Bench lighting

[ps_bond]

Over at Making Space, the benches are individually lit by a wall-mounted anglepoise-type lamp with a low-energy photo bulb in them. This gives a fairly bright but relatively diffuse light, making a number of tasks much easier. I've been hunting around for something similar for a while (at a reasonable price); I think I've finally found what I need - from Ikea. The Ikea Tertial worklamp - which can be either clamped to a worktop or wall mounted (or in my case screwed to the back board) and best of all, costs only £8.19. Add a suitable photo bulb on (from EBay) and you've got a pretty good light source for the money. The 11W bulbs that Ikea suggest are nowhere near bright enough though.



Equally, they'd probably make not bad photo lights.

[Dennis]

Yes I worked with one of those for years, but to avoid dark shadows you still need some ambient lighting such as overhead fluorescents, I think.

Dennis.

[ps_bond]

I've now got both fitted to the bench with 35W photo bulbs; I'm almost tempted to get more, but I'm not convinced it is needed. The light is, as you might hope from a CFL, quite even, so I'm not seeing much in the way of shadows even when running just the one.

It's high time I moved my microscope onto the bench - it'll be interesting to see if there's enough light like that or if I'll still need to use the ring light.

[ps_bond]

Finally got around to it - I had to clear some of my bench to get it there, but never mind. 2 35W photo CFLs are not quite enough to use the scope with, so I'll be sticking with the ringlight attached to it.

[GoneMad]

My lighting is pretty bad, need to add that to the list of out going cash...
Anyone tried this type of light?

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/LED-Aquari...item5d2e2c31f3

I've seen these a few times whilst looking for aquarium lighting, I always thought they wouldn't be bright enough for a tank but maybe ok for the bench - or do LED's cause problems with reflections etc?

[Dennis]

You can but try. I went through several lamps before I settled down. Now I have an Anglepoise lookalike and a compact fluorescent bulb, rather like Peter. The difference is that mine is a 15w, and Peter has a 35w photographic, which will be a great deal brighter.

LEDs are cheap to run, but tend to be a rather cold blue. You might get an idea from visiting a lighting shop, or lighting department before you buy.To find the equivalent, count the no. of LEDs in the lamp.
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Regards, Dennis.