Anyone familiar with Coralife Mini Compact Colormax bulbs?????

Ms.Bubbles

Ms.Bubbles

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Sep 26, 2005
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They are somewhat Pink, But honestly I think they make my tank look better than any other bulb I've used. The reds look really red, the greens still look vivid, and the fish are amazing under them.
on the last page of this thread is a picture of my 15g, The front Fixture has 2 20w colormax in it, the rear fixture has 65w of 6700k. As you can see the tank does not have a pink appearance and the pink lights are in front. I highly reccomend these bulbs for small tanks that you want high light on. I have actually started shopping for incandescent fixtures so I can get these bulbs over my 10g and grow out tank as well.

Dave
 
Dave, your plants look great. It's pretty hard to see if the light is pink since you have so many red plants anyway. Thanks for the input.
 
I know this is an old thread I'm bumping, but I can't believe more people aren't talking about, or trying out mini compact fluorescent bulbs for planted tanks.

Thanks for the recommendation Daveedka. My light setup is going to wind up exactly the same as yours: one 65 watt power compact, and two 10 or 20 watt Colormax mini compacts. I have retrofitted two socket outlets into my Eclipse 3 hood on a deep 40 gallon tank. I will post some pictures of my retrofit and updated tank soon.

The huge advantage and discussion I was looking for here, is the wattage output of these mini compacts. They only use 10-20 watts, but the output is 50+ watts. If I remember correctly, fluorescent tubes that use 20 watts, only put out 20 watts correct?

Even the ones you can buy for household use now, for instance, will say they use the power of a 20 watt bulb but they appear as a 60 watt. Most of the household ones are white though, and I would like to add some color.

Basically my previous setup, the 65 watt power compact, and one tube fluorescent (20 watt bulb, but the ballast said it was only 18watts) wasn't doing the job. So I'm hoping that by adding 2 mini compacts it will more than double my wpg, possibly 200 watts for a 40 gallon deep tank! i would be thrilled. :dance2:

Not only that, but it would greatly reduce my electricity over trying to get the same wattage out of other lights.

Does anyone have any insight into whether this is true with the wattage output and it's benefits on plants?

thanks
Chris
 
The watts vs light output of screw-in CFLs is comparing them to Incandescents. A 20W screw-in CFL puts off the same amount of light at a 75W Incandescent. When people are talking about light needs for aquaria they are assumed to be talking about fluorescent lighting because it is so much more efficient than incandescent.
 
UCF-Planted said:
The watts vs light output of screw-in CFLs is comparing them to Incandescents.
Click to expand...

Ok, right. So let's say I just took out my 20 watt fluorescent tube, and replaced it with two 10 watt screw-in CLF's, which the manufacturer says the wattage output is comparable to 50 watt incandescent.

Am I now getting 100 watts of light to grow my plants, for the same electricity usage I was using before?

chris
 
No, you are replacing 20W of fluorescent growing power with 20W of Fluorescent growing power, no increase. If you were replacing 20W of incandescent power with 20W of fluorescent, then you would be improving. As it is you probably want to go with higher wattage screw-ins to make the swap worthwhile.
 
anyone using screw-in compact fluorescents?

While I appreciate UCF-Planted's response, this still does not make any logical sense to me.

I would like a more detailed or scientific explanation from someone.

Isn't the WHOLE point of these lights that they put off more light using less energy? Why would the plants see anything different than what our eyes see? The reason the manufacturers are telling us that it looks like a 60 watt (or whatever) incandescent is because if you are replacing a light in your house where you had a 60 watt... that's what looks best there.

The funny thing is, my LFS here in San Francisco, agrees with my theory! He has retrofitted nearly all of his planted tanks with mini compact screw-in fluorescents. He buys his wholesale, and said most of the ones he uses are in the 2700 spectrum, very white. I'm not sure what wattage he's using. But on most of the tanks he's got 2 to 4 bulbs, and says that the output is MORE than 10 watts each. He said maybe not 50 but possibly 35 watts.

thanks
chris
 
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2700K spectrum is also pretty well accepted as not the best for growing plants either. The Cool White & Warm White bulbs in that color temperature range are intended to provide the most amount of light visible to the human eye. When dealing with plants you want to provide full spectrum bulbs that do their best to recreate the light of the sun. This is not inexpensive, so it's cheaper to produce something like Warm White or Cool White that will provide lots of lumens per watt. Full Spectrum lights cost more to manufacture, but is actually far more efficient if your goal is plant growth. Screw-In fluorescents are still Fluorescents. They are not more efficient than straight fluorescents, in fact are likely to be less efficient because of re-strike (light from one part of the bulb falling on another part of the bulb rather than the water). This is why ahsupply is very popular, because their parabolic reflectors are very good at redirecting the light to make the most possible land on the water, and why T5 bulbs are popular, because they have a very slim profile that minimizes restrike. Incandescent lights are very inefficient, and screw-in fluorescents only compare wattage to incandescents to helpe people know what power fluorescent to use when replacing an incandescent bulb. Screw-in fluorescents can be cheap, and a high wattage screw-in will usually cost less than the fixture and bulb of any straight bulb (compact fluorescent, T5, T8, etc.) but they will be less efficient at growing plants than the previously mentioned straight bulbs with decent reflectors. You can read more about appropriate lighting and the science behind it here: http://www.wetwebmedia.com/PlantedTksSubWebIndex/lgtfixtags.htm or here: http://www.wetwebmedia.com/ca/cav1i4/fluorescent_lamps/fluorescent_lamps.htm or any of a variety of sources if you look for them.

When in doubt, compare lumens and CRI (color rendering index) not watts.
 
The screw in spiral bulbs are just fluorescent bulbs, twisted around in a spiral. Their wattage is like most other fluorescents (20W spiral = 20W straight T5 = 75W or whatever they claim for incandescent). They are more efficient than incandescent bulbs, which is what they are intended to replace since they have a screw in base. Its supposed to be an easy way to bring the efficiency of fluorescent to a socket designed for incandescent and impossible to put any normal fluorescent in. But no more efficient than most other flouros. In fact, due to their spiral design a lot of light 're-strikes' the bulb itself and does not make it into the tank. In that way they are slightly less efficient than their straight counterparts with optimal reflectors. They are great an easy upgrades for those already using screw in regular bulbs. But it would be far better performance wise to do something like a AHSupply.com retrofit using CF's.

BTW daveedka hasnt been on here in a while (moved over to *************.com Edit> guess they dont like us saying the name of other forums here - what a crock of $h!t... and hasnt been here at least in a few months). Edit> a q u a r i u m b o a r d .com lol :p:

The Colormax bulbs are fairly strong pink color, to the point where many dont like them. However I have used a regular (straight) one and do like it, mixed along with a white daylight bulb. I've got a picture somewhere I could dig up if you want.
 
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