Uplighters
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Uplighters are light fittings that direct light output upwards. The light is bounced off a white ceiling.
Uplighters come in several flavours, each with their own strengths & weaknesses.
Advantages
- More even lighting spread than other lighting types
- Minimum shadowing
- Fittings use shrouded bulbs, enabling a wide range of bulb types to be used
- Thus relatively futureproof
Disadvantages
- Uplighting requires a white ceiling to be effective
- Unsuitable for exposed beam properties
- Not suited to very low ceiling properties (eg 6')
Types
Main types are:
- Halogen uplighters
- Half moon plaster uplighters
- Spotlight fittings, eg R80
- PAR38 spotlight fittings
- Trough fluorescent lighting
- Shelf fluorescent lighting
Halogen Uplighters
These are usually free standing floor lamps
- Typically 300-500w.
- High powers create excessive lighting in one area
- Thus it fails to eliminate glare and give even lighting, which are some of the main advantages of uplighting
- Power consumption is high
- Increases indoor temps on summer evenings
- Relatively expensive to run
- The lightbulbs run hot enough to ignite anything that lands on them, making them a fire risk
- Ignition temperature bulbs plus the ability to be knocked over are also not a good combination from a fire safety point of view
- Halogen bulbs run at high pressure and are known to very occasionally explode. A shower of high speed & very high temperature broken bulb pieces is probably not beneficial for health.
Half moon plaster uplighters
The bulb is positioned quite close to the wall, and this results in:
- every little blemish of the plaster is shown up, including the many slight blemishes no-one had ever noticed before.
- light intensity on the wall above the fitting is unnecessarily high
- So it fails to eliminate glare and give even lighting, which are some of the main advantages of uplighting
- Because of these shortcomings and the existence of better options, plaster half moon uplighters arent a great choice
R80 Spotlight Fittings
- These hold the bulb in a shroud on the end of a stalk.
- Fittings that leave the bulb unshrouded are unsuitable
- GLS lamps (lightbulbs) are used in these fittings for uplighting, not spotlight bulbs
- R80 fittings can also take the smallest CFLs, but the light output of these is much less than a 60w GLS bulb
- Bulb is positioned far enough from wall to avoid glare and excessive lighting levels just above the fitting
- Spotlight fittings are position adjustable
- PAR38 fittings can take almost any CFL
- Ability to use either GLS or CFL makes this approach more futureproof
- R80 spotlight fittings are usually white inside the shroud, but any fitting that is not is unsuitable
- The fittings usually look pleasant
PAR38 spotlight fittings
- These hold the bulb in a shroud on the end of a stalk.
- Fittings that leave the bulb unshrouded & visible are unsuitable
- GLS lamps (lightbulbs) or CFLs are used in these fittings for uplighting, not PAR spotlight bulbs
- Bulb is positioned far enough from wall to avoid glare and excessive lighting levels close to the fitting
- Spotlight fittings are position adjustable
- PAR38 fittings can take more or less any CFL
- Ability to use either GLS or almost any CFL makes this approach very futureproof
- PAR38 spotlight fittings are much larger than R80 fittings. The appearance of the fittings is thus particularly important
- PAR38 fittings are usually white inside the shroud, any fitting that is not is unsuitable
Trough Fluorescent Lighting
- These use linear fluorescent tubes
- Fluorescent tubes permit choice of colour temp, covering the whole range from 2700K to daylight.
- Highest efficacy and thus energy efficiency of all uplighter types
- This minimises running cost & summer heating
- Fluorescent Lighting can give very good lighting, but some precautions are needed with Fluorescent Lighting to avoid the common mistakes and achieve this.
- Fluorescent uplighters give a very wide lightspread, maximising the benefits of uplighting.
Shelf Fluorescent Lighting
Similar to trough uplighting, but the fitting itself is visible
- Less visually appealing, but as simple to use as plugging a light in and putting it on a white shelf.
- Good choice for garages & workshops, where good lighting is wanted but appearance of fitting is not important.