Garage door spotlights

[eniacs]

Morning all.

I want to put 3 spotlights above the double garage doors on an astro timer. However... the garage has a lintel in it. A classic catnic lintel which is a box section steel.

Am I ok to drill the 56mm holes in this for the spotlights? As a guest I would say it's ok since its only a garage roof not a 3 story building on top of it. However would be good if someone else has done it already? Or any other solutions to this.

Edited by eniacs on Tuesday 16th June 09:23

[eniacs]

Bump. Anyone any ideas or experiences?

[eniacs]

Thanks all. This is what I expected I suppose.I'll look into some led strips!

[eniacs]

Again thanks for all the suggestions so far.

I've now had some time to look into this and have come up with only one real solution...

I tried the LED strip idea, I had some 72w 5m 5050 LED strips in the house i bought with the intention of doing the living room coving thing with them. So tried these at night on the garage. They work great and produce a good light. However at 72w they were far too bright and would use too much power.
I was intending to do 3 spotlights at 3w each which would provide ample light for the door and driveway and would use a pittance of £5.40 per year to be on for the 4000 hours of darkness we have.

So I scoured the internet and found these:
Ebay link


So I guess im asking if there is a better option. I like the spotlights as they will look nice and they look on paper to be efficient, has anyone seen better surface mount spots?
Is there another option for an LED strip? I want to keep power usage down and could probably use about half the light the 5050's produce, and would prefer to have a quarter of the power they use!

[eniacs]

Guy; That's granted, although to be fair my LAP GU10's using 3W dont have heatsinks either (at least not on the outside, given the outside is plastic). The spotlights in the link are also an aluminium body, so its possible the body is thermally connected to the chip.

I feel my options are limited here, so Im grasping at straws. I wouldn't normally consider the cheap imported ebay junk usually...

[eniacs]

Guy; Take a look at the photos in the first post, the soffit for the door is just the steel lintel. I think I can glue things to it and probably get a screw through it, but not cut holes into it really...

[eniacs]

Yes that part of the lintel is hollow behind. Could easily be drilled for spots, but what damage will this do to the lintel? First thoughts are probably not much considering the low weight actually on the lintel, but theres a nagging feeling in my mind that says dont do it!

[eniacs]

Ok so a little bump as I've gone ahead and installed an LED strip above the door. After messing around with the chinese suppliers of the strips I've now got a few around the house! A couple sets of bright that are way too bright, one set of 3528 that are not warm white (although ebay seller told me I was wrong despite photo showing it next to a real warm white lol) and the installed strip which is seen below...

Although, I'm not convinced that it doesnt look a bit too "showy" or "council" or im not sure what. But Im not sure that I like it! Would have preferred a more classy looking finish maybe.

What do you all think?

[eniacs]

The LED strip is currently always on (just plugged in). I plan on powering that the same way the spotlights either side of the door are powered - with an astro timer. In the garage this will need a junction box and a power supply inside as well for the LED strip. Currently its running on a computer power supply which came with the LED strips - not the best.

[eniacs]

The strip is totally obstructed by the door going. Not a massive issue at present as the garage is full of junk and cannot hold a car. However the lights are mainly placed as architectural lighting, there is enough lighting to see the floor from the street lights.

[eniacs]

Cyber LED's in the floor may be too bright, once your eyes adjust to the darkness and then a hugely bright set of LED strips come on it will be dazzling! Unless your paths are high up so you could fix the LED's to the side lighting up the gras - now that would be nice.

Royce - thats my idea exactly. I was going to go for a strip of PVC. Pretty cheap and avaiable in long lengths in white ready to glue in front of the strip.

Herewego - The photos are taken on my camera phone so the brightest objects will appear bright as it tries to resolve the surrounding dark objects. The Lights by the door are 250 lumens each 3W spot lights. Not the brightest and certainly not offensive on the eyes. Yes they are on all the time that it is dark as will the garage door lights be. At the moment the garage doors lights are on 24/7 as I havent put the timer on them yet.

[eniacs]

Well I'd say Im concerned to the point of minimzing unecesary cost. So I worked out the cost of the front door LED's (all 4 outside, plus the two in the porch on the same circuit) to be £10 a year. I went for all night automation as I'm sick of coming home at odd times and the house being pitch black. Lazyness for not switching a light on befor I go I know but for £10 a year I thought it was well worth it. Now I'm used to the porch being on all the time at night I like it. Kind of like a night light for a child I suppose.