# full spectrum fluorescent bulbs



## per_son (Oct 12, 2010)

Ok, I don't know if anyone else has been confronted about this but I have and I want to share my experience and get input from others on this. I am in charge of the maintenance at a large dry cleaning plant and have been asked about improving the lighting in several areas of the plant. good lighting is critical in being able to see the spots and stains on the customers garments. using cheap standard 4100k fluorescent bulbs makes it impossible to see certain stains (mainly yellowish) so I decided to try some higher end bulbs from here: http://www.fullspectrumsolutions.com/fluorescent_bulbs.shtml I am not by far any kind of lighting expert but we are totally blown away by these bulbs. From my research the specs on these bulbs equal to or beat anyone's. I have not used them for very long but they are much brighter and has solved our lighting issue. My question is has anyone else used these bulbs or other full spectrum bulbs that they can recommend? these bulbs are not cheap and I am getting ready to retrofit all the fluorescent fixtures in the plant and install these bulbs unless you all recommend something else? thanks in advance for everyone's input!


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## Lighting Retro (Aug 1, 2009)

Pretty strong specs. A bit pricey, but if they do what you need, they are worth every dime.


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## erics37 (May 7, 2009)

per_son said:


> Ok, I don't know if anyone else has been confronted about this but I have and I want to share my experience and get input from others on this. I am in charge of the maintenance at a large dry cleaning plant and have been asked about improving the lighting in several areas of the plant. good lighting is critical in being able to see the spots and stains on the customers garments. using cheap standard 4100k fluorescent bulbs makes it impossible to see certain stains (mainly yellowish) so I decided to try some higher end bulbs from here: http://www.fullspectrumsolutions.com/fluorescent_bulbs.shtml I am not by far any kind of lighting expert but we are totally blown away by these bulbs. From my research the specs on these bulbs equal to or beat anyone's. I have not used them for very long but they are much brighter and has solved our lighting issue. My question is has anyone else used these bulbs or other full spectrum bulbs that they can recommend? these bulbs are not cheap and I am getting ready to retrofit all the fluorescent fixtures in the plant and install these bulbs unless you all recommend something else? thanks in advance for everyone's input!


I have a couple of them set up for growing veggies and stuff indoors during the winter. Yes, vegetables. Not weed. Seriously.

Anyway, I don't recall the brand we bought off the top of my head. And I don't have it set up yet (it's stored out in the shed) so I won't know for another few weeks when it's time to start indoor crops.


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## Electric_Light (Apr 6, 2010)

Those who got approached by "full spectrum" sales people should try newer RE80 which is a major improvement over standard "cool white" but if that doesn't work out, there are higher CRI lamps out there, but they suffer *significantly (30-50%) *in lumens per watt. 
The major manufacturers offer 80+ CRI lamps in 5000 & 6500K in many sizes which works fine for many applications with minimal sacrifice in efficiency and about the same cost as regular lamps.

Those claiming very high CRI and high lumens are making inflated claims and usually come from companies that don't really do anything other than use strong sales force to sell private labeled lamps at extreme prices.

You really can't have 32W T8 that's 91 CRI AND 3300 lumens. With current fluorescent lamps, CRIs in excess of 86 comes in at the expense of efficacy. 

5000K >90 CRI: 
These are used for graphic arts, dental labs and such. These three are pretty much the same. 
GE Chroma 50 (Sunshine is retail brand) 
Osram Sylvania DSGN50 (Sunstick is retail brand) 
Philips Colortone 50 
http://www.nam.lighting.philips.com/us/ecatalog/fluor/pdf/P-2272-C.pdf

For T8, there are:
Sylvania Octron 950
Philips 950 

SLI Excella 5765K. (~$4 each)

If you feel like you must open up walleet and pay $10/lamp, there are plenty of "full spectrum" sales people selling lamps under various names with a plethora of unfounded claims.


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## MDShunk (Jan 7, 2007)

I have a "full spectrum" light at the couch that I use for reading. It is awesome! (Great light for picking splinters out of your fingers too). The one I have is an OTT Light. It's a little spendy, but worth every nickel. You can find them in craft stores most easily, since people who crochet and do needlepoint and such use them mostly. They sell a nearly identical version at a lot of ACE Hardware stores for 49 bucks, and it's the same damn thing. 

http://www.ottlite.com/c-40-floor-lamps.aspx


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## Electric_Light (Apr 6, 2010)

MDShunk said:


> I have a "full spectrum" light at the couch that I use for reading. It is awesome! (Great light for picking splinters out of your fingers too). The one I have is an OTT Light. It's a little spendy, but worth every nickel. You can find them in craft stores most easily, since people who crochet and do needlepoint and such use them mostly. They sell a nearly identical version at a lot of ACE Hardware stores for 49 bucks, and it's the same damn thing.


Try a daylight CFL. They're 5000K, 5500K or 6500K depending on brand. 5500 or 6500K is pretty much comparable to Ottlite CFL and they cost about the same as "regular color" CFL. The big difference between Ottlite and regular CFL is just that, the different color temperature. CFLs were not readily available in 5000K+ until recently. 

If it's just one light in a home, it makes very little difference if the lamp costs $3 or $40, but for commercial lighting, buying fitting an entire plant floor with those hyped full spectrum stuff is just a big waste of money.


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## MDShunk (Jan 7, 2007)

Electric_Light said:


> ....
> If it's just one light in a home, it makes very little difference if the lamp costs $3 or $40, but for commercial lighting, buying fitting an entire plant floor with those hyped full spectrum stuff is just a big waste of money.


I know. When I was a factory electrician, we had different types of lamps all through the place for different reasons. The entire art department had 6000+ K lamps, which I think were remarkably blue. The boss's office had these yellow fluorescents. I forget what the scoop was on those. The pre-press area had these t-12's with gold colored shatter shields molded on them for some reason. That was a strange room to work in. I'd have slit my wrists if I had to work in that room for years. It was like the old low pressure sodiums. Everyone looked like a corpse.


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## BuzzKill (Oct 27, 2008)

MDShunk said:


> It was like the old low pressure sodiums. Everyone looked like a corpse.


sounds like the current city lighting around here. :yes:


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