any ideas on how to make flouro tube reflector

I just ordered 6 two foot T5 florescent lights.....Each one is just a skinny light fixture w/bulb....any ideas on making homemade reflectors for tube lighting would be much apprciated

whatever you got in your house that reflects light, i would say aluminum foil but i dont hear anything good about it.

wrap two poster boards in mylar and hang them over the lights.

get some sheet metal and mylar.. get creative..

easiest way would probablly be take a piece of play wood cut it so all 6 tubes fit on it, wrap it in mylar, then mount lights to it.. then take poster board or something and wrap them in mylar and make it like wings attached to the play wood, then put hooks on the back on the playwood so you can hang it, i would also attach a surge protector to the top and make sure it and were wires cant move use zip ties and shit just keep it clean other wise you will have wires everywhere and it will suck to adjust lol

Cant you put foil on one side of the tube?

Corrugated sheet metal(that shit with the waves in it). Mount them in the valleys.

SWIMoryou said:

Cant you put foil on one side of the tube?

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Sure you can. But why not use something that is much better?

Aluminum foil only reflects between 50% and 55% of light rays. It will reflect even less if uneven and or crinkled and it can create hot spots.

Flat white paint reflects between 80% and 85% of light rays.

Mylar will reflect 90% to 92% of light rays.

Quality pebbled/textured light hoods/reflectors reflect 95%+ of light rays.

Brick Top said:

Sure you can. But why not use something far better?

Aluminum foil only reflects between 50% and 55% of light rays, less if it is uneven and crinkled and it creates hot spots.

Flat white paint reflects between 80% and 85% of light rays.

Mylar will reflect 90% to 92% of light rays.

Quality pebbled/textured light hoods/reflectors reflect 95%+ of light rays.

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Bullshit.

Powder coat white paint reflects 80-85%. Aluminum reflects 85-95%. Mylar is just aluminum metalized to fiberglass.

Hot spots don't exist. You are not creating lenses with your foil, especially crinkled.

Lens = large area of light concentrated into small area.

Diffusion = little areas of light 'randomly' dispersing light into a larger area. This is what crinkles will do in foil. This is what white paint does.

And what about the silver shiny as heck but not reflective wrapping paper what is that any one have specs on that

Silver is an excellent reflector, perhaps the best in the visible spectrum. It tarnishes quite rapidly.

All this wrapping paper, mylar, foil... it's all aluminum. None are likely coated with any real oxidation protection.

HID lights are much higher intensity, white paint would probably be better because daylight is only around 10,000 lumens, and high-wattage HPS put out 10x that. Diffusion would probably be very beneficial. But the smaller the light source the better reflector you need for that 30-40% yield increase over using nothing at all.