Replacement fluorescent light bulb?

[avoxo]

The bulb in my 20-gallon just went out, I have had this one for almost 15 years. I went to my local Home Depot and bought the Plant and Aquarium bulb, got home and hooked it up and was totally blown away by the color change. The tank, fish, gravel everything now has a yellow tint to it. On the package it said it has a unique spectral and color range but I was not expecting this. I am going to return the bulb and possibly buy another one from there, any recommendations. I will also be ordering supplies soon and would take any suggestions for a replacement.

[blitzen25bm]

do you have live plants? the plant bulbs have that yellow or pink tint to them. if you dont have live plants you can get any plain bulb i put one in thats supposed to look like sunlight and the couple plants i have under it are ok and the light is really white.

[chipstahoy]

i've bought a lot of bulbs from home depot, so i know what you're talking about. home depot also has a "sunlight" bulb or whatever that is brighter and may be more of what you're looking for. the plant and aquarium bulb is mostly for tanks that have live plants...but if you had that other bulb for 15 years, i'm guessing you're not worried about plants. another good thing you could do (that i did on one of my aquariums) is get the type of strip light for incandescent bulbs (it has two screw-in places for two incandescent bulbs) and buy the new spiral daylight bulb at home depot that are about $8. they typically last longer and provide more light. my aquarium looks pretty dang nice, and it's good for my plants. hope this helps

-chip

[avoxo]

It’s not the brightness (because the other one was bright enough), it’s the way the colors are different. There was a yellow tint to the tank that was not there before. I returned the bulb and bought a different one and it was almost the same thing (way to much yellow). I am going to try to get Aqua Rays made by GE. Except I cannot find them from the 2 pet supply places that I buy stuff from.

[beviking]

Did you try the kitchen and bath light? These are designed to look white so may be what you're looking for?

[Turin Turambar]

Fffifteen years??? Wow... can't believe you used the neon bulb every day for FIFTEEN YEARS?!
Anyway, there is possibility that your FIFTEEN YEARS old bulb produced duller light than a new one. It's actually very common for neon bulbs to lose its brightness over the time...

[avoxo]

I ended up going to a little aquarium shop around the corner from my house and he had the GE bulb that I was looking for. I gave up after trying Home Depot 3 times. This one is much better than the others.

I ended up going to 7 other pet stores to get that particular brand that I was looking for. Is there a reason that most pet stores do not carry the GE brand?

[beviking]

Yeah, b/c most Home Depots carry them.;)

[125gJoe]

avoxo,

If you are looking for aquarium spectrum lighting, you won't find them at Home Depot. I had to order bulbs online - but they are the Compact Flourescents which aren't real common - yet.

For the GE aquarium bulbs, try All Glass' Aquariums website..

edit:
Many do use Home Depot 'regular' bulbs, but if you want live plants, I'd use the 'aquarium type' bulbs.. AquaRay is good..
Bulb brightness lasts for a year or two, then it's time to replace them.

[Locust]

Aha! I just did the same thing with my Betta tank and was wondering about the color change, but I thought it may have been a combination of residual bettamax and driftwood.