Feb 142013
 
PinExt Product Spotlight: Halogen Landscape Lights

This week’s Product Spotlight has fallen on Valentine’s Day, and that couldn’t be more apt, since our halogen landscape lights are so easy to fall in love with.

Halogen Landscape Lights Product Spotlight: Halogen Landscape Lights

If you’re looking for a way to add a little dazzle back into your landscape, halogen landscape lights might be just what you need. Imagine being able to stroll with your sweetie down softly lit pathways on warm nights under the stars, or showing off your prized garden to friends and family, even after the sun goes down.

You can use halogen landscape lights to enhance walkways and flowerbeds or the areas around your decks and patios. These lights can also accent plants or architectural features, adding beautiful points of light around the outside of your home or business.

Find Your Perfect Style Match

Each of our halogen landscape lights is made of elegant black powder coated metal, and comes with a mounting spike and halogen light bulb. Continue reading »

PinExt Product Spotlight: Halogen Landscape Lights
Jan 052012
 
PinExt New Home Project: Remodel Recessed Lights

electrical project New Home Project: Remodel Recessed LightsWelcome to this fifth blog post of my New Home Project series. This series of posts reviews the lighting projects that I have undertaken in my new home since moving in to it in September 2009. To be honest, most of these projects have been completed some time ago. It was my goal to write a post after each project, but time just gets away from you sometimes. I cannot believe that it has been over 2 years since moving into my home.

This project involved adding seven 4-inch recessed cans throughout the first floor of my house.

PinExt New Home Project: Remodel Recessed Lights
Jul 152010
 
PinExt How to Choose Under Cabinet Lighting

Xenon Line Voltage Thin Under Cabinet Lights How to Choose Under Cabinet LightingIf you’re only going to choose just one lighting feature to add your kitchen, make it under cabinet lighting.  It provides task lighting for your countertops to make them ideal for food preparation and cooking, it illuminates the backsplash on your wall to create beautiful accent lighting, and it can also be used as night lighting for your kitchen.  Once you install under cabinet lighting, you’ll never want to go back.

Many lighting designers talk about creating “layers of light” for your kitchen.  Under cabinet lighting serves as a crucial “layer” for great design.

That being said, there are a ton of options to choose from.  How do you know what style of under cabinet lighting is right for your kitchen?  Hopefully, this guide will make it a little easier to make your selection.

It’s a good idea to choose your light source first.

1. Fluorescent, Xenon, or LED?

Microfluorescent T4 Under Cabinet Lights How to Choose Under Cabinet Lighting

Fluorescent Under Cabinet Lights

Fluorescent under cabinet lights are the most energy efficient in providing a given amount of light.  Moreover, fluorescent light sources give off very little heat.  This is a great feature depending on what is stored in the cabinet immediately above the under cabinet fixture or, perhaps, what is lying 12 to 18 inches below the light.  While most fluorescent fixtures cannot be dimmed, they can be a wonderful, inexpensive option.  In addition, our Microfluorescent Fixtures or Fluorescent Swivel Sticks are probably the easiest products to install – a definite plus. Continue reading »

PinExt How to Choose Under Cabinet Lighting
Jan 182010
 
PinExt Low Voltage Indoor Lighting: Pendant Lights for Every Room

mini pendant light1 Low Voltage Indoor Lighting: Pendant Lights for Every RoomLow voltage lighting is not new. According to Popular Mechanics magazine, “Low voltage outdoor lighting got its start in the early 1950s when Bill Locklin, an electrical contractor in Redlands, Calif., was asked by a client to put up some outdoor lights.” It took a few decades for homeowners to catch on and take advantage of all the benefits that low voltage lighting has to offer. Nowadays, homeowners installing outdoor landscape lighting often choose low voltage lighting fixtures.

But what about low voltage indoor lighting? Almost 60 years after Bill Locklin’s innovation, low voltage indoor lighting has finally become mainstream. There are several reasons why low voltage lighting has become more popular. Better quality fixtures, long-lasting bulbs and easier installation methods are just a few of the reasons. Further, many Americans are more aware of the importance of energy conservation and the savings that result from using low voltage fixtures and energy-saving light bulbs. Low voltage lighting fixtures, and the bulbs that are used with them, provide a higher quality light. Low voltage lights have also become more versatile than in the past. There are many low voltage design options. Some popular fixture types include track lighting, under cabinet lighting and hanging pendants.
Continue reading »

PinExt Low Voltage Indoor Lighting: Pendant Lights for Every Room
Dec 172009
 
PinExt Monthly Forum Winner for November

site logo Monthly Forum Winner for NovemberIt is that time of the month again – announcing our newest monthly Pegasus Lighting Forum $50 gift certificate winner. I really do like writing these blog posts. This month our winner is forum member kalieaire. Kalieaire joined our forum in May shortly after it was launched.

To help build our new online lighting community, Pegasus Associates Lighting is giving away:

  • Free lighting gifts to the first 100 members who join the forum. To date, we now have 70 members.
  • Free lighting gifts to the first 50 members who post in our forum 10 times.
  • A $50 gift certificate to one lucky forum member each month for the rest of 2009. There is only one month remaining to be eligible to win a $50 gift certificate.

The Pegasus Associates Lighting Forum is an online lighting community with a primary focus on helping to answer our website visitor’s lighting questions. Answers may come from one of our technical customer service representatives monitoring our lighting forum or another forum member. In addition, our forum is also a place to allow people to share their lighting projects (including images), post lighting articles, and to provide feedback on our products or website.

Our most recent post asked a question about which type of dimmer needs to be used for a 150-watt electronic transformer powering under cabinet puck lighting. The best type of dimmer to use is an electronic low voltage dimmer. If a regular line voltage dimmer is used it may shorten the life of the transformer, cause a slight humming from the transformer, and reduce the range of dimmability.

Our monthly forum winners:

May: cmgeupel
June: Joe B.
July: Premium
August: pbcomm
September: bigguy
October: Chloe & Co.
November: kalieaire
PinExt Monthly Forum Winner for November
Jul 012009
 
PinExt Low Voltage Lighting: 15 Things You Need to Know

featured on ezine articles Low Voltage Lighting: 15 Things You Need to KnowThe use of low voltage lighting systems has become increasingly popular over the past several years.  Low voltage halogen and low voltage xenon lighting systems can be found in almost any setting – restaurants, hotels, bars, retail stores, museums, art galleries, offices, and the home.  We have all seen these types of lighting systems in the form of cabinet lightingcove lighting, landscape lighting, picture lights, regular track lighting, flexible track lighting (sometimes referred to as monorail lighting), cable lighting, and under cabinet lighting.  Here are 15 things that you should know about these low voltage lighting systems.

Continue reading »

PinExt Low Voltage Lighting: 15 Things You Need to Know
Jul 012009
 
PinExt Customer Lighting Project: Xenon Low Voltage Light Strip

If you’re searching for the perfect display lighting for your cabinet or showcase, check out these customer lighting project photos.  These are from Case Sensitive of Hartford, Connecticut (a company that sells custom showcases for guitars).  Featured in the photos is our Xenon Low Voltage Light Strip:

StripLightCase Customer Lighting Project: Xenon Low Voltage Light Strip StripLightCase2 Customer Lighting Project: Xenon Low Voltage Light Strip
StripLightCaseDetail Customer Lighting Project: Xenon Low Voltage Light Strip
PinExt Customer Lighting Project: Xenon Low Voltage Light Strip
Jul 012009
 
PinExt Customer Lighting Project: 3 Inch Low Voltage Recessed Trim & Housing

We have a wide variety of LED and halogen recessed lighting fixtures and accessories. You can choose trims and housings from a variety of materials, shapes, sizes, lamp wattages, and light sources.

Shown here are two 3-Inch Low Voltage Recessed Lighting Trims with 3-Inch Low Voltage Recessed Lighting Housings using MR16 12-volt halogen light bulbs installed over each hotel bed.

3inRecessedOverBed400 Customer Lighting Project: 3 Inch Low Voltage Recessed Trim & Housing 3inRecessedOverBed400A Customer Lighting Project: 3 Inch Low Voltage Recessed Trim & Housing

Photos provided by Holiday Inn Express in Mountain View, CA

PinExt Customer Lighting Project: 3 Inch Low Voltage Recessed Trim & Housing
Jul 012009
 
PinExt Customer Lighting Project: 4 Inch Low Voltage Trims with Adjustable Eyeball & Housing

The before and after photos below show how two 4-Inch Low Voltage Trims with Adjustable Eyeball and 4-Inch Low Voltage Air Tight Remodel Recessed Lighting Housings are being used as “picture lights”. They provide excellent accent lighting and highlight the vivid colors of this artwork.

artwork before Customer Lighting Project: 4 Inch Low Voltage Trims with Adjustable Eyeball & Housing
Before: An authentic Thomas Kinkade painting is hanging over a red brick mantel with no accent lighting of any kind highlighting the finer points of this piece of art. (Note: the reflection off of the lower part of this painting was caused by the camera flash.)
artwork after1 Customer Lighting Project: 4 Inch Low Voltage Trims with Adjustable Eyeball & Housing
After: The two low voltage adjustable eyeball trims (PNL-418-WW) and two 4in low voltage air tight remodel recessed lighting housings (PNLR-404QAT-50-120) in just the right location helps to reveal the nuances of this work by the “Painter of Light”.

Eyeball trims were selected so that the light from the light bulbs could be directed exactly where the light is needed, white was selected so that their finish/color does not distract the viewer’s eyes from the painting, and low voltage MR16 light bulbs were selected so that the light could be precisely focused on the painting without producing much “spill light”.

The remodel recessed lighting housing was selected because the sheet rock ceiling was already in place and the air tight model was selected to avoid significant leakage of heated or air-conditioned air to or from the space above the ceiling.

Finally, the two recessed downlights were located in such a way that the central beam of light created a 30-degree angle with the vertical. This guideline for locating downlights used to light wall hangings tends to minimize any indirect glare being reflected off the painting. Notice how the accent light coming from the two newly-installed recessed downlights accentuates the light coming from the house windows in the painting.

PinExt Customer Lighting Project: 4 Inch Low Voltage Trims with Adjustable Eyeball & Housing
Jul 012009
 
PinExt Lighting Tips for Cabinets

Guiding Principle
“Light is the first element of design; without it there is no color, form, or texture.” – Thomas E. Farin

General
Lighting can add depth or drama to your cabinet or to the items inside your cabinet.
Lighting can give even a small display inside your cabinet a “dimensional quality”.

Ambient Light
The ambient light provided by the room is often not enough to see what is in or under your cabinet.
Continue reading »

PinExt Lighting Tips for Cabinets