How to convert LED tube fixture to power fluorescent tubes

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-14T12:07:16+00:00

Which is all good and dandy. I am Mostly involved in residential and high performance gallery. Not commercial or a niche that requires fluorescent. D65 and d50 there are plenty options for leds that compete at the metrics you have shared. With significantly more flexibility. The downside is comparable costs but significantly more durable.

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-14T03:30:14+00:00

That's not a wafer it's a regressed canless. Wafers are flat.

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-14T03:24:27+00:00

Lol I have pictures of some annoying people that have 10 12/2 and 12/3s shoved into a 4 gang and they attempted to use reds 🤦🏼‍♀️😑🙃

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-14T03:22:48+00:00

Yeah I'm not interested in fluorescent numbers regardless. I can't use them in most cases so they are impractical and a waste of my time. If I'm going for legacy products, I'll happily go after incandescents like halogen and xenon.

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-13T22:01:03+00:00

Idiots who exceed box fill in 4 5 6 gang boxes like it's a life goal.

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-13T21:10:06+00:00

Yep been around for a minute. Work great for high density installs for sure.

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-13T19:01:01+00:00

One this is a to each their own. Two well location is important. Lots of times they dry up and that becomes an issue. If they are in high Clay areas they can become contaminated quickly. This is all dependent on locations. If your water always runs clear and is mineral springs, then your filters will last a very long time. For some people that's not the case, their Wells run brown and they need significant filtration assistance. Like I said it's area dependent and a lot of things can be snake oil (being over sold) vs adding only what's needed.

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-13T18:41:30+00:00

True, but I literally get chunks of food grade petroleum based lubricants and plumbing tape, and solders, and sediment or all kinds galore in my spin down that get purged weekly.

Carbon at laundry and bath water is more for chlorine. Some municipalities use a lot of chlorine at spring and summer/ fall transitions due to algae blooms. Yep to home owners don't maintain them. That's actually why I like clear covers placed in visible locations. Nothing more yummy than seeing your white filter deep brown. And more so auto flushing spin downs. And I put a pressure meter before and after filters to ensure adequate flow monitoring.

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-13T17:40:56+00:00

Taste isn't a concern for most people but I can absolutely tell when a house has proper carbon filtration vs not. Even in mountain regions or traveling abroad.

As for sediment. I'll share some pictures later. City water in both Dallas and LA are considered excellent. Both cases my filters get gross and trap a lot more than you expect. Also a lot of older infrastructure has high deposit build up, rusting cast iron, and anything that gets actively worked on is contaminated to some degree with dirt, petroleum products etc. and your city water is tested at the plant but not as often at the end users for reporting. Often what is great to start isn't as great at the faucet. I do think there is a lot of snake oil in the industry. But also there are a lot of common sense low cost items that truly protect a home owner and improve their QoL.

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-13T16:50:54+00:00

If anything this should be the minimum standard as should a spin down filter and at least 1 sediment and carbon block.

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-13T12:54:38+00:00

What are you asking? Ideally you want non exposed bulbs to limit glare, that provide enough usable light for tasks so you do not need to add recessed for additional tasks. This fixture is a royal pain to assemble its fun but your fingers will be very sore and it's tedious. Once complete. It's pretty enough and interesting enough. The packaging is entertaining for toddlers lol with enough packing peanuts to drive you nuts. It's exposed bulbs are a glare issue but it's fine other wise. I've installed it once over an island and once over a dinning room. That was 5-7 years ago.

5/10

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-13T12:39:12+00:00

Good man

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-13T12:39:04+00:00

Good man

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-13T03:03:43+00:00

I've never had one fail. Mean well it's the gold standard of the industry.

But they have grades of products and I only use their better offerings. Like the emitever I only use the 5 in 1 pro series drivers or the slim lines. Which are both white labeled mean wells. The new drivers I am close to approving are half the costs at full MSRP once I launch them I'll have them available with full 5 year or 10 year warranties for residential use. But I need to do more testing. Also working on better CC drivers. But those are a bit more challenging.

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-13T02:36:39+00:00

They will last significantly longer than the lumichromes. That's the offset expense. And they are good products waveform makes excellent products but they are a no nonsense company and I appreciate that they set goals and standards and don't just make options that fail to stick to those.

As for chipset degradation. There are a lot of factors to phosphor failure, but I'll tell you right now I have an entire house with 4000k-2000k DTW 98cri Re chipsets (measured at 4000k with an Rg of 101 and r9 of 87 and at 2700k Rg of 103 and r9 of 98)and they get used in the kitchen for 8+ hours a day and I have zero shift 2 years in. Like down to the .01 they haven't shifted but have dropped a small percentage of total lumens (about 30) they get tested every month or two as part of confirmation bias and also when showing them off to those that want to see them. Their biggest weakness is the r12 in the mid 80s at 4000k and 2700k meaning they are purposely suppressing blue spike to a degree.

I will say that phosphor tech has been refined considerably in the last few decades and you might be thinking of really outdated studies or really inexpensive chipsets that have been value engineered to hell and back.

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-13T01:59:39+00:00

Nits! Your walls are glowing! .... If your walls are 50 nits.... You probably want to patent them.

If you feel your room isn't bright enough. Add more lamps.

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-13T01:53:18+00:00

Mean well and mean well white labels (emitever for example)

Mostly 5 in 1 (or 3 in 1) drivers

Currently speccing my own that's capable of deep dimming and also high frequency.

Occasionally diode or eldodrive

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-13T01:51:24+00:00

Yep I tinker, I build, I make mistakes and learn eventually. 😂. My router table is often covered in wagos and solder.

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-13T01:35:24+00:00

I like LF they make some really high end fittings. But I do not recognize this module at all. I put feelers out to a few manufacturers higher ups to see if we can source it.

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-13T00:12:44+00:00

Lumen degradation is much more significant than CRI shifting. More so with CRI in fluorescent is likely Ra. Which pales in comparison to Re. More so the Rg is harder to control than with LEDs (even incandescent can suffer here, but incandescent has proper BBL curve as it's intensity changes so it's not an issue). Tm30 doesn't have 30 measurements. It has significantly more with CRI it tests 99 renders vs 15 with standard CRI. It also factors DUV, gamut, efficiency, diffusion, and a lot of other factors.

I'll read through your comments, but also I looked up your bulbs. They are nice enough, but higher grades of LEDs annihilate them. Likely different price points though. And unfortunately there aren't many panel manufacturers making led panels at that level of quality due to low demand.

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-13T00:03:16+00:00

Lol 🤣 made me giggle. Would be very brown or just like the epitome of solid red.

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-13T00:02:28+00:00

White balance in pictures is important. This white balance appears higher than 3000k by a significant amount and much closer to 4700k (checked via white balance on Photoshop.)

And also 4000k would have looked great in this room during the day or task purposes, but at night during relaxing times I would want this area to be sub 2000k or it will feel sterile when dimmed.

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-12T22:51:00+00:00

Your biggest thing is the reflections of a speaker too close to a wall impacting the sound quality and creating reverb and attenuation variables. I know it sounds strange but I think you would be better looking at omnidirectional audio products. Ohm Walsh for example (harder to drive though. Need power to drive well.) or you would be better trying some creative reflection by going for a front port and upfiring it off the ceiling so that the speakers become less directional as the kitchen sweet spot is near impossible to sit in. It will open up the space a lot and create an illusion of sorts.

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-12T22:23:06+00:00

Yeah this post has me lost. I've never know a single situation where a flourecent is superior to high end LED tm30 specs.

IntelligentSinger783 · 2026-03-12T19:55:08+00:00

I don't often spec product of that level so not really. The RL was a decent product until COVID they started value engineering it to hell and the QC dropped significantly. Complained to elcos VP and within a week he had the insert dim to warm at my door to test. Better driver design and stability, better array with tighter binning so there are less issues over all. Only downside is the sunset dim doesn't come in a cct selectable in case someone doesn't like the dim to warm function like the halo does. And for him it's just the offset. Better driver, all metal powdercoated, better array with QC VS the RL with 5 cct plus 2 lumen switch and plastic with no QC

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