screw in compact flourescents

[Hebdizzle]

I could buy a hood like this
http://www.petsmart.com/fish/shopping/lighting/products/product%5F34537.shtml

and use bulbs like this?

http://www.petsmart.com/fish/shopping/lighting/products/product%5F34544.shtml

[Elmo]

Yep, that should work fine.

[Starry]

I'm not sure about the bulb, but you might want to rethink the hood - it has a tiny opening, so you're going to have to remove the whole hood to work on your plants, so you won't be able to see much without lights. Just something to consider.

[kveeti]

Starry is correct. I have an old 10 gallon, with a 1 piece incandescent canopy (with screw-in fluourescents) - plus my tanks are in the basement - too dark to even do water changes without the canopy on. Here is what I rigged up for mine using a thick dowel. Of course, it would depend on the canopy shape but maybe you could adapt something similar. On the left are close-ups of the top (a cut slit) and bottom (a V-notch).

http://members.shaw.ca/kveeti/canopy.jpg

[only6foot6]

Stupid question but curios?

If you use a screw in power compact bulb, what wattage do you use figure out the common ratio watts/gallon. Do you use 10 watts because that is how much the power compact consumes, or do you use 50 watts because that how much light it is equilivant to in incandescent light putting out?

For example, a gallon tank it would be 10/10 = 1 watt per gallon

or,

50/10 = 5 watts per gallon.

Any help would be great!

Thanks

[kveeti]

You use the wattage it consumes, in your example the 10 watts.