Duralec Blog

When choosing lights for a job that needs high quality products and guaranteed results, it helps to start on the right foot. The right manufacturer can be hard to find. Ideally, you would choose a spec-grade manufacturer with decades of experience and a huge inventory of cutting-edge products. Fortunately, that manufacturer exists in Cooper Lighting Solutions.

Duralec is proud to offer Cooper Lighting Solutions products and to spread the word about their LED lights and first-class service. They’re an amazing example of a spec-grade manufacturer working at the top of the field. Their offerings can be a bit overwhelming (in a good way), so let’s take a quick look at a few of their top products and how they set themselves apart.

HALO Lighting

Cooper Lighting Solutions has over twenty well-known brands, like AtLite, Lumark, and Trellix. One of their brands is constantly mentioned as a leader in downlights—HALO. In fact, HALO has been named Builder Magazine’s #1 Lighting Brand for 24 years in a row. Their products include downlights, track lights, under-cabinet fixtures, outdoor lights, and more.

HALO downlights meet the highest industry standards and are suitable for every lighting need. They come in a wide variety, including recessed canless downlights, surface-mounted downlights, and countless more. Most models offer options for different sizes, wattages, trim finishes, and functions. In short, there is a light out there for every application.

HALO lights are certified by multiple organizations. This ensures top quality, reliability, efficiency, and safety. For example, the popular HALO HLBC4 Series Ultra-Slim Regressed LED Downlight is ENERGY STAR® Certified, IECC code compliant, UL Certified, T24 certified, and RoHS Compliant. These are obviously top-quality lights.

The best LED modules and drivers give HALO lights an unrivaled edge. Color rendering indexes (CRI) of 90+ guarantee exceptional light quality. Selectable color corrected temperatures (CCT) and lumen outputs make the fixtures flexible for any situation. A conference room that needs cool white light and a lounge that needs comfortable warm light could feasibly use the same fixture. Many lights are dimmable down to 5% and are of course flicker-free.

HALO lights offer exceptional efficiency, as well, even for LED lights. These fixtures use a fraction of the electricity of older lights. These numbers represent huge savings in energy bills, especially in times of energy price spikes.

Lights like the HALO HLBC4 offer five-year warranties, though it’s likely these lights will last much, much longer. The lifespans of these LED lights are well known for being exceedingly long.

Exit and Emergency Lighting

Cooper Lighting Solutions leads the industry in exit and emergency lighting solutions, as well. Through their brands AtLight and Sure-Lites, they offer comprehensive solutions for both of these needs.

Proper exit and emergency lighting isn’t just a safety issue—it’s a legal issue, as well. Federal laws (as well as some state laws) require workplaces and many other buildings to have functional exit and egress lighting in case of emergencies. Choosing compliant lights and placing them correctly is an important part of finishing a building. Cooper Lighting Solutions offers not only a wide array of lights to fulfill these needs but also the expertise to walk you through your situation, if you need.

Exit lights like those made by Sure-Lites are high-quality LEDs with nickel cadmium batteries for at least 90 minutes of emergency run time. They come with universal mounts so they can be installed in any location. Their low wattage—around 3 watts—sip electricity while providing essential exit light.

Emergency lights by Sure-Lites are also top-of-the-line LEDs that have battery backups with run times of at least 90 minutes. Lights like the Sure-Lites APELMINI are UL 924 listed and produce powerful light to meet legal egress-light requirements. These emergency lights are made to survive wet locations, extreme temperatures, and harsh conditions.

Exterior Lighting

Cooper Lighting Solutions offers nearly every exterior lighting solution imaginable. (If you have a need you’re not sure they can meet, it would be wise to check with them just in case.) They have decades of experience manufacturing floodlights, street lamps, landscape lighting, sports arena lighting, and more.

Floodlights like the GFLD Galleon II (made by the McGraw-Edison brand) produce lumens from 1,261 to 36,393 lm. They are available in a range of color corrected temperatures (CCT). These floodlights are IP66 rated to endure wet and extreme weather. They also offer a wide variety of mounting options (pole, slipfitter, yoke, trunnion, wall, and knuckle), giving you the option to use them in any application, from a parking lot to a loading dock to a tennis court.

A large catalog of outdoor architectural and decorative lighting gives designers many new options. These fixtures were designed with aesthetics in mind and can work in any style, from traditional to modern. Functional and attractive lighting is key to maintaining great pedestrian spaces.

Fixtures like the Arbor Post Top Light provide a highly modern, sculptural shape while delivering powerful, high-quality LED light. Traditional designs, on the other hand, like the New Haven or the Traditionaire fixtures, are suitable for historic districts or places looking for some old-fashioned charm. These lights come with LED drivers and other components guaranteed to survive even the harshest elements. They produce bright light at just the right CCT and just the right diffusion angles.

Cooper Lighting Solutions produces many garage and canopy lighting solutions, as well. These fixtures produce bright light that isn’t just about visibility—it’s about safety. Well lit spaces are crucial for maintaining public safety. Property protection is an added bonus to great lighting.

Garage and canopy lights come in many shapes and sizes. Some resemble street lamps while others look like floodlights. They produce a variety of light, as well—the Caretaker light produces as few as 4,500 lumens, while the Galleon puts out up to 80,000 lumens. These lights are as efficient as they are bright. Most produce between 130 and 160 lumens per watt (LPW). A good array of garage lights combines maximum coverage and energy savings, and lights from brands like Lumark and McGraw-Edison can do that.

These examples only scratch the surface of what Cooper Lighting Solutions has to offer. If you would like to explore the high-quality products of one of today’s best spec-grade manufacturers, feel free to call a Duralec expert today.

The marketplace for indoor commercial lighting has never been so good. New products seem to appear almost every day, and they’re getting better and better. The only challenge is deciding among so many options. It’s a good time to review the offerings and try to decode some of the new technology.

Indoor commercial lighting includes applications like retail, offices, and warehouses. (One could even argue that institutional spaces like schools, libraries, and hospitals are included.) These applications ask for a lot of light fixtures. The light has to be reliable, affordable, energy efficient, powerful, high quality, easy to install, easy to maintain, and more. It’s no wonder that manufacturers have been pouring major resources into developing new products in recent years.

Flat Panel LED Lights

Perhaps the most popular indoor commercial light fixture is the flat-panel LED light. These flush-mounted (usually) lights are spread across ceilings of offices and stores around the world. They have proven to be a reliable light fixture for these applications, but early versions earned a bad reputation as flickery and unattractive. Fortunately, today’s flat-panel lights are infinitely better.

Today’s fixtures are flicker-free and produce bright light that is evenly distributed across the entire lens of the fixture. They can also be tuned to whatever color temperature and brightness you need.

If an office break room or a hospital waiting room needs warmer, softer light, new fixtures can do it. If a conference room or a commercial kitchen needs powerful white light, that’s possible, too. Often, the same fixture can meet all of these needs.

Flat-panel LED lights are more flexible than you might think. This is especially true of newer models. These flat-panels are not limited to dropped ceilings. Cable-suspended flat-panel lights can create a modern look in a store or a loft office space. These fixtures can also be fitted with advanced lighting controls (ALC), also called “smart light controls” or “networked lighting controls.” These devices provide even more flexibility in how a space is lit throughout the day. An ALC device lets the user program a fixture (or array of fixtures) to follow a schedule or adjust automatically to factors like incoming natural light.

The long-term cost savings of an LED flat-panel light, especially one outfitted with advanced lighting controls, are immense. LED lights operate with a fraction of the electricity used by previous technologies—sometimes up to 80% less energy. When used in a commercial setting—i.e., when scaled up across a huge store or an entire office building—LED lights provide a multiplier effect for these savings.

LED Troffer Lights

Another popular light for indoor commercial spaces is the troffer light. (The word “troffer” is a portmanteau word that combines “trough” and “coffer.”) This fixture has roughly the same shape as a flat-panel, but its light bulbs or diodes are arranged along a central trough. The fixture’s light is projected upward, bounces against a white panel, and is reflected downward. These fixtures come in similar dimensions to flat-panel lights, like 2x2 feet, 2x4 feet, and so on.

Troffer lights are a good fit for offices, hallways, and other indoor spaces. They offer a different look than flat-panel lights but deliver a very similar quality of light.

Today’s LED troffer lights are powerful and adjustable. Many offer selectable color-corrected temperature, which means you can have warm light, cool light, or anything in between. Today’s troffer lights guarantee higher quality light than office lights from the past. For example, troffer lights from Duralec have a high color rendering index (CRI) of 80+. This index is a measure of the light’s quality and how well the light produces true colors.

LED Strip Lights—Architectural and Otherwise

Sometimes a commercial space demands a little more style from its lighting fixtures. When this is the case, an architectural strip fixture is the best fit. These lights often look like long, elegant, aluminum-clad boxes. Sometimes these boxes are suspended for added drama. Their light is cast downward at strategic angles. (The light can often shine upward, as well.) These lights bring a little more flair and sophistication than your average light.

Perfect for an upscale hotel lobby or a high-end store, an architectural strip light delivers reliable, bright LED light with style.

For example, the new Linear X light, from Luxurio, looks amazing while providing adjustable LED light in a number of color temperatures (3500K, 4000K, or 5000K) and wattages. It produces 1,300 lumens per foot and has optional dimming.

Basic LED strip lights are an effective lighting solution for indoor commercial spaces, as well. These fixtures resemble the long tubes of their older fluorescent cousins, but they have many advantages over older technologies. An LED strip light has none of the flicker of other lights and performs at a much higher level. Its light is strong and energy efficient and can often have selectable color temperatures and power levels. Glare-free lenses mean that even the most modest fixture can produce high quality light that is comfortable on the eyes.

Today’s LED strip lights offer unprecedented lifespans, as well. No longer will maintenance crews have to replace bulb after bulb. Many lights, like the Horizon Linear Industrial LED Light Strip provided by Duralec, have five-year warranties, as well as being DLC-listed and Intertek-listed. These lights produce tens of thousands of hours of light with little to no dimming.

LED High Bay Lights

High bay lights are a special kind of indoor commercial lighting. These are commonly used in spaces with high ceilings, like warehouses, gyms, big box stores, or factory floors. The newest generation of LED high bay lights is punching well above its weight class. These lights can produce tens of thousands of lumens while running on remarkably few watts—often only 100W, 200W, or 300W. For example, the most powerful IntrinsiX CIRCA Round High Bay Light produces over 43,000 lumens.

When choosing between LED high bay lights, it’s important to get it right. Many of these applications—factories and warehouses, in particular—require excellent visibility for safety reasons.

A full array of the correct light fixture can make all the difference between a facility that is safe and productive and one that is not.

Choosing energy efficient lights is important, too. High bay lights tend to run for many hours at a time—often 24 hours a day—so a highly efficient LED fixture is crucial for keeping utility bills in check. The new generation of lights is amazingly efficient. The IntrinsiX CIRCA light can produce over 140 lumens per Watt.

LED Retrofit Kits

The indoor commercial lighting world is a great place to explore opportunities for LED retrofit kits. Upgrading the lights in an office building or warehouse to LED lights can vastly improve lighting quality and energy efficiency while avoiding the cost of installing new fixtures. The savings begin the second the lights are switched on.

Retrofit kits can take advantage of the latest LED technology, no matter how old the fixtures are. Many LED lights can plug straight into an old fixture. These include LED tube lights, which resemble fluorescent tubes but are in fact filled with the latest LED lights.

Another simple plug-in option is the LED corn light (sometimes called a “corn cob” light, due to its cylindrical shape). These screw directly into E26 or E39 bases.

LED strip lighting is a quick way to replace the old lights in a troffer or flat-panel fixture. The magnetic, flexible strips snap right into the old fixture. Kits come in one, two, three, or four strips, and can produce over 10,000 lumens if needed. Installation is extremely easy on most of these retrofit kits. Easy installation and maintenance add to the huge return on investment, as well.

Exit Signs and Lights

A key component of indoor commercial lighting is having effective exit signs and egress lighting. In some cases it is even legally mandated. For example, the International Building Code (IBC) requires exit areas and passageways to have proper lighting. They even designate specific lighting power densities (LPD’s) for some of these areas (measured in watts per square foot).

The best exit signs and lights use LED fixtures that are reliable and long lasting. There is no better safety light than one that lasts for 50,000 or more hours and requires zero maintenance.

LED fixtures offer that kind of performance. They also sip energy compared to older light bulbs.

If you have any questions about indoor commercial lighting, feel free to contact an expert at Duralec, today. Duralec has an immense inventory of best-in-class LED lights for every application and experts available to talk about it.

It’s easier than ever to buy high-quality LED lights today, but judging one against another is sometimes difficult. At the very least, a buyer should be able to know if the light is safe and efficient. Luckily, there are certifications that help a buyer know this. These are stamped on the light or the packaging. However, there is a plot twist: there is more than one certification. In fact, there are many.

It's not hard for a buyer to get lost in the flood of information. The alphabet soup of certifications—DLC, ETL, UL, ETC.—promises great quality, but if you have to weigh one standard against another, it can be confusing. Eventually you have to make a decision on which light to buy.

Let’s run through the different lighting standards and see how they compare.

DLC Rating

Many LED lights come with a DLC certification. The organization behind this standard is the DesignLights Consortium. This is a non-profit organization that issues certifications for light bulbs and fixtures. The goal of this industry-led organization is to encourage the manufacture of highly performing products that are energy efficient and high-quality.

Currently, the top DLC rating is called DLC Premium. A light with this rating is certified as having the top level of the criteria above. Not only should these lights perform well—in terms of brightness, color temperature, color rendering index (CRI), and more—but they should also have long lifespans and not suffer from long-term dimming.

UL Rating

The UL rating is a must-have mark because it indicates that a light meets strict safety standards. This rating comes from a testing laboratory called UL Solutions, formerly known as Underwriters Laboratories. The white coats at this lab test products according to their own UL standards or those set by the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC). Not only do the standards certify safety and performance, but the rating comes with quarterly “surveillance” of the product. This surveillance lets you know that the light has a long (and safe) lifespan.

The UL 1598 standard is one of the most important LED lighting standards in the industry. It lays out requirements for performance (and how to measure it), such as lumen output and color temperature. It also sets requirements to ensure the product’s safety.

“UL-Listed” is the top rating from UL Solutions, but there is a “UL-Classified” stamp, as well. This label indicates a product has been certified as a retrofit product. In other words, a UL-Classified product (say, a light bulb) is certified to replace a bulb in a UL-Listed fixture. This allows the original fixture to maintain its UL-Listed status.

ULC Rating

It’s like the UL rating, but Canadian. This rating is issued by Underwriters Laboratories of Canada, the UL’s sister organization north of the border. The ULC rating indicates that a product meets the regulations of the Standards Council of Canada. The ULC organization, in fact, has helped create and maintain hundreds of Canadian safety standards.

ETL Rating

Yet another well regarded rating regime is the ETL, formerly known as Electrical Testing Laboratories. The ETL is an independent laboratory that uses the UL rating in its testing of products. An ETL-Listed badge is a top certification for LED lights.

The ETL-Listed rating has quite the pedigree: it originated in the work of Thomas Edison. His Lamp Testing Bureau was an early laboratory for testing the safety and quality of early light bulbs—obviously the earliest light bulbs. The laboratory eventually became the Electrical Testing Laboratories. Today, this lab is part of the Intertek Company.

Intertek tests products and rates them to many different standards: UL, ULC, ASME, ASTM, ANSI, CSA, NFPA, NOM, NSF. The testing that Intertek does is similar—sometimes identical—to that called for by most of those standards.

What is an NRTL?

An NRTL is a Nationally Recognized Testing Laboratory. This is an independent, third-party laboratory officially recognized by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) as having the ability to perform rigorous testing of products. In short, OSHA certifies who can certify things.

Intertek (ETL) is an NRTL. As is Underwriters Laboratories. But DLC is not an NRTL—it is an organization that uses third-party testing to certify lights (specifically lights, and under their own DLC badge) as efficient and high quality. (ETL and UL test and certify many different kinds of products, not just lights.)

What are regional standards?

Another family of standards is created by political entities (states, cities, etc.). These are actually statutory regulations that manufacturers must meet in order to be used in those jurisdictions. But if a product is labeled as “NYC Code Compliant” or “California Energy Commission” compliant, then that stamp carries the weight of a standard.

What does a testing laboratory actually do?

Every rating system is a little bit different, but there are many similarities between what laboratories do. Most laboratories follow a similar list of steps to inspect and test a product. In the case of testing an LED light, a laboratory would go through at least the following steps:

• Random sample of products: The lab grabs random samples from the manufacturer at an unannounced time.
• Visible inspection: The lab scrutinizes the light for any visible flaws.
• Electrical testing: The lab runs the light through a set of standard electrical tests.
• Mechanical testing: The lab shakes, drops, and generally abuses the light to test it for physical endurance.
• Environmental testing: The lab exposes the light to various conditions—heat, moisture, etc.—to test its ability to withstand environmental stresses.
• Performance testing: The lab measures the light’s output to properly quantify it. This includes lumen output, CRI, color temperature, and more.
• Label confirmation: The lab then uses its data to confirm whether or not the labeling is correct on the light.

If a lab issues its own listing, which is what ETL and UL do, it will certify the light as meeting all of the high standards it was tested against. If the lab does not issues its own listings, then it will pass along the data to whomever commissioned the product testing.

When it comes to installing high bay lights—and correctly spacing them—in a large space, there’s good news and bad news. The good news is that the lights available today are radically better than those available only ten or twenty years ago. The lights are powerful, efficient, and flexible enough to light any space. The bad news is manageable, don’t worry—it is simply that there are many factors to consider. It can be a little confusing.

Let’s run through the major issues. The goal here is a basic literacy on the topic. We’ll save the complex formulas for another time.

Spacing Lights According to Application

Your application should be one of the top guides in spacing your lights. In short, some spaces need more light than others. Manufacturing facilities, big box stores, workshops, and warehouses with a lot of product handling require the most light and a high lighting power density (LPD) (which we’ll get to in a minute). Storage rooms, gyms, and warehouses with low activity require less lighting.

There is no guide to exactly how much light is needed for each application, but knowing what end of the spectrum you’re on (use-wise) will help you get started. It sounds obvious, but the more light you need, the more lumen capacity you need to install. (Brightness is measured in lumens.) Also, if you your facility needs good visibility, you will have to be more careful in designing the spacing—if your lights are too far apart, you risk creating gaps in your coverage.

Floor Area and Ceiling Height

Perhaps the two biggest factors to consider in spacing high bay lights is your floor area and your ceiling height (or, more specifically, your mounting height). These issues are fairly common sense. The more space you have, the more lights you’ll need; and the higher your ceiling is the more light you will need from each source..

This calculation, at its simplest, resembles a basic middle school math problem. You are roughly taking the square footage of your facility and dividing it by the coverage of a single light. That gives you the number of lights you will need. (For example, if your floor is 1000 square meters, and a single light covers 100 square meters, then you will need around 10 lights.) But it’s not quite that simple. You also need to calculate how high your lights will be mounted. The higher you raise a light, two things happen. The beam gets wider (more light!). But the beam also gets weaker (less light).

You would also need to take into account the shape of the space—rectangular, square, irregular, etc. There is little need, for example, to install a light near a wall. Ideally you want the lights evenly distributed across your ceiling. Again, some of this is common sense.

Most high bay lights will come with specs that tell you the shape and intensity of the beam. This information is sometimes called the fixture’s photometrics. For example, a UFO LED light (the saucer-shaped lights popular in warehouses) like the IntrinsiX CIRCA light has a spec sheet that indicates an “average illuminance effective figure” for its beam. The photometric shows you that the width of this light’s beam (and square footage of coverage) at different distances (i.e. mounting heights). It also shows you the light’s intensity at those distances; this is measured in lux (symbol: lx). A lux is a unit of light’s intensity and is the equivalent of one lumen per square meter.

By using these two numbers—the width and intensity of the beam at different heights—for a particular high bay light, you can begin to calculate how many lights you need for your space and how far apart they need to be.

But there are also some rules of thumb that people in the industry use. One of them is that the mounting height is roughly equal to the distance between your lights. In other words, if an light is mounted 20 feet up, it should be roughly 20 feet from its neighboring light.

That rule of thumb is great for giving you a rough idea of how to space your high bay lights, but there will be long-term benefits if you can get a more accurate figure. A little bit of number crunching goes a long way. Also, there are many experts out there who can help you with this calculation, including those at Duralec who have been doing this for years.

The Type of Light Fixture Matters

The two most common kinds of LED high bay lights vary in how they distribute light. These lights are the (aforementioned) UFO light and the linear light. The UFO light is roughly a point source and casts its beam in the shape of a cone. Its area of coverage is roughly a circle.

The second kind of light is a linear high bay light and resembles a flat-panel fixture. As you might expect, its area of coverage is more like an oval. These shapes need to be factored into the overall spacing of your lights.

Another fixture feature that affects spacing is the option for dimming. Many LED high bay lights come with dimmability, and this feature gives users more options in how they mount their lights. For example, having dimmable lights would allow you to space the lights more closely for powerful brightness and visibility but would give you the option of running the lights at lower wattages at certain times of day or in certain sections of your facility. The end result is a lighting array that is flexible in its brightness and efficient in its energy use.

When Correct Spacing Is Required by Building Codes

In some cases, a certain amount of lighting is required by building codes or workplace-safety regulations. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), for example, requires that employers “shall ensure that each work area and walkway is adequately lighted whenever an employee is present.” This standard specifies different light intensities for different types of work spaces (warehouses versus changing rooms versus offices, etc.). Another standard is the International Building Code’s (IBC) requirement for proper lighting in exit areas and passageways. This code requires different lighting power densities (LPD’s) for various egress areas. The code measures LPD’s in watts per square foot. Other lighting standards have been published by the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) as well as the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE).

In some cases, meeting these standards would require that you create the proper degree of spacing to provide the necessary lighting intensity. However, the standards do not mandate an amount of spacing. Being mindful of proper spacing is key to meeting these lighting standards.

The Benefits of Correct Spacing of High Bay Lights

When designing a network of high bay lights, it’s important to try to get the spacing right the first time. No one wants to do an installation twice. Figuring out the spacing on paper—perhaps with the help of an expert—could save you loads of trouble and money during the process.

There are many long-term benefits, as well. Correct spacing will ensure that your lights work at their most efficient levels. Planning it correctly might prevent you from over-buying and having more capacity—and energy usage—than you need.

A well-spaced grid will also ensure the most effective lighting. Proper lighting is necessary not only for visibility and productivity but also for worker safety. LED high bay lights are ideal for worker wellbeing, as well, as they are free of flickering and limit eye strain and fatigue. A well designed array that produces high-quality light also looks professional and attractive.

To discuss the issue of how to space high bay lights in any kind of situation, feel free to reach out to a Duralec expert today. We have years of experience creating lighting solutions across the Midwest.

Duralec has recently upgraded its online store to allow easy purchasing by customers all over the country! For years Duralec has been a mostly regional supplier of LED lights and other electrical equipment. But the company has been expanding more and more, due to its talented staff, unrivaled expertise, and superior sourcing.

Opening up the website to new users—and inviting everyone to explore the massive inventory—is the next frontier for Duralec. Let’s look at the new and improved site.

New Features

Previously, the Duralec online store was mostly used by contractors and large-scale buyers, particularly in the Midwest region. The new online store is built for the entire country, as well as for all kinds of customers. The development team focused on building a site that is user friendly, comprehensive, and secure. For that reason, the new site should feel intuitive and familiar. Let’s walk through the site’s basic steps.

Products on the Duralec home page are organized into categories and sub-categories for quick access. Most product pages have extensive descriptions and specs. Once you’ve found your item, you click on Add to Cart. (Again, no surprises here.) Shipping and tax will be estimated after an address is added. Next, either add more items to the cart or click Check Out Now.

The next step is either to sign in or to register as a new user. Having an account gives you the ability to track order status, look at purchase history, as well as offering other benefits. Creating an account is quick and easy.

Shipping options are extensive. Sometimes you need your order tomorrow; sometimes you can wait. You can even pick it up for free. Hint: being a registered user gives you access to the Duralec UPS account number for even better rates.

To finish the process, simply put in a form of payment—all major credit cards are accepted—and that’s it. The system is truly built for everyone—from the busiest contractor to the home owner looking for a floodlight.

If you don’t see a product you need, feel free to call us (847-250-7902, the number at the top of the web site) or email us (Contact Us form at the bottom of the site). More and more items are being added to the site every day, so it’s possible the thing you need is on our shelves. (If not, our team can point you in the right direction.)

If an item is out of stock, feel free to call about that, as well. It’s possible that a shipment is on its way or that the online system has yet to update itself—as we move quickly to offer more features, it’s possible that a wire gets crossed every now and then. If you ever experience a hiccup in the system, we’d love to hear about it so we can address the issue for you.

The Duralec VIP Program

The website has even more benefits available for contractors, ESCO providers, and facility managers. Signing up for Duralec’s VIP Program gives you special discounts and even more access to Duralec’s expert service. Check out the program at the link here.

As always, working with Duralec gives you access to all of the top brands. These include IntrinsiX, Philips, Topaz, Morris Products, Garvin, Eiko, and countless others.

The lighting industry is full of many confusing terms, but few are more technical than some of the units of measurement involved with light. Kelvins, lumens, foot-candles, and even watts can be difficult to understand. But it’s important to be able to speak with authority on these terms to your clients or customers. This article will try to provide a background and summary of each term without making it feel like a science textbook. We’ll tackle these terms roughly in order of difficulty.

Measuring Light’s Power

In the lighting world, you see lights rated in watts. A flat-panel LED light, for example, might operate at 30 or 50 watts (or have selectable wattage). This number represents the electrical power that the light fixture uses, in other words how much energy per second. The symbol of the watt is “W,” and the name comes from the 18th-century engineer James Watt who was credited with the invention of the steam engine (though he did not invent the concept). Often the word “watt” is capitalized, because it is based on a proper name, but that rule is no longer a strict one; capitalizing the symbol (W), however, still seems like good form.

The watt is an important measure of lighting because it is shorthand for how much electricity a light is using. It is also one of the key numbers on an electricity bill: the kilowatt is 1,000 watts.

Like most of the units of measurement in this article, the watt is an SI unit (something you might remember from high school). SI units are internationally accepted forms of measurement defined by the International System of Units. Also, like many topics in science, if you look at the watt more closely, it gets a bit complicated. You can define a watt in a couple different ways. Because it is a unit of power, it can be defined as one joule (J) of energy happening per second (s). Or, more appropriate for the lighting world, it can also be called the power created by one ampere (A) crossing an electrical potential difference of one volt (V).

A simpler way to think of a watt is the rate at which electricity is flowing. Like miles per hour. A 50W LED light needs a flow of 50W at all times. (A kilowatt-hour (or kWh), on the other hand, is how much electricity will flow through the light in one hour. The kilowatt-hour also appears on electricity bills.)

Measuring Light’s Color Temperature

Some light is warm and yellowish and cozy, while some is bluish and cool. These are lights’ color temperatures, or, more specifically, their color corrected temperature (CCT). The unit of measurement of CCT is degrees Kelvin (K).

Color temperature is important in lighting design because the temperature greatly impacts a space. An office or warehouse needs cool, bluish light for good visibility, whereas a living room or lounge space needs warm, cozy light for comfort. If you switched the two, it would be obvious that something was wrong.

The key thing to know about this unit of measurement is that its numbers are a bit counterintuitive. The lower numbers are the “warm” colors, and the higher numbers are the “cool” colors (which is obviously the opposite of most other temperatures, where higher numbers are the warmest).

To use a specific example, let’s compare a flat-panel LED light to a high bay LED light. The first fixture will be used in a school library, while the second will be used in a warehouse. The flat-panel light, like an IntrinsiX Vista Series LED Light Panel, offers adjustable color temperatures of 3500, 4000, or 5000K. This will produce a variety of light. The 3500K setting will be significantly yellower and warmer than the 5000K light. A powerful LED high bay light, like the IntrinsiX CIRCA round high bay light, produces 5000K light that is perfect for warehouses or big box stores. This light is white-ish and cool and produces great visibility.

Measuring Light’s Brightness

Brightness also has an SI unit of measurement, and it’s called the lumen (lm) (also called lumen output). A lumen is a quantity of visible light coming from a source. The lumen output of a light usually roughly correlates to the light’s wattage, but not exactly. A higher wattage light will no doubt produce more lumens than a lower one. But light fixtures differ in quality and design, so there is not a direct correlation between the two numbers.

Light fixtures often offer adjustable lumen outputs. The IntrinsiX LED flat panel mentioned above offers lumen outputs of 2500, 3750, 5000, and 6250lm (and also include the option of dimming). This allows users to customize their lights to whatever application they need as well as to natural light sources.

The sub-units around brightness can grow confusing if one digs in very deeply. One could get lost in the differences between luminous flux and radiant flux and the angles of light that can be measured (called steradians). But the only other unit you’re likely to encounter (and probably not, actually) is the candela. The candela is another SI unit that measures light intensity rather than light quantity (the lumen). But knowing about the candela helps explain our final unit of measurement, the foot-candle.

Measuring Light’s Brightness in Another Way

If a “foot-candle” sounds old fashioned, you’re not wrong. It comes from a time when the main source of indoor light was the humble candle. The unit of the foot-candle (fc) is not part of the SI system of units. (The nearest SI unit is the lumen.) In fact, today the foot-candle is rarely used outside of the United States. But a foot-candle is still employed now and then to describe a quantity of light, especially in certain fields (museum galleries, cinematography, horticulture, and so on).

A foot-candle is defined as the light of one candela cast upon the inside of a sphere with a radius of one foot. In other words, it is the quantity of light cast upon that area. Another way to define it is one lumen per square foot (at even light distribution).

While the unit is slowly going out of fashion, you might still encounter it. The unit is useful in describing an amount of light, and that is always useful for designing a space.

The boom in electric cars has created a huge need for electric charging stations around the country. Over 800,000 electric cars were sold in 2022 in the United States, up 65% from the previous year, and the upward trend appears to be stable. Installing new charging stations should be seen as an opportunity rather than a challenge, especially for businesses. Owning charging stations is an opportunity for businesses to appeal to new customers, attract workers, improve the environment, and more.

Electric chargers come in all shapes and sizes, and much of the terminology around them is new (and sometimes confusing). Later, we’ll define some of those terms. But first, let’s briefly review some of the use cases for electric charging stations.

Who Might Need an EV Charging Station?

The need for charging stations is exploding, and there are many types of drivers who use them. Here are some of the places that currently need charging stations and will need them in the decades to come.

Residential: Most EV drivers want the ability to charge their cars at home, so small and simple charging stations are some of the most common options on the market. These devices usually run on 120V or 240V power, though the latter option is growing in popularity due to its faster charge times.

Multi-unit Housing: Condo towers, apartment buildings, and other multi-unit buildings have a serious need for EV charging stations. Soon, these stations will be necessary for attracting new owners and tenants.

Retail: Offering electric charging stations is a top amenity for retail stores and malls, and it will become even more so in the future. Charging stations are a way to attract affluent, engaged shoppers and to demonstrate environmental responsibility.

Workplaces: At a time when attracting and retaining the best workers is a challenge, having EV charging stations at work is a valuable perk. In fact, charging stations might soon go from “perk” to “required criteria” for workers.

Fleets: Increasingly, fleets are being electrified, and this brings with it an obvious need for multiple charging stations. An electrified fleet means lower operating costs, huge sustainability benefits, and the chance to earn substantial rebates and tax incentives.

How Electric Charging Stations Work (a Mini Glossary)

Electrification (the transition to electricity from other forms of energy) is happening quickly, and the market for EVSE’s (electric vehicle supply equipment) is growing. Electric charging stations will be a key component of the new energy infrastructure. Let’s look at how a single electric charger works for both installers and users.

Most electric charging stations are either Level 1 or Level 2 chargers. Level 1 chargers run on 120V power and are good for overnight charging at modest speeds. Most chargers in use today are Level 2 chargers—these devices run on 240V power. A Level 2 charger can provide a significant charge to an EV (electric vehicle (sometimes called a BEV, or battery electric vehicle)) in minutes rather than hours, depending on its specific power. The power output of an electric charger is measured in kilowatts (kW).

A good example of a popular electric charging station today is the BreezeEV P48 Smart Electric Vehicle Charger (available from Duralec). It is a Level 2 charger with 11.2 kW of maximum output at 48 amps (A). This power can be adjusted to 40A, 32A, or 16A. The device charges a vehicle in the range of 12 to 60 miles per hour. The BreezeEV P48 can be hard-wired or can use a common NEMA 14-50 plug (a four-prong plug with hot-hot-neutral-ground); these are the same plugs found on many electric stoves.

Most charging stations today offer the same connector (the end of the cable that plugs into the car). The SAE (Society of Automotive Engineers) J1772 connector is a five-pin plug in a sturdy housing. It is also sometimes called a J plug or Type 1 connector.

Charging stations can be networked or non-networked. A non-networked device is a simple plug-and-go device that is most commonly used in home garages. A networked charger, on the other hand, is connected to the Internet and offers a range of functions that help both the owner and the user. The owner of a networked charger can offer scheduled charging to multiple users, get data reports on the charger’s usage, offer dynamic and customizable pricing, and more. Networked chargers can be a profit center for a business, a convenient amenity offered to customers or employees, or something in between. Whether a charger is networked or not, it is a good way for a home owner or business to improve property value.

Networked chargers use cutting-edge software and connectivity. The BreezeEV P48, for example, uses 4G LTE or Ethernet communication using the OCPP 1.6J (Open Charge Point Protocol) cloud-based management software. It comes with the ampUp software and a mobile app that delivers a huge range of benefits, including driver reservations, RFID cards (radio frequency identification cards for granting access), location access control, analytics (data reports), driver support, revenue collection, and more.

The user experience for electric charging stations is getting better and better. Apps like ampUp make it easy for drivers to find chargers, pull up, and plug in. These apps handle payments and can track usage for multiple cars. Customer service is available for owners and users 24/7/365.

Installing a charging station is easy. A charger like the BreezeEV P48 can be attached to a wall mount, a pedestal, or a cable-management pedestal. Its pedestal can even be decked out in custom branding.

The housing of a good charger is durable and weatherproof. The BreezeEV has an IP65 rating (ingress protection that guards against dust and rain). Chargers can operate in temperatures from -22F to 122F.

How to Find the Right Electric Charging Station for You

As with most capital improvements, choosing the right device depends on your application. If you’re looking for a single charger for a home, a simple non-networked charging station might do. If you need to outfit an office building, multi-unit apartment, or strip mall with one or more charging stations, then networked chargers are likely the best fit.

Before you invest, however, you should look into rebates and tax incentives. There are many of these programs offered by local and state governments, the federal government, as well as by many utility companies. These programs can offset much of the cost of installing charging stations. Talking to an expert might help. Top distribution companies like Duralec have experts on hand to walk you through that process.

To discuss electric charging stations or any related topics, feel free to reach out to a Duralec expert today.

Choosing the right light for a space can be confusing, but picking the right high bay light brings with it extra pressure. High bay lights are used in spaces like warehouses and factories, where visibility is critically important. It’s important to get it right.

Fortunately, there are many exceptional LED high bay lights on the market. Choosing the right one is a matter of matching your particular application—warehouse, factory floor, gym, retail space, etc.—with the correct power and features of the best lights available. Let’s review the major factors to consider with this type of fixture.

What Makes a Good High Bay Light?

The current boom in warehouse construction makes this discussion of high bay lights more relevant than ever. Warehouse lighting is a classic use case for high bay lights. These lights guarantee great visibility for work and safety. Here are some issues to consider.

Performance: Because performance is critical for high bay lights, LED options are by far the best choice. LED fixtures provide powerful lighting in a variety of lumen outputs (i.e., brightness) and color temperatures. LED lights are also highly reliable and have longer lifespans than competing products.

A good LED high bay light floods a space with powerful light no matter how high you hang the fixture. A light like the IntrinsiX CIRCA Round High Bay Light can produce up to 43,000 lumens. The CIRCA light produces bright, white light (up to 5,000K) that is perfect for situations that require the best visibility.

Whether your space is a factory floor, an aircraft hanger, or a school gym, an LED high bay light is the only fixture that delivers the performance required.

Safety: High bay lights are a key element to a safe workplace where visibility is important. Workers in spaces like warehouses, workshops, or factory floors often have to deal with dangerous machinery. A well-lit facility is crucial for protecting workers from accidents. Proper lighting in workplaces is also legally required by federal and possibly state regulations. For example, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) requires a certain lighting standard be met for various parts of a workplace, from machine shops to stairwells.

Energy savings: LED high bay lights are also the best choice for the application because of their promise of immense energy savings. LED lights use up to 75% less energy than older technologies, and that means far lower electricity bills. The savings begin to accrue immediately, making the return on investment (ROI) for LED lights extremely high.

Further savings are gained on maintenance, due to the long lifespan of LED lights. The need to buy replacement bulbs and have personnel to install them plummets with LED lights.

Network ability: LED high bay lights are highly efficient and deliver major savings, but there is yet another level of savings available: the optional use of advanced lighting controls (ALC). Also called networked lighting controls or smart light controls, this technology allows you to tie your lights into a programmable network that turns them on only when necessary. This combination of software and hardware is the next generation of energy savings. For example, you could program the lights to turn on and off according to even the most complicated schedule. A further possible step would be to make the lights more automated by employing sensors on the lights to adjust to daylight or worker occupancy.

The ability to affordably and easily program your lighting grid is the next frontier of building maintenance.

Options for High Bay Lights on the Market
—UFO Lights vs. Linear Lights

When looking for LED high bay lights, it’s smart to go with a reputable distributor. This guarantees that you get a certified, high-quality light with proven success and a great warranty. Here are some ways to narrow your search.

Shape and configuration: It’s not often the term UFO makes its way into a commercial lexicon, but here we are. One of the main shapes of high bay lights is the UFO light—a round, saucer-shaped light that is suspended from the ceiling. Sometimes called a round light, the UFO light is a favorite of lighting designers for high-ceilinged spaces like warehouses or factories. They cast their light powerfully and evenly across a space and are perfect for putting into an array. The IntrinsiX CIRCA light mentioned above is a UFO light. Besides being highly practical, this UFO LED light has a modern, industrial look that makes a space look great.

The second most common shape for high bay lights is a linear light. This fixture is rectangular in shape, and its LED lights are arranged in a line

(hence the word linear). These lights loosely resemble flat panel LED lights, and, like flat panels, they can be mounted either flush or suspended. Linear lights offer powerful lighting with easy installation. Top products, like the Altitude Linear High Bay LED Light, provided by Duralec, offer high-quality drivers, many mounting options, and integrated sensors.

Wattage: Like most LED lights, high bay lights come in a variety of wattages. These wattages correlate to how bright the lights are. Not all lights are created equal, however. The best fixtures, like the IntrinsiX CIRCA UFO light, are DLC Premium rated, meaning they deliver 130 or more lumens per watt.

The CIRCA light comes in five wattage options (100W, 150W, 200W, 240W, and 300W) and has selectable wattages on all but the most powerful model. This means you can tailor your light to your specific needs. As always, your application is the key factor in determining which light you need.

Mounting options: High bay lights are mounted in a variety of ways due to the high ceilings involved. Good LED high bay lights offer a variety of mounts that will work in whatever application you have. For example, the IntrinsiX’s CIRCA UFO LED light comes with hardware for either pendant or surface mounting. IntrinsiX’s Altitude LED linear light comes with V-shaped hangers and strong chains for hanging the fixture, as well as surface-mounting options.

Emergency backup: LED high bay lights provided by Duralec have optional emergency backup units, as well. These battery packs ensure that your facility never goes dark. This is crucial for worker safety, as well as for legal compliance in many areas (especially egress areas).

Sensor options: The best LED lights today come with a variety of sensors. This technology is what turns a good LED light into something great. Sensors allow lights to be controlled in ways that lead to much better lighting as well as to huge energy savings.

The most common sensors include the daylight harvesting sensor. This photocell device senses how much ambient light is available—say, coming through windows or skylights—and, with the proper controls, can tell a light to adjust to it. Another top sensor is the occupancy (motion) sensor, which can sense when a person enters or leaves a room. The potential of these sensors to save money is immense.

These are just some of the options available for LED high bay lights. To talk about your specific needs, feel free to reach out to a Duralec expert today.

Today’s product spec sheets for LED lighting fixtures are so packed with information that they can sometimes be confusing. A good spec sheet contains technical details that fully describe the product, but some of those details can sound like jargon. This article is an explainer of those terms, standards, and features. As a point of reference, let’s use this spec sheet for the IntrinsiX CIRCA Round High Bay LED Light.

Wattage: Perhaps the most important number on a lighting spec sheet is the wattage of the light. This number refers to the power a light needs to run at its maximum level. On this spec sheet, this number appears on the front page and is also the first bullet point listed on page one. This high bay light is offered in wattages of 100, 150, 200, 240, and 300 watts.

The higher the wattage of a light, the brighter it will be (although brightness is measured by its own metric, which we will get to soon). LED lights require far less power than previous technologies (like high-pressure sodium or metal halide lights). Their wattage numbers, therefore, are relatively modest. The powerful light seen in this spec sheet—suitable for warehouses, factories, and the like—comes in wattages between 100W and 300W. To give you an idea of how much more efficient LED lights are: not long ago, you might have used a 100W light bulb for a table lamp at home.

Today, a 100W LED high bay light can flood a warehouse space with powerful white light; the 300W version is obviously even brighter.

Your application determines which wattage you need. A warehouse high bay light likely needs a higher wattage than a similar light in a workshop, simply because you need more light in a warehouse. This is why the wattage rating for a product plays such a big role in its spec sheet—it is the best way to categorize the products. In the bottom half of the spec sheet, the wattage of the lights is the key factor in separating the products.

Lumens: Lumens is the best measurement for brightness. Lumens (Lm) being the form of measurement. This number tells you how much light the bulb or fixture will produce. Brightness correlates roughly to wattage within a product type; in other words, a 300W light will produce roughly three times the lumens of a 100W light.

You will often see a lumens-to-watts (lm/W) rating on a spec sheet, and if you do not, simply divide the total lumens by the total watts! However, different product types on the market—say, LED lights versus fluorescent lights—have different lumens-to-watts ratios; that fact demonstrates how much more efficient LED lights are than older technologies. Lumens per Watt is quickly becoming the go to way to choosing the most efficient and correct light as you want the highest efficacy.

The Specifications portion of this CIRCA spec sheet indicates the lumen output for the five varieties of this high bay light. The first four wattage sizes (100, 150, 200, and 240W) show three different lumen outputs because those lights have variable settlings; for example, the 100W light can operate at 60, 80, or 100W. Therefore, that light also has three different lumen outputs available.

https://duralec.com/spec-sheet/IX-RHB.pdf

Color: The “color” of a light, also called its color corrected temperature (CCT), is measured in degrees Kelvin (K). The light’s color refers to how warm or cool a light appears. A cozy library wants a soft warm light, whereas a warehouse wants a clear, white light. A conference room or office wants something in between (a cool color for good visibility).

In a spec sheet, look for “color selection” or “Kelvin Temp variables” or “CCT.” Sometimes a light will have three or more selectable color temperatures. The IntrinsiX CIRCA high bay light in this spec sheet has narrower applications—warehouses, supermarkets, and so on—than other general-purpose lights, so it only has two color temperature options (4000K/5000K, seen on page 3).

Color Rendering Index: This measurement, also known as CRI, reflects the quality of light and its ability to show you the most natural colors (of objects) possible. By the definitions of CRI, the best color-rendering light is that produced by a natural light source like the sun.

CRI is rated on a scale of 1 to 100. At the low end of the scale, colors look distorted or unnatural. At 100 CRI you are seeing the “true” colors of an object. Today’s LED lights produce much higher CRI light than many previous technologies, including fluorescent lights. Lights with ratings over 80 produce excellent light that makes everything it touches look natural.

Voltage: The input voltage can range from anywhere between 120-480. This is reflected on most spec sheets. (The “V” stands for volts, and the “VAC” stands for volts of alternative current. They are more or less interchangeable.) Most wiring in a building is 120-277V, where buildings that have more powerful equipment can range all the way up to 480V. Common high bay lights like the LED IntrinsiX CIRCA usually run on 120-277V. However, larger fixtures can use 277V-480V circuits.

DLC Rating: Spec sheets of high-quality LED lights will likely mention a DLC rating. The DLC is the Design Lights Consortium, a non-profit organization that creates standards for lighting performance and gives products a rating. Their goal is to guide the lighting industry toward high-quality, efficient, and long-lasting products.

The best DLC rating at the moment is DLC Premium.

The best DLC rating at the moment is DLC Premium. Any light with this rating—including the one in this CIRCA spec sheet—is certified as having high levels of performance in many areas, including its resistance to long-term dimming. Look for the DLC Premium certification as a logo on your spec sheet (seen on page 2 of this sheet) or in a mention of it in the text.

UL Rating: There are a couple ratings for safety in electronic components, and it can be a little difficult to tell them apart. At the very least, your light fixture should have one of these ratings. The UL rating is granted by the testing laboratory called Underwriter Laboratories (UL). This laboratory tests products against the standards set by the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC). Underwriting Laboratories is also a part of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s (OSHA) product testing program.

When a product wins a UL rating it is certified as having met the strict safety standards of the organization. Look for a “UL” logo on a spec sheet or some mention of it in the text. A UL rating also comes with quarterly “surveillance” of the product. This ensures ongoing product quality, performance, and safety.

ETL Rating: This rating is closely related to the UL rating and is another good indication of product safety. The ETL rating is granted by the Electrical Testing Laboratories. This lab, like the previous lab, is also part of OSHA’s testing regime. It simply uses slightly different criteria for judging the products it tests.

IP Rating: The IP rating is sometimes called the “waterproof rating.” IP stands for “ingress protection” and addresses how safe a product is from dust, moisture, and other harmful materials (or bugs) getting into a lamp or fixture. This standard was also developed by the aforementioned IEC.

Most IP ratings of light fixtures are either IP65 or IP66. An IP65 rating guarantees protection against dust, moisture, and even sprayed water. A light with this rating is very resilient against the elements. The IP66 rating, however, is even strong—it indicates protection against dust, moisture, and heavy sprays or blasts of water. (IP67 and IP68 score protection against varying levels of water immersion.)

This high bay light spec sheet lists the IP rating under “Materials” on page 3. However, an IP rating could appear nearly anywhere on a spec sheet.

Warranty: A spec sheet for a high-quality LED light or fixture will mention a warranty. One of the best qualities of a modern LED light (for both users and the environment) is its long lifespan. Manufacturers generally offer extremely long warranties on these products.

In the case of this spec sheet, the IntrinsiX CIRCA high bay light has a manufacturer’s 5-year, 50,000-hour warranty (seen at the bottom of page 3).

Duralec oversees all warranties for this and all of its best-in-class products.

Photometrics: The graphs you see on a good spec sheet are called photometrics. These graphs represent how a light performs and disperses across a distance. One such graph of this dispersion is sometimes called the light’s luminous intensity distribution. This graph shows not only the width of spread but also how many lumens are projected at different distances. The same graph might also include the average diffuser angle, which shows how widely the light spreads. Another graph might show the light’s average effective illuminance, which includes the light’s beam angle.

These photometrics attempt to show you what you get with a certain light. They can be very useful when creating a lighting design and allocating lights across a space.

If you have questions about a certain spec sheet, feel free to reach out to a Duralec lighting expert today.

 

Transformers have been around for almost two hundred years. The technology began with the discovery of electromagnetic induction by the English scientist Michael Faraday in the 1830s. (Other scientists probably discovered it around the same time, as well.) Induction is the phenomenon in which a changing magnetic field (magnetic flux) creates a current in a nearby wire. An electrical transformer uses this phenomenon to convert one voltage to another. Since the 1800s, inventors have been making better and better transformers. Today, transformers are crucial components of our electronics as well as our electrical grids.

When choosing a transformer, the top concern is picking the right one for your application. Small transformers come in a variety of sizes and configurations and are suited for electronics or other devices. Large transformers, on the other hand, are capable of connecting you (your building, your campus, etc.) to the power grid. Let’s review some of the considerations when choosing a transformer.

What Is the Right Transformer for the Job?

No matter the size of the transformer, a few factors are key in determining which the best fit is. Understanding these factors—and weighing which are the most important to your project—will ensure long-term success, safety, and savings.

Protection from the elements: Transformers that require enclosures offer many options that meet NEMA (National Electrical Manufacturers Association) standards. Many transformers come with NEMA 3R rated enclosures, along with weather shields. (NEMA 4 enclosures are often available, too, and offer even higher levels of protection against elements like dust and moisture.) Because large transformers often sit outside, these high standards for protection are critical.

Transformers also offer a variety of cooling options to ensure optimal performance and long lifespans. Units are often ventilated or even outfitted with forced-air cooling. Oil or water cooling are also available. Transformers that are used indoors often have cooling systems filled with non-flammable dielectric fluids rather than oil, as an extra safety measure.

An example of these safety measures is seen on the Jefferson Electric Three-Phase Ventilated transformer (rated from 15 to 2,500 KVA). It has insulation rated to 220°C and a temperature rise of 150°C. This transformer is a good fit for all general loads, including lighting, industrial, and commercial uses.

Flexibility: Manufacturers such as Jefferson Electric or Hammond Manufacturing offer electrical transformers in a wide array of sizes and capabilities. Whether it’s a small transformer to fix a guitar amp or a 3-ton, 1000 kVA transformer to power your building, there are many options available and affordable on the market. The top factor for choosing a transformer is likely the voltage rating. The Jefferson Electric Three-Phase Ventilated transformer mentioned above comes in no fewer than 27 voltage options, from 15 to 2,500 KVA.

A huge variety of enclosures is possible, too. Housing dimensions for these large transformers vary from the size of a suitcase to that of a small car. These units can be mounted in a number of ways. Wall brackets are an option for transformers up to 75 kVA. Beyond that, transformers become very heavy, and a floor or concrete pad mount is likely necessary. Drip pans, pole-mounting brackets, and other hardware are also available.

Applications involving facilities with critical needs, such as hospitals or data centers, might require special transformers. Units such as drive isolation transformers or harmonic-mitigating transformers are appropriate for these situations. These units guarantee steady electrical supply in all circumstances. Other specialized transformers are suited for non-linear loads that occur in some buildings, such as offices that use large amounts of modern office equipment.

Efficiency: Today’s transformers are much more efficient than their early ancestors. Manufacturers have had decades to fine tune their designs, and many transformers today are nearly 99% efficient.

Small energy losses can occur in a couple of ways inside a transformer. Energy can be lost in the windings—the coils of metal wire—as well as in the transformer’s metal cores. Sometimes the energy is lost to resistance in the metal, resulting in unwanted heat. Other times, parts of the magnetic field are not fully converted into energy. However, advanced designs have rendered these losses minimal. Different designs include core, shell, concentric, and sandwich configurations of the windings and cores.

In short, the higher the quality of the metals, the more efficient the transformer will be. High-quality windings—either aluminum or copper, usually—and the best steel cores ensure minimal losses.

Seismic protection:Sometimes a transformer needs to be “seismic qualified” for a specific project or region. Critical facilities like hospitals, government facilities, or fire or police stations often fall into this category. In these situations, transformers must be guaranteed to work after seismic events like earthquakes.

Fortunately, many transformers have been built to this high standard and have undergone independent, third-party testing to gain the seismic qualification (the ICC-ES AC156 qualification). These units meet the International Building Code (2015 IBC), as well as the California Building Code (2016 CBC). Units can still be either floor-mounted or wall-mounted.

These seismic qualified transformers can be found in a wide variety of sizes and voltage ratings. For example, Jefferson Electric offers both wall-mounted and floor-mounted transformers in either single or three-phase encapsulated or ventilated models. These seismic qualified units guarantee legal compliance in applications or regions that require it. The seismic protection also offers an additional layer of protection even when not legally mandated.

Quality: Looking for high quality in a transformer ensures that you get a unit which performs at the highest level, runs efficiently, and lasts as long as possible. Duralec-provided transformers, for example, are best in class and offer top performance. High-quality metals in the windings and cores promise efficiency and minimal load losses. Good venting and cooling tools keep transformers running smoothly and add to their long lifespans.

A high-quality transformer will operate more quietly, as well. Some transformers produce a steady humming sound. This is the result of components expanding and contracting with the magnetic field. A transformer with higher-quality materials, however, will be quieter. Its better build quality will also lead to less long-term vibration and noise.

To explore the many electrical transformers on the market, reach out to a Duralec expert today.