Lighting for Layouts?

[e-paw]

I use 4 lamp fluorescent fixtures in my basement. They are the "T-8" ,skinny bulbs that use a electronic ballast. That ballast will not leak like some "T-12" ,fatter tubes tend to do when they go bad. Also, they do not contain any pcb's like the older T-12 do. Instead of the cool white lamps I also use the day light type, there color balance is better for taking pics. They give me enough light that I seldom need a flash. I got lucky and got the fixtures free ,but they were in bad shape. I was able to get 6 working fixtures out of the 9 that I got. Any fixture can be converted from a T-12 to a T-8 just by changing the ballast, the sockets are all the same. look at any of my pics to see the results that i get with them.