Shop Products
Houzz Logo Print
stuii

4' bare batten -) what reflector to use?

stuii
15 years ago

Hi all,

Can people please post some links to products, pics or their own ghetto solutions for cheap and effective reflectors to suit your standard 4' bare twin tube flouro battens?

I'm thinking this might be a really good upgrade to my system!

Thanks and regards,

Stuart

Comments (5)

  • Karen Pease
    15 years ago

    Don't have any pics, and not using fluoro, but my "ghetto reflector" solution is made of an old piece of 8'x2' low-grade wood lattice that I had lying around, two 8' cheap 1"x2"s forming reinforcements along the length and two scraps of 1"x2"s forming crossbeams. I attached aluminum foil with elmer's glue to its underside, then taped two feet of foil down the sides on all sides. I added two ceiling hooks to the room and hung the whole thing with clothesline so that it's adjustable up and down. Seems to work pretty well, and the spots where the foil doesn't fit very well together (I should have taped all the way across the joins instead of just at a few locations) makes it look really eerie at night. ;)

    Oh, and I coated the tops of my plant trays with a loose layer of perlite, just for added reflection.

    I considered using something white instead of the foil, so as to scatter light rather than just reflect it, but I felt I'd get good enough scattering merely from the unevenness in the foil, and I liked how the foil was a near-perfect, completely opaque reflector; a lot of white things I considered had either some degree of translucency or seemed more likely to absorb some of the light.

  • stuii
    Original Author
    15 years ago

    do people think using that builders type wall insulation (foily kind of stuff with heavy paper on one side) with some form of a gantry to hold it in place would be worthwhile?

  • hydroponica
    14 years ago

    A simple way to do it is with the stiff (not flexible) metal dryer ducting. Cut it up one side with tin snips and carefully open it up into a big half-cylinder.

    You'll probably want to reinforce it a little so it doesn't bend or flex on you in a bad way. But those things only cost a couple bucks or so.

    I'm considering exactly this kind of design for a lighting system I'm planning to build soon.

  • stuii
    Original Author
    14 years ago

    what are these metal dyrer ducts?

    I'm not familiar with the product... are you able to post some screenshot or link?

    Cheers!

  • hydroponica
    14 years ago

    There's a bunch of different things you can use for dryer venting. There's the plastic flexible kind (that really ought not be used at all), the metal flexible kind, and the metal inflexible kind. I'm talking about the latter.

    Basically just a solid sheet of metal curved around into a tube. Open it up and you get a nice reflector for a few bucks. You can polish it or line it with something reflective like mylar if you want, or just leave it as-is.

    In the picture I linked below, it's the tall pipe on the left I'm talking about. Incidentally, this is also the smartest ducting to use for a dryer hookup since it is much less likely to collect lint and start a fire.

    Here is a link that might be useful:

Sponsored
Fairfax Kitchen and Bath
Average rating: 4.9 out of 5 stars53 Reviews
DC Area's Top Rated Kitchen & Bath Remodeling Experts