reflector/lighting question

[Salt4Us]

Does anyone or has anyone had any experience w/ the different types of reflectors for lighting?
The reason I ask is because AH Supply (http://www.ahsupply.com/36-55w.htm) has a reflector with their Bright kits that they say has better coverage (something like 162%) as oppsed to standard reflectors (99-100% coverage). I'm comparing two of the 36" 2x55W kits w/ reflectors to Hello Lights kit that has one reflector (http://www.hellolights.com/36retrokits.html). Would the reflector make that much of a difference?

Any thoughts & opinions are welcome.

John

 

[Salt4Us]

bump

 

[alrmc4]

with t5's the individual reflectors make all the difference with out them do not bother do not know if it is the same in this case... just figured someone would chime in and correct me now if i am wrong

 

[justDIY]

home depot - $6 for 20 feet of polished aluminum flashing

paint it flat white

is it as efficent as these fancy specular reflectors? No

I'd venture to guess it's around 75% efficient ... but it's a LOT less expensive

I don't agree with AH supplies math ... how can you get more than 100% out of a system? that would require free energy... maybe they've cracked Nikola Tesla's ideas on harnessing 'free energy'.

 

[Guest]

The reflectors that AH Supply are somewhat similar to the Spider Light Reflectors..The amount of refraction or curviture you get from a reflector, is designed to increase the amount of light produced to the subject in question... Does it make a difference? Well, to the naked eye? not really, to a light meter? yes. This is what they base their tests on... The reflectors that AH supply can produce 162% efficiency. This does not quite mean that you will get 162% more light by using their reflector, it simply means that you will use every drop of light produced as opposed to the flashing method which just as Gordon said, may be around 75% efficient..Am I making sense here?

 

[BillyZ]

so, i've always wondered then, why don't people just attach mirrors as reflectors? I can't imagine a more efficient reflector than a mirror. Any colored surface, even white, will absorb some amount of the light.

 

[Guest]

why don't people just attach mirrors as reflectors?

Some do. They glue it to the underside of the canopy and line the walls of it... This can work great however, it is hard to bend and hard to drill through, and plastic gets discoloration badly due to heat...so, most of us depend on manfacturers of reflectors to do this for us... Unless you get teh DIY bug and do it with mirrors or aluminum flashing...

 

[astride13]

The reflector can actually make a big difference. A fluorescent bulb provides 360 degrees of light. If you could reflect 100% of the other 180 degrees, you would have 200% on the other side. Unfortunatly, even with a mirror you can never get all of the other side to reflect down. You would always get some loss on the reflection. If they claim 162% then they are pushing 62% of the unused light down. Since they are probably doing more than 180 degrees on the top, they are losing more than 50% of left over light. This is similar to a spot light, the reflector focuses the all light into one spot small spot.

The hard part is to actually prove that their reflector is actually better. I guess there are tools to measure, but I think buying extra lighting would be cheaper.

 

[Salt4Us]

OK....the general opinion here is that a reflector will make a difference. Aluminum, mirror or otherwise is better than no reflector at all. Thanks for the opinions!

Does anyone have any experience w/ Hamilton lighting? There's a factory outlet about 30 to 40 mins away from us & we were thinking about getting their 2x96w PC reto set up.

Thanks again!

John

 

[gooyferret]

reflectors are the most important part of lighting, besides ballast rating and bulb type. to run flouresents it is best to run individual reflectors for each bulb that way each bulb is getting its light reflected more efficently. Check out my thread on the sticky Lighting comparisons I give alot of explanations and info on there. AH supply's info on that page is misleading and irrelevant. Their kits are PC's not T5HO. PC's will never have the better reflectivity that a T5HO will have because of the dual tubes of PC's. Also if you look at the reflector and tubes of their example pics you will see and can tell that the info is false. Most of the lighting that will ascend upward will be lost with a dual tube light. The reflector in which they have is designed for a flouresent bulb not a dual PC. IF they can give me a photometric report ill believe there fantasy. Sorry for the gripe JMHO