Lighting for Structured Wire Area

[sbex55]

Hello. I am in the middle of a major home upgrade and have taken the time to run miles of wires to my HomeRun 'nerve center' in the basement, I'm looking for some advise on overhead lighting for this area. I'm wondering how far away should my lights be from any cat6/rg6/etc wire and which type of lighting is better (fluorescence vs incandescent vs ?). My homerun area will contain network/video/security/phone and whole house stereo. Thanks for the help!

Scott

 

[Neurorad]

I currently use the linear fluorescent spec'd for the mechanical room. I have plans to add a drop ceiling and a can light or 2. The more point sources of light the better, if you'll be fiddling with stuff a lot - fewer shadows. But, if most of your stuff will be rack mounted, then any light will do as you'll prob use task lighting to work in the rack.

 

[pete_c]

When I finished the basement in my last house put in a drop ceiling. (middle 80's) My kids were young / infants so I wanted to make it a "play room of sorts" combination media room. It was about 40' X 20' or so. I put mutiple fluorescent lights in the ceiling with opaque 2' X 4' panels. These lights created a "daylight" scenario for making it a playroom. I also put multiple sconces on three of the walls for the media room lighting. The basement had another section which was also about 40' X 12' adjacent to the main area. I put the media center on the center wall and used the adjacent room to run all of my cabling. I used all metal conduit to run all of the electric and put multiple three ways at the entrance of the basement living area and the middle section (adjacent to the main room).

I also put new electric/lighting on the walls adjacent to the stairs (with three ways in the middle section).

Two neighbor just recently finished their basement with a drywall ceiling (I disagreed) and put multiple cans in the ceiling. I've seen them both have to repair the drywall ceilings because of flooding in the main floor bathroom. I had that happen once in my old house and the flooding wet an acoustic tile which was easily replaced. Another neighbor did a combo of drywall and acoustic tile ceiling with multiple cans in both ceilings. It looks nice.

 

[ceady]

Electronic transformers are notoriously noisy especially cheap ones that come with fixtures like Home Depot. I've had an install where the neighbor lost AM stations on their radio when some pendant lights were turned on in the other house.

Frankly I have had no noticeable problems installing fluorescents or other fixtures near data/tele/AV but I always route my cable as far away as feasible, so that may be why. If you want to err on the side of caution, I would stick with line voltage halogen (or incandescent) where possible. If you want to go the low voltage route, use fixtures with a magnetic transformers not electronic transformers, unless they are known to be high quality transformers, and finally if you use fluorescents just make sure cables are routed to avoid getting close to them, as ballasts will be noisy as well.

Just my thought on the subject anyway. . .

 

[apostolakisl]

I have fluourescents all over my office and all of the cat5 runs up in the ceiling with them along with all of the high voltage wires and air handling units. I have had no problems. I did keep them as far away as possible and never ran any kind of power line or other noisy wire parralel to a data cable. Always cross at 90 degrees and when running parallel, keep a foot or more of separation.

 

[pete_c]

During that period of time (80's) did have X10 all over the house and detached garage with no issues. I also had a garage which was illuminated primarily via fluorescent lighting (daylight like).

 

[sbex55]

I've decided to go with line-voltage halogen track lights. Thanks for the advice and help from all!

Scott

 

[Neurorad]

I don't know if your lights will be 'to code', since it is a closet of sorts, and there are rules for closets.

I think most of the code requirements for closets relate to clothes closets, because of the risk of fire. If it's not a clothes closet, I doubt it would be an issue. But, for some reason, my mechanical closet has a linear fluorescent very similar to the linear fluorescent in my upstairs MBR clothes closet.

Since it's unlikely that it will ever be an issue - no clothing in that closet - I doubt it's a fire risk.

But, have any shelves in that closet, for storing boxes and such? That might be a fire risk.