How to choose front lamps
Facade lights are designed to highlight and decorate buildings, above all this is the aesthetic aspect of lighting. With the help of outdoor lighting, you can create an illusion and a fairy tale, draw attention to the merits or disguise flaws. Through the use of facade lighting, you can illuminate any part of the building: walls, arches, columns, terraces and garden plots.
The most common exterior facade lighting is divided into three groups:
- architectural and artistic lighting;
- central lighting;
- landscape lighting.
Before you choose front lamps, you should decide on the type of lighting, because each of them has its own purpose, place of use and equipment. The object of the illumination itself is also important: a city building or a country house, private or public buildings. Well-designed and executed outdoor lighting ensures the comfort and safety of movement.
Lighting devices are selected in the style appropriate to the landscape design and exterior of the building. LED lights, hidden lights, marker spotlights - many options.
Types of lighting
There are:
- incandescent lamps,
- discharge lamps,
- xenon lamps,
- fluorescent lamps,
- induction lamps
- solar lighting.
When choosing a facade fixtures should pay attention to their strength and security from temperature extremes. Due to the fact that they are under the open sky, they are highly susceptible to natural influences. Corrosion - one of the most common damage.
When choosing facade fixtures for urban buildings, you must consider the location of the building and the characteristics of its surrounding area. Often for such lighting choose LED multi-colored illuminators. To do this, you need to make preliminary calculations on the facade itself, after which a test visualization of the entire lighting complex is formed.
Note! The lifetime of LED lamps and fixtures is up to 35 years, which distinguishes them from others.
One of the most frequently used methods of facade lighting is the use of marker spotlights in combination with lamps of lesser power, with clearly directed light rays.
In such cases, large spotlights are placed below, and they illuminate the building as a whole. Smaller lanterns are positioned around the perimeter on special supports to emphasize the desired details.
This type of lighting is excluded for use in residential buildings due to excessively bright light.
Degree of protection
On outdoor lighting fixtures indicate their degree of protection from exposure to the environment. It is marked as IP (Ingress Protection), where І is protection against solid particles and dust, and P is moisture resistance. Minimum indicators I - 1, and maximum 6. Indicators P range from 1 to 8.
Based on these data, we can conclude that for low-rise facade luminaires, the degree of protection is IP-44, lanterns with a height exceeding two meters is IP-23; , and for lighting in the pool - IP-68.
The terms of operation of external lighting devices are determined not only by the material from which they are made, but also by the method of its processing.
Note! Products made of ferrous metal are subject to corrosion for one year. Aluminum has a longer life due to the oxide film covering them. Even more durable are lamps made of anodized aluminum or coated with a special polymer powder. Operational periods of up to 15 years provide chrome plating, and metal-plastic will last up to 20 years.
Lighting control
Currently, it is no longer necessary to control the lighting by switching the switch on the panel. Modern lighting devices meekly light up and go out from the whistle, clap, voice commands, obey light and motion sensors.
The inclusion of lamps according to the plan requires the presence of light sensors, which automatically turn on the facade lamps with the onset of twilight. There are ordinary timers that turn on the light at a specified time. The most convenient and expensive are the infrared motion sensors, they consistently light the lighting groups so that the person walking always is in the highlighted area.
These sensors save energy, increase lamp life and, at the same time, are a kind of security system.
To create a unique lighting at home, you need to work hard; this process requires technical and design skills. An excellent assistant in the design of building lighting is a special computer program that works in three-dimensional mode. Connect the imagination, combine the power and size of the facade fixtures and get unique and unforgettable lighting.
See also:
How to make lighting the facade of the house