Outdoor lighting of many varieties can effectively keep your space well-lit, safe, and inviting for you and your guests. These lights are typically reliable and long-lasting, but if they stop working and leave you in the dark, it can be a frustrating experience. Having an understanding of your lights and their potential issues can help you if you need to conduct outdoor lighting troubleshooting. There are several types of outdoor lights, all with different looks and objectives. Spotlights provide bright, direct light onto a specific area. Uplights are installed at or below ground level to shine upwards onto objects while downlights are installed high in a tree or structure to shine down. Floodlights use a motion sensor to shine directly onto an area when they sense someone there. Path or walkway lights are installed as individual fixtures along a walkway to illuminate it. Solar lights gather energy from the sun throughout the day, then turn on at night. These lights are installed in a variety of areas such as on a home; on a deck;  around a patio, deck, sitting area, or pool; or on the ground. There are also a variety of bulbs including halogen, incandescent, LED (light emitting diode) and bug light, each with their own uses and benefits. Each of these fixtures has several parts and can be susceptible to different issues depending on their parts and assembly. If your lights aren’t working properly, it can be concerning, and create potentially dangerous situations.

water and vinegar to remove residue and keep your lights shining brightly.While some outdoor lighting troubleshooting can easily be done on your own, outdoor lights are complex fixtures that aren’t always easy to diagnose and fix.

relatively high ceilings. Drive by any industrial park, warehouse, or factory, and walk inside and what you will see is a high bay light.

But walk into any factory or warehouse and you will see different styles and options, wattage’s and configurations. Traditional high bay fixtures that were once common place were Mercury Vapor, which were then replaced with High Pressure Sodium and Metal Halide bulbs. As new technologies were introduced, and old technologies became more common, the old HID bulbs were replaced with Induction and Fluorescent light sources. And more recently with the more wide spread approval and popularity of LED, we started to see conversions from these older technologies to the latest energy saving LED High Bays.

A High Bay Fixture, depending on the light source, can take on many forms and shapes. If you consider a Metal Halide or High Pressure Sodium fixture, they typically consist of a large heat sink block at the top of the fixture that typically houses the fixtures ballast. Below is an aluminum or acrylic dome and at the top of the dome is the HID bulb. These bulbs typically come in two wattage’s, 400 and 1000. 400 Watt Fixtures tend to be installed in ceiling heights no higher than 30 feet, 1000 watt fixtures are typically 40 feet or higher. Interestingly enough, spacing of lights is similar to the height they are located off the floor. A fixture installed at 20 feet from the floor is installed in a 20X20 pattern, 30 feet in a 30X30 pattern, 40 feet in a 40X40 pattern. Of the 3 type of HID bulbs, Metal Halide tends to be the best option. High Pressure Sodium Bulbs are very low on the temperature color and have the warehouse aisles have the ability to focus the light where it is needed. A light designed for a warehouse aisle is a lot different than a light designed for a gymnasium or a factory floor. In these spaces, a light that can flood the area evenly is important, in a warehouse aisle, a light that can light up the face of the shelves and the floor below is important. And when selecting energy efficient options, its just as important to understand the technology and what it is capable of doing. Adding controls to a T5 fluorescent fixture is a good idea only if the ballast is designed to handle that requirement and not lower the life expectancy of the bulbs. Motions sensors and daylight controls that dim the light output based on occupants and the amount of daylight available in the space. Technologies such as metal halide and high pressure sodium are not a good choice as these technologies are not good at dimming or turn on or off quickly. Fluorescent can dim, but you need special ballasts for them. So knowing what you want to do and may want to do is important at time of purchase, because not having the proper equipment or options could mean a costly lighting warehouses, factories, gyms and readily available through the utility companies, and mass adoption means the technology of LED had matured to the point where the questions and disbelief of past years have gone away.