Attic lights???

[John Terefenko]

I am looking to install some attic lights. It is a crawl attic but it is in a ranch house so I want to store things up there. What is a good light fixture to put up there that will give good light and be tolerant to heat and cold of an attic. Name of fixture and source would help. Thanks in advance.

[Ole Anderson]

I just use regular bare incandescent bulbs in porcelain fixtures. Temperature proof and cheap. Available at any hardware store. Energy use not an issue it gets so little use.

[Bruce Page]

A lot depends on how much light you want/need. I installed one of these pull chain fixtures with a 100 watt equivalent LED bulb in my shop (garage) attic. It gives me plenty of light for my needs.

Leviton 9726-C2 One-Piece Glazed Porcelain Outlet Box Mount Incandescent Lampholder, Pull Chain, Top Wired, White

[John K Jordan]

I am looking to install some attic lights. It is a crawl attic but it is in a ranch house so I want to store things up there. What is a good light fixture to put up there that will give good light and be tolerant to heat and cold of an attic. Name of fixture and source would help. Thanks in advance.

John,

I use CFLs in porcelain bases.

One thing I have done several times which was a stroke of genius if I say so myself, rare for me since I'm far more likely to have marginal ideas - I put the light switch on the wall in the room below the access panel/stairs. I use a light switch with a bright red pilot light so I can see from the room below if I forgot to turn the light off. I started doing this after leaving an attic light on for several months.

I think you do need to wire with a neutral but that's usually not a problem.

The biggest problem is finding one that is bright. The kind they sell at the big box stores now, like in the first picture, is not quite as bright as those common 30 years ago.

pilot_switch.jpg pilot_switch1.jpg

The second one is a little better - the pilot light is built into the toggle handle.

An alternative would be to wire a separate light below that turns on at the same time as the attic light. For more fun, wire in an old disco light.

I also use these pilot light switches to enable my DC so I can see from across the shop if the control circuit and remote receiver is powered up.

JKJ

[Ken Platt]

I like those 4 foot LED fixtures. I recently made a storage area in a garage attic, and the light seems to spread out well from them, so shadowing seems less of a problem than in my house attic where there are just a couple incandescent bulbs. A bit pricier than the cheap solutions, but worth it to me when I'm up there looking for stuff. The ones I got were from the big box store - I can't remember if HD or Lowe's.

Ken

[Rich Riddle]

We live in a ranch with an attic much like the one you described. We use outside flood lights in the attic with great success. You could place LED fixtures that don't emit much heat yet tolerate the temperature extremes of the attic if you chose.

[John Terefenko]

Will Led lights tolerate the extreme heat and cold is my question. Not concerned about price. Do it once and it is done. $150 for lights is nothing. I have the wire, boxes and all other necessities. I am wiring a pilot lighted switch in plus a couple outlets. I am having central air conditioning installed this year so they will be running the duct in the attic. Would like to have lights there before they get there.

[Rich Riddle]

If you keep with blue or white LED lights, you will have no problem with heat. Red LED doesn't like it much. Here is a scientific article:

http://www.lrc.rpi.edu/programs/nlpi...s/led/heat.asp

My flag light is LED and it tolerates cold as well. It's a LED Flag Pole Light 16 Watt LED Narrow Spot Bright White 15° Beam

[julian abram]

I just use regular bare incandescent bulbs in porcelain fixtures. Temperature proof and cheap. Available at any hardware store. Energy use not an issue it gets so little use.

Ditto. Unless you have some special need like growing plants in the attic, it is hard to beat the old porcelain base with a bulb of your choice. I've probably been in a hundred house attics and don't believe I've ever seen any other type of fixture.

[Tom Stenzel]

The ranch we moved into in 2002 has a crawl space attic. One of the previous owners installed a couple of porcelain fixtures and incandescent bulbs. Nothing has changed. Not even the bulbs, none have burned out. They're on an less than an hour a month. It's too cold in the winter and too hot in the summer to spend any time up there.

In a basement closet I have a bulb that says "Detroit Edison" on it from when the power company exchanged burned out bulbs for free. They haven't done that for over 35 years now. Not to say the bulb lasted long, it just isn't used. An inefficient bulb that's off uses no power.

As far as LED lamps I wouldn't think that the heat would kill the LED itself as much as damage the supporting electronics. The bulb would fizzle out while it's not on.

It's a judgment call, how much do you think the bulbs will be on? Is it worth the cost? Plus there's other practical concerns. Like how much light do you need? While you're struggling about in the limited space will the bulb get broken? Will you be forced to place them so that the heat from an incandescent burn you? You might pick LEDs just for that reason alone.

Right now halogen incandescents can still be bought. That's what I would use in my attic, install and forget them for a couple of decades. YMMV.

-Tom

[Rich Riddle]

I took a few photographs from the attic today to offer an idea of how bright the exterior lights illuminate the space.

Front.jpg Storage.jpg Outlet.jpg Switch.jpg
The last photograph shows the switch near the entrance of the attic. One can look up to see if it's on or off and use a stick to turn it off if needed. An outlet or two wired with the lights proves very practical in the attic when working and doesn't require a lot of extra time. Just something else to consider.