side is a full wave bridge and some resistors.
And the other, a filtering capacitor and what looks to be a high frequency bypass capacitor.
Once I separated the stars and drivers from the bulbs I soldered longer wires onto each so that I could mount the separate modules onto the Aluminum Plate.
The 3 drivers. BTW, I think that black component at the AC input is a fusable link, at least I hope it is!
Each driver individually wrapped with heat shrink tubing.
The finished light with everything mounted. Very bright! 2250 Lumen, but too much glare from the harsh light the bare LEDs produce. I will modify the original “domes” and “re-dome” the emitters. This has to be a BLF first. LOL
The original dome on the left and one that has been sanded down somewhat. Then all three, but I had to take them down even further. Now that I know how far to go, I could do this in about 1 minute for each one. They sand down very quickly.
After getting them to size, I merely glued them to the Aluminum Plate, centering them over the stars, using DUCO household cement. I shot this after the light was all put back together. Remember this is an old, used light and the clear plastic cover has seen a lot of use. I cleaned it and polished it the best I could.
This mod is probably twice as bright as the original florescent and even though these were warm white bulbs (3000K) it appears a little whiter. The original florescent has a slower startup and is susceptible to shock. Hopefully this mod will service me well.
LED on left, florescent on right.
Oh yeah, I wasn’t clear on that. They plug in for super long run times I did convert one of these lights to 12VDC a couple of years ago. It was still a working light so I kept the florescent bulb in and added LEDs. Here is the link and pic of the finished light. This light runs the florescent when plugged in or the LEDs when plugged into the cigarette lighter.
Now that's my kinda mod! I had ideas to do something similar but never found the ideal host (my idea was to start with one of those typical 500 watt halogen floodlight worklights).
I know compared to flashlights, in home LED light bulbs are boring. But lately there have been exciting advances in the pricing of these bulbs. Just 2-3 years ago a typical quality LED light bulb was $20 or more. Now with subsidies or clearance prices or Black Friday deals we can get them for a buck.
3 years ago I wrote a nasty post about The false economy of in home LED lighting Since then the economics of it all have certainly changed! Here is pic of a 60W equivalent bulb from back then. “EcoSmart” not even a brand name was $23.97 pre-subsidy price. Even the subsidy price was $9,97
3 years ago, I would have been crazy-stupid to do this mod
This really got me thinking of some potential updates to my dads workshop lights. His old florescence lights, mounted 10 feet off the ground, are impossible. He is constantly smacking them with a long stick just to keep them from flickering. I love the idea of updating them with LEDs. I just checked Lowe’s website, and it looks like you were using the Utilitec ? 9W bulbs. They don’t seem to be rated for a long life, but for another $.25, Lowes has the 9.5W bulbs rated for 15,000 hours. Apparently they are half-price at the moment. I am ordering some, thanks for the post!
With these cheap LED bulbs available, new possibilities emerge. This 1 to 7 socket adapter found at BangGood makes it easy and cheap to make high lumen worklights for the shop or garage.
In the garage I used 7 of the CREE 4Flow bulbs, 800 lumen each. I have since upgraded to 7 Utilitech 1100 lumen bulbs. That’s was really nice about cheap LED bulbs and fixtures. They are configurable! In the past I have already ordered about 20 of these for friends and myself, but with a new trove of cheap bulbs I ordered 4 more. What a combination!
Another way to go is use some of the older bathroom fixtures that can be found at used house parts stores. I got these at The ReStore for free. No one wanted them.
Nice mod! I’ve been using some commercially made led floods for work, and they’re sooo much better than the old halogen units. This, with it’s classic BLF approach, is extra awesome. (Though I feel a little bad for the hawk.)
Aww you’re lucky! Our local restore doesn’t know what the hell their doing when it comes to pricing. Everything is supposed to be 50-90% off!
But they do have some good stuff; one time I got a whole bunch of CFLs for free. We were about to leave and the lady put a whole bunch of CFLs in the bin! Also there were100w incandescents but I didn’t get those.
Here’s the thread https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/5925020/Archives/SiteSucker/terrium.cybuniv.net_8-7-15/index.php-topic=162.0.html
I’m thinking either using something like the bulb pulls above or some of the large LEDs mounted on an aluminum stud. I’m assuming that would be enough of a heatsink….right?
I would keep it simple. If the existing light is 10’ feet up in the air then it is high enough to disperse light evenly down below. You could mount a single porcelain light fixture and screw in a 1 to 7 adapter and fill it up or you could try to get one of 8 bulb bath fixtures and fill that up. Using 800 Lumen bulbs you would get either 5600 Lumen or 6400 Lumen. That is way more light than your existing florescent fixture. A brand new twin tube fixture may do 5600 Lumen, but not all of that is directed downwards. Actually only about a third is, the rest is reflected off the shade (if there is one) and not all of that 2/3 is reflected back. Those bulbs from Lowes are not omnidirectional and most of the light produced would be directed downwards if the bulb is in a ceiling fixture upside down. Also with separate sockets for each bulb you have the option of using higher or lower wattage bulbs to suite your Lumen needs. I have one of those 1 to 7 adapters in the garage running 7 - 1100 Lumen bulbs for 7700 Lumens. If you really want a lot of light, use an 8 socket bathroom fixture and 2 of the 1 to 7 adapters. Fill up those 2 adapters and plug them in at the far ends of the bath fixture. Those gold bath light fixtures that I showed are exactly 4’ long. 7 bulbs on each end and 6 more in the middle gives a total of 20 bulbs. If those 20 bulbs are the 800 Lumen bulbs from Lowes that will be available this Black Friday, you would net 16,000 Lumens. Almost all of them pointing downwards where you need them.
I am getting ready to replace an old 4 tube florescent light fixture in my in home shop with something like this.
I think just the 8 - 800 lumen bulbs will be enough. I won’t have to use the 1 to 7 adapters on each end. But this picture should give you an idea of the kinds of things that you can do with lots of cheap LED bulbs.
Loose 4’ Florescent bulb in front for size comparison.
I did convert one of these lights to 12VDC a couple of years ago. It was still a working light so I kept the florescent bulb in and added LEDs. Here is the link and pic of the finished light. This light runs the florescent when plugged in or the LEDs when plugged into the cigarette lighter.
