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Gardenia Owners: Did you add solar tube(s)? If so, where did you put them? Are you glad you did?

[pooh]

My mother-in-law owns a Gaardenia. She has two solar tubes and loves them. One is over the kitchen sink and the other is in the guest bathroom. The difference in light was amazing.

Love them....I have a Lantana and have three.

[suebanj]

We put one in the guest bathroom and the laundry room..love them!

[juneroses]

In our gardenia we put one in the guest bathroom and the second over the end of the kitchen counter. Love the light they add to otherwise dark areas and would do it again without hesitation.

[Matt and Gail]

Laundry Room only as the new Gardenias have nice light in the guest bath (with our elevation).

[Marlo]

We have one in the kitchen right in the middle and one in the master bath (we have an oversize bathroom) and wish we had put one in the laundry room.

[villagetinker]

I changed out existing lights for LEDs, these provide more light than the original lamps, cost MUCH less than solar tubes, and they have a less than 10% thermal load on the AC system from the original lamps. The cost to relamp my entire Gardenia was less than 1/2 the price of 1 solar tube.
Please do not get me wrong, I have neighbors that have installed these and they are quite nice, but I could not justify the cost.
Just my thoughts, please do not beat me up.

[bachfan]

We have a Gardina and we did the laundry Rom and guest bath but we also put them in the his and her master closets.

[TwoVillagers2]

I have a camellia ( same as gardenia in vinyl). We have 6. LR,Kitchen , MBR bath, Laundry room, guest bath and 2 nd BR.

[mtdjed]

Why? Just because we can and have the money. There really is no need. We have that model house and the lighting is totally adequate. There are so many products that are offered to us to help us spend our money that you have a choice. If that is what you want , do it.

[Lbmb24101]

Originally Posted by mtdjed

Why? Just because we can and have the money. There really is no need. We have that model house and the lighting is totally adequate. There are so many products that are offered to us to help us spend our money that you have a choice. If that is what you want , do it.

I agree with you.
I think the Gardeniae has very good lighting.

My fear is:
What would these solar tubes do to the roof after several yrs?
Leaks?

Who has had these installed for, lets say, 10 or more years?
Any roof issues?

[Russ_Boston]

Originally Posted by villagetinker

I changed out existing lights for LEDs, these provide more light than the original lamps, cost MUCH less than solar tubes, and they have a less than 10% thermal load on the AC system from the original lamps. The cost to relamp my entire Gardenia was less than 1/2 the price of 1 solar tube.
Please do not get me wrong, I have neighbors that have installed these and they are quite nice, but I could not justify the cost.
Just my thoughts, please do not beat me up.

Exactly what I did. Wasn't so much the money saving aspect vs. solar, I don't like the light on ALL THE TIME during the day and you still need the lights at night anyway. I know that they have some with turn on/ turn off levers but that did seem worth it. You'll never make your money back. I probably won't make the money back going with LED's either but with the very low thermal load of the new LED's it was a very good choice. And I was able to mix soft white LED's with Daylight white LED's.

FYI: I used new Cree lights available at HD.

[philnpat]

Originally Posted by Russ_Boston

Exactly what I did. Wasn't so much the money saving aspect vs. solar, I don't like the light on ALL THE TIME during the day and you still need the lights at night anyway. I know that they have some with turn on/ turn off levers but that did seem worth it. You'll never make your money back. I probably won't make the money back going with LED's either but with the very low thermal load of the new LED's it was a very good choice. And I was able to mix soft white LED's with Daylight white LED's.

FYI: I used new Cree lights available at HD.

Russ,
Another benefit to using LEDs is they last so much longer than incandescent bulbs. Less ladder time = more golf time!