Before I go to the trouble of designing barn doors for 500watt garage lights, I thought I would ask if anyone has done this already and has a design already worked out.

yes , there is a guy on this forum advertising for such thing, made in china, cost around $30

Here's your link...

http://www.coollights.biz/clbd4-halogen-worklight-barndoor-p-36.html

Hope this helps...

Kevin

Oh, if your looking for the DIY solution...

http://www.coollights.biz/free-clbd4-barndoor-template-p-48.html

Kevin

Thank you for your time and trouble. I thought that somebody would have arrived at a solution which was better than my Glad cooking tray method of using a box knife to make temporary horizontal flaps in the base of one, vertical flaps in the bottom of the other, then folding the tops over the wire grilles and stacking one over the other and using alfoil over any remaining light leaks.

The home depot style lights require a few changes to the fasteners before they pan and tilt satisfactorily, principally, longer lateral bolts, flat washers between friction faces, a three layer sandwich stack of flat and spring washers or real heavyduty coil springs to maintain a friction which endures and a nylok nut over each square nut to keep things from coming loose.

"Life was never meant to be easy, but son, do you really have to work so diligently at making it so hard for yourself."

Here's a video showing the process:

http://www.coollights.biz/wordpress/archives/21

As Kevin pointed out, you can either do it all yourself using the resources on the site or just buy our kit.

Richard.


Thanks for your added information.

Where I was going with my own design was to have the barn doors hinged onto a removable perimeter frame.

This frame would fix to the front opening frame of the lamp house by sliding down from above on rear folded vertical "C"-sections with limit folds on the upper ends to stop the thing from sliding right down and off again.

My impression from the images is that your arrangement permanently affixes hinges to the front opening frame which retains the wire grid and safety glass. Is my impression correct or have I got it wrong as I am known to do from time to time?

The two styles of lamps are of similar dimensions, close in design and style and a one-size-fits-all vertical sliding frame should work for both.

also... a roll of black cinefoil goes a long way.

Richard.


Thanks for your added information.

Where I was going with my own design was to have the barn doors hinged onto a removable perimeter frame.

This frame would fix to the front opening frame of the lamp house by sliding down from above on rear folded vertical "C"-sections with limit folds on the upper ends to stop the thing from sliding right down and off again.

My impression from the images is that your arrangement permanently affixes hinges to the front opening frame which retains the wire grid and safety glass. Is my impression correct or have I got it wrong as I am known to do from time to time?

The two styles of lamps are of similar dimensions, close in design and style and a one-size-fits-all vertical sliding frame should work for both.

Yes, thats right they affix permanently in my scheme. It would be quite a bit more work to make the removable frame type. The most common design in that type of removable barndoor is a 1/8" (or so) wire, bent into the shape of the face of the worklight (rectangular mostly). Then the barndoor leaves are attached to that with copper or other metal straps and tightened down to where they move in a "sticky" fashion. This is the most commonly seen type of barndoor on modern fresnels for instance.

Richard.


Thanks again for your responsive info posted here and on the Cool Lights website.

I have had a bit of a play with cardboard patterns and arrived at a generic slide-on arrangement for the two styles of worklights.

The downside compared with your arrangement is it needs three different barn door profiles for four doors. If the groundlevel model of the worklights is ignored, one can get away with two profiles for R/L sides and upper/lower.

It is all sheetmetal cut and fold, thin bolts and flatwasher/springwasher three-layer sandwiches for friction hinges, no bent thin rod or wire material used.

All up, five sheetmetal pieces plus fasteners.

If you want scans of the templates, please let me know via dininfo email and I will do them as .jpg files.