Fluorescent 4' T8 direct wired tubes.

[Lee Schierer]

My new tubes arrived this afternoon. I have all but one fixture converted. I plan to rewire that final fixture tomorrow. WOW, what a difference. I am pleased the light levels. I like the instant on as well. I'm sure the old florescent tubes had lost some of their brightness over the years.

I just checked the FM and AM radio bands on my shop radio and the new Barrina Tubes don't make any static that affects the radio.

[Jim Becker]

Yea, amazing what a lot of light contributes to a workshop space!

[Jim Andrew]

I replaced all my bulbs several years ago, found some on ebay that cost half of the ones at Menards. Took out all the ballasts, and the extra wire, mine are hot on one end only, and they are much brighter than the old fluorescent bulbs. Anyone know what you can do to clean up your radio signal?

[Jason Roehl]

I may be off on this but I think all or most consumer LED 'chips' run on 12 volt DC. The drivers Jim reference above convert 120 volt AC to 12 volt DC. The '50,000 hour' life may refer to the expected life span of the LED 'chip'. It may not include the life of the driver so the LED may be fine, the driver may not be.

I challenge anyone to find a bulk/wholesale capacitor that would be used in the manufacture of an LED driver that has a rating of more than about 4-5000 hours.

One little tidbit I noticed was absent from this thread is that “color temperature” does not have anything to do with faithful reproduction of color. That’s in a different spec: CRI, or Color Rendering Index, with 100 being perfect. Many LEDs fall in the 70s or 80s, which isn’t great. 90+ will let you compare colors.

[Lee Schierer]

I challenge anyone to find a bulk/wholesale capacitor that would be used in the manufacture of an LED driver that has a rating of more than about 4-5000 hours.

One little tidbit I noticed was absent from this thread is that “color temperature” does not have anything to do with faithful reproduction of color. That’s in a different spec: CRI, or Color Rendering Index, with 100 being perfect. Many LEDs fall in the 70s or 80s, which isn’t great. 90+ will let you compare colors.

The Barrina tubes I purchased have a CRI of 85. I also checked for radio static and I have much less now than I did with the electronic and conventional ballast fluorescents. The new tubes also eliminated the humming noise.