Red light in engine room?

[esarratt]

Does anyone actually use a red light in their engine room?

[Fortytwo]

You can replace your engine room light with a red/white LED or use a red white head lamp.

https://bedazzledledlighting.co.uk/product-category/led-bulbs/g4-led-bulbs/g4-side-pin-horizontal/

https://a.co/d/hh9RtOw

[Foswick]

All of our lights are red/white.

[esarratt]

But do any of you actually use the red light at night?

I've got lights I can install in my engine room that are red/white and other ones that are white.

So, I'm wondering if the red light is just a "feature" that is not used in actual practice? Thank you for your help.

[Foswick]

I would use it if I needed to look at the engine at night, just to preserve night vision. I guess that there are some other benefits in the engine room, but nothing that matters to me.

It used to be the case that red lights created less heat, but with LEDs, this isn't the case, and I don't know that it ever really made much difference. It also supposedly makes some things easier to see like certain leaks, but this isn't something I have found.

[ChrisJHC]

I would expect that, if I have to do some unplanned work on the engine in the middle of the night, that maintaining my night vision would be very low on the list of things I was worrying about.

[Foswick]

Originally Posted by ChrisJHC

... if I have to do some unplanned work on the engine in the middle of the night, that maintaining my night vision would be very low on the list of things I was worrying about.

Fair enough. In general, there isn't much that I do at night under a red light that takes more than a few minutes. That's true of anything - not just engine work. If it takes more than a few minutes, I probably want more light.

[grantmc]

Any light in the engine bay is better than no light at all.

[SailingHarmonie]

I use red lights in lots of places, but not the engine room. If I am in there underway at night, it is because there is a problem, and I need to SEE clearly what is going on and what I am doing to fix it. If I need to make a quick trip in for a look or to grab something, a red headlamp is good enough without the expense of an extra or modified fixture.

[esarratt]

Originally Posted by SailingHarmonie

I use red lights in lots of places, but not the engine room. If I am in there underway at night, it is because there is a problem, and I need to SEE clearly what is going on and what I am doing to fix it. If I need to make a quick trip in for a look or to grab something, a red headlamp is good enough without the expense of an extra or modified fixture.

Thanks!

[jamhass]

We used both in our engine room. But ... we had a fuel vacuum gauge that we checked each watch on passages (and it was easy to see in red) so it was nice to NOT impede our night vision. Having the option is almost always better than not, IMHO.