Haiku Garage Series Lights by Big Ass Fans - Review

LED Garage (Shop) Lights Deserving of the Big Ass Name

My shop is my garage. It’s where I work on projects for my house, and it’s where I test the products that I review for Tool Skool. For quite some time, I’ve thought about upgrading the lighting in my garage / shop. Big Ass Fan’s Haiku Garage Series Light is exactly what I was looking for. I’ll let the folks with the propeller caps can throw out data all day long but people like what they like. These lights fit my garage / shop perfectly and nothing I write detracts from that, but a proper review shares all that was learned during the process.

Easy installation

The Haiku lights arrived well packaged and ready to install. I was unaware the Haiku lights were pre-wired with plugs and planned to use the same conduit my old fluorescents. It wasn’t a problem but I had to add two boxes, receptacles and covers. The attached power cord is also quite long, I didn’t measure it, but Haiku says the cord is 10 feet, so my OCD got a little twitchy coiling up the slack. If you go to the Haiku website, you’ll see that they do state that they are pre-wired, but I did not do that prior to their arrival. Really, these are very easy to install. And I believe that’s their point for the pre-wiring option.

BAF Haiku Garage Series Lights Installation

The method BAF used to wire the lights is the most versatile and allows the widest variety of mounting options I just wanted to give a heads up to those thinking of a different wiring method.

The lights come supplied with screw-in eye bolts for the joists and S-hooks to attach the light fixture to the eye bolts, but know that the configuration is set for 16” on center. If you don’t have that standard distance you need to be a bit clever, just don’t skimp because the lights are solid and pretty heavy.

Bright Light that Lasts

Now I am down to the money shot and it sure is bright! That is the whole point for garage lights, in my opinion, and Big Ass Lights are certainly that. If you want mood lighting in your garage don’t buy these because the light is stark, bright and white, probably about 12 bazillion Kelvin; just kidding but I wanted to show you nerds I knew a little about color temperature. If you want to get technical, Haiku says that that Garage Series has a 13,000 lumen output which is 16X great than a 60watt incandescent bulb and last a lot longer, like 150 times longer. In fact, they claim 150,000 hours of life on these lights. That's over 17 years if you leave them on non-stop. Holy Cow!

I installed two lights; one at around 7/12 feet high and the other right at 7 and the lower one is somewhat more stark but it’s over my workbench which is a benefit. So the higher the fixture is the softer the light output if that helps. Haiku says that a single fixture will adequately illuminate a 10 x 15 area.

Extras

I passed on the automatic occupancy sensing setup because I didn’t replace all the lights in my garage and avoided a more complex wiring situation where some lights were manual and the two Haiku were automatic. If in the future I replace all the old fixtures with Haiku I will arrange it so one bank is all automation motion sensor activated. The occupancy sensor adds about another $40 to the price.

You can also add a wall mount for about $100 per light.

Final Thoughts

One of the best things about this product is there is not much to say. The lights are simple to install and they light the shop very well. Since they are LED, they should last a very long time, and if you do have an issue, they come with a 7-year warranty. Each unit is a bit under $400, it is a step up in cost from your standard fluorescent garage light, but for a high-quality and long-lasting product, that’s not a huge price to pay. Big Ass Fan’s Haiku Garage Series Lights are amazing and I am very happy with the huge increase in usable light.

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For comparison of shop lighting on Amazon.com: CLICK HERE