I have recently started a new 10gal. tank. I am doing a fishless cycle and already have another 10gal and a 55gal. which are both established with fish. My question relates to the heat produced by the lighting. My 55gal. has floruscent lights that came with it and the temp. of the tank water remains very steady. In both of my 10gal. tanks I have tubular 15 watt lights that came with the hood. I notice that these two tanks seem to have temp. fluctuations that create about a 5 degree change from when lights first come on to when they go off. They are set on a timer for 12 hours on/off. Does anyone know about any tubular bulbs or any other options that would fit this type of hood light which would not produce so much heat as to create such temp. fluctuations? Thanks in advance.
Heat from lighting?
- Thread starter jaxjags64109
- Start date
Hmm. In my experience, a regular 15" flourescent light doesn't produce much heat - though an incandescent would.
Do you have a heater set up? What is it set at? If, for example, there is no heater, or its set low....say around 74 and the water heats to 79...Itd work to just set the heater to 79 normally.
Though, I can't figure out why its heating that much to begin with:scratch:
Do you have a heater set up? What is it set at? If, for example, there is no heater, or its set low....say around 74 and the water heats to 79...Itd work to just set the heater to 79 normally.
Though, I can't figure out why its heating that much to begin with:scratch:
The flourescent lights in my 55gal do not produce any heat or at least iy is not appreciable. It is the filament type screw in bulbs that came with the 10gal hoods that I am having trouble with and the temps. are reaching 81-83F. My heaters are not the type which so an actual temp. reading but they are set to keep the water closer to 76F, I have been lowering the setting on them and have found that it is noting changing the water temps maximum and is only changing the minumum readings as they only come on at night when the lights are off. Once the lights come on the heaters are no longer necessary as the lights produce so much heat that the heaters are not needed. Because these lights came with the tank I figured this would be a fairly common issue and that there were replacement bulbs that I could buy to solve this problem. Any ideas?
I have a cheap Hagen single tube fluorescent light on my 33G and it was putting out a lot of heat. The tank was large enough to disperse the heat with only maybe 1 degree of temp change but I noticed that it was starting to melt the casing on top of the light. I sent it to Hagen's repair dept. and they fixed it for free. It turned out it was the ballast overheating. You should be able to take it back to the store and ask them to have it repaired/replaced.
Just replace them with the screw-in flourescents (as long as you have a glass between the hood and tank, mine didn't I had to buy one to lie across). Get the lowest wattage you can (not so much a heat issue as a too much light and possible algae issue). Mine are the 11w which are equal to 40w, but you can even get 7w ones, you just have to look for the smaller ones. Some are too large in diameter to fit in the hood.
Thanks for the input. I had purchased what looked like compact fluorescents before but they were just plastic covered spiral lights. I found some actual fluorescent screw in bulbs at Walmart this afternoon for about $5. I'll give them a try and see if it makes a difference. I appreciate the feedback.
I had bought the cheapo 10 gallon kit from walmart for a quarentine tank and quickly figured out the incandescent light hood that came with it (two screw-in bulbs with no glass top) were overheating the tank. I finally figured out that if I moved the HOB filter over where there was no hole in the hood and propped the hood up in the back on top of the filter, It would relieve the temp. I then adjusted the heater a little lower than the temp I wanted and have got a pretty constant temp. I could not keep the temp low enough with the hood all the way down. I even bought a lower wattage "grow bulb" and removed the second bulb and it would still get too hot. I bought my wife a 10 gallon and bought a good fluorescent hood and it doesn't get warm at all. Kyle
Snake - out of curiousity...was that the "regular" ($30)10g kit or the "deluxe" )$50), if you don't mind my asking?
All my 10gs are the "deluxe" and came with flourescent lights...
All my 10gs are the "deluxe" and came with flourescent lights...
I have one of the $30 10 gal. starter kits from Wal Mart and those lights definately raised the temp of the tank. I was having major newb probs with my tank, still a newb but anyways. I figured part of the problem I was having had to do with temp fluctuations. After reading into afew things and finding that the staandard tank therms were less then acurate I brought home a spare thermomitor from the resturaunt I manage and tracked the temp of the tank with the light on it did raise 5 degrees in about 2 hours. The therm from work should have only a 1-2 degree variance on it so I'd have to say those incondecent lights in the hood of the tank were just to warm to keep the temp consistant. The tank temp was pretty consistant though with just the heater and not having the lights on other wise though. And yes i washed and sanatized the heck out of the probe before I took it back to work I case you were wondering 
. Just my two cents there since I take temps pretty much for living working in the food industry. At least I'm glad to learn there are flourescent bulbs that fit the hood for the tank so I can still use it as a back up.
-Neo Sithlord
. Just my two cents there since I take temps pretty much for living working in the food industry. At least I'm glad to learn there are flourescent bulbs that fit the hood for the tank so I can still use it as a back up.-Neo Sithlord