Flood Light's Buying Guide

The global market for outdoor lighting is expected to surpass USD 14.44 billion by 2030, and floodlights have played a significant role in this growth. These lights have applications ranging from sports venues to security fences, street lighting, and backyard lighting. Ever since their first use in the 1928 Summer Olympics in Amsterdam, a major sporting event, floodlights have been a staple of sports arenas and venues.

The manufacturers of modern floodlighting systems address the initial problems entirely, such as non-focused or overbright lighting. They use LED lighting elements for enhanced spread and power-efficient lighting setup. This article will cover every aspect one needs to know about flood lights, including their purpose, types, and a quick buying guide.

Purpose

Floodlights illuminate a large indoor or outdoor area. They offer high-intensity ambiance lighting, which improves visibility and security. Most of their applications are in outdoor spaces, including sports fields, parking lots, rooftops, and streets. However, they are equally useful in large indoor spaces like warehouses and industrial setups.

Specifications of Flood Light

♦ Power and Brightness

The unit measuring the power of any electrical device is “watts” (W). A watt defines the amount of electrical energy the device consumes per unit of time. Lumens (lm) is a unit representing the brightness of an illuminating device. It defines the perceived power of visible light in an environment lit by a source. These factors are of significant importance when selecting and purchasing a flood light.

Generally, more watts mean more light but with a higher electrical consumption. A vast area will require floodlight with more lumens. For example, a sports venue may need up to multiple decades of lumens, whereas a house's backyard may need only 1,000 lumens.

♦ Color Temperature

It defines the color of light emitted from a light source. It is measured in Kelvins (K). High color temperatures up to 5000-6000K give cooler bluish-white light, whereas lower temperatures (~3,000K) represent a warm yellowish light source. Here are some of the floodlight color temperatures:

● Warm White (2700K-3000K)

● Neutral White (3500K-4000K)

● Cool White (4500K-5000K)

● Daylight (5500K-6500K)

♦ Regulation

Floodlights and their constituent elements should conform to environmental and safety regulations. The International Football Federation FIFA has strict Quality Assurance guidelines for installing floodlights in stadiums regarding their luminance and luminance uniformity. Floodlights with ENEC, CE, RoHS, ISO9001, ISO14001, ISO50001, and ISO45001 certifications align with many government regulatory and organizational requirements.

♦ Material

Flood lights are usually encased in aluminum or stainless steel bodies, which protect them from harsh weather conditions, and are known for their durability over extended periods. The transparent cover is made of tempered glass, which protects in case the glass fails.

♦ IP/IK Rating

The Ingress Protection (IP) is a set of international ratings that tells how much an electrical device is dust and water-resistant. For example, an IP65 rating means the device is dust-resistant and can protect itself against water splashes. The IK ratings are a set of international standards that define the degree of protection for an electrical enclosure against external mechanical impacts. The numeric representation of the IP/IK rating is from 0-10. A higher IK08 rating means the electrical flood light can withstand physical shocks. Having a solid IP/IK rating is vital for installation in a public place.

Ingress Protection

Impact Protection

♦ Working Hours

Manufacturers refer to a flood light's lifespan in terms of working hours (h). Working hours depend on multiple factors, including the type of lamp and the weather conditions in which it is installed. LED-type floodlights offer the most working hours, up to 50,000 hours.

♦ Lighting Element

Common lighting elements installed in floodlights are Halogen, LED, metal halide, and high-pressure sodium lamps. The type of heating element significantly defines the response and the working hours of a floodlight.

Applications

● Residential: Backyards, rooftops, courtyard, lawn areas

● Commercial: Parking lots, outdoor advertising, building illumination

● Industrial: Large warehouses, manufacturing setups, process industry halls

● Public: Streetlights, metro stations, airports, train halls

● Sports: Stadium, football grounds, tennis courts, and more

Different Types of Floodlights

1. Halogen Type Floodlight

These are classical incandescent lights in which the manufacturer encloses the tungsten filaments in a glass tube filled with halogen gas. Iodine and bromine are the most used halogen gases. On passing electric current across the tungsten filament, it heats up and gives light. The halogen gas inside the quartz tube surrounding the tungsten filament reacts with tungsten vapors and redeposits them back onto the filament. It inhibits the deterioration of the filament, allowing the tungsten filament to achieve higher temperatures, which means more light than the standard incandescent light. Also, it increases the life span of the filament.

Based on feedback, buyers prefer them for outdoor field lighting and security fence lighting due to their bright white light. However, they usually generate a lot of heat and are less energy efficient than their LED counterparts.

2. LED Type Floodlight

These floodlights use a semiconductor device popularly known as a Light-Emitting Diode (LED). When an electric current passes across the LED, it emits light photons, which give visible light. Unlike their traditional incandescent or filament bulbs, they don’t generate heat up a filament to produce light. LEDs are solid-state devices, so they are much more energy efficient.

They generate a small amount of heat. They offer longer life spans than 100,000 hours, meaning fewer replacements, saving money and time. They produce instant illumination, unlike halogen lights, which take time to heat filament. It makes them best suited for security purposes. Due to their solid-state circuitry, they are less prone to external shocks, environmental impacts, and damage from frequent on-off cycles. A high-end LED flood light can withstand up to 90% relative humidity and voltage fluctuation between 100-277V. It may also feature an IP65 / IK09 rating with a life span of >50,000 hours.

They come with metal heat sinks, which dissipate the very little heat generated during operation. It makes LED lights cooler to the human touch. Users prefer placing them in parking lots, sports fields, security fences, etc.

The initial cost of an LED-type floodlight is higher, but it pays off early due to its> 90% electrical efficiency. Halogen lights offer more brightness than LED lights, but if we think of brightness in terms of lumens per watt of electricity consumed, LED flood lights are the clear winner.

    3. Metal Halide

These are High-Intensity Discharge (HID) lamps. They consist of a mixture of mercury in gaseous form and metal halides (metal compounds formed with iodine or bromine). When an electric current is passed across the arc tube, gas is ionized, and as the temperature increases, the metal halides dissociate into metal atoms and halogen atoms.

The most frequently used metal halide is sodium iodide. As the electric arc increases gas temperature, sodium dissociates from the iodine, adding orange as the metal ionizes. Metal halide lights offer higher efficacy than their counterparts. They produce up to 75-100 lumens per watt of electricity consumed. They primarily use lighting applications like sports arenas, automotive headlamps, and public places.

They take time to reach full operating conditions as the pressure and temperature inside the gaseous mixture tube take time to warm up. This period can be as long as five minutes. As the metal halide lamp ages, the outer glass tube becomes weakened due to operational heat stresses. The pressure inside the tube can reach up to 3.5 atm. The tube at the end of life usually breaks inside the outer glass casing. Generally, their life span is < 20,000 lumens.

4. High-Pressure Sodium

These are sodium vapor lamps that operate at internal pressure, usually above 1 atm, and temperature above 1000C. They contain xenon gas along with a sodium-mercury mixture enclosed in a ceramic tube. When an electric current is passed, the xenon gas ionizes to create an arc that heats the sodium mercury amalgam. The mercury vapors emit a bluish-white light, and the sodium vapors emit a golden-white light.

These lamps offer higher efficacy and produce up to 150 lumens per watt of electricity consumed. They provide higher life spans, usually > 24,000 hours. However, it gives poor color rendering (distorts illuminated object color). They are typically used for street lighting and as advertising light on billboards, signs, parks, and monuments.

Quick Buying Guide

Now that we know the basics of a floodlight, we can quickly make the decision to buy one for our next project based on these quick guides. The main target is to build a solid knowledge base to assist in making a knowledgeable buying decision.

1. Assess your needs: Identify the purpose, review location-specific requirements, and assess the desired lux level.

2. Type Selection: Based on the requirements, choose between the available Halogen, LED, or high-pressure sodium lights. LED is the latest technology, requiring less power and providing longer-lasting performance.

3. Specifications: Choose appropriate lumens, wattage, IP rating, etc.

4. Comparisons: Compare different options as per budget requirements

5. Check for Reviews: give due weightage to the operating experience feedback by the users.

6. Purchase: Get the floodlights and have them installed by a qualified technician.

FAQs

1. How long do flood lights generally last?

Their everyday life spans over 45000 hours of illumination. Life spans are also dependent on environmental and operating conditions.

2. Is there any difference between IP65 and IP67 rating flood lights?

IP65 rating guarantees protection against dust and water splashes, while IP67 offers water ingress protection up to 1-meter deep water immersion for 30 minutes.  In a nutshell, IP65-rating flood lights are for general outdoor purposes, whereas common adversaries are dusty winds and light rainfall. IP67-rating flood lights offer superior protection against harsh weather conditions, including short-duration water immersion.

3. What type of flood light is best suited for outdoor security?

LED floodlights are best suited for security purposes. They are energy efficient, offer bright and clear lighting, and possess longer life hours.

4. Do flood lights serve the purpose of indoor lighting?

Floodlights offer high-lumen light intensity and are suited for large indoor spaces like warehouses, halls, metro stations, and indoor process industry spaces like turbine halls.

5. Which Flood light rating is best suited for me?

Each application has its own set of requirements. Large open spaces like a football field will require higher lumens ( >10,000 lm), whereas backyard or street lighting purposes require lesser lumens (2,000 to 3,000 lm).