Home made lights from Home Depot?

[Nolapete]

Yep, the $20 price was off the website, in store it was just under $9. I built a temporary canopy with 320 watts for $74

4 shop lights
4 6' 1x10s
1 4' 1x12

The 6500K Philips bulbs come in a 10 pack for just under $30

 

[mellowvision]

nice going!

 

[Que]

Yep, the $20 price was off the website, in store it was just under $9. I built a temporary canopy with 320 watts for $74

4 shop lights
4 6' 1x10s
1 4' 1x12

The 6500K Philips bulbs come in a 10 pack for just under $30

I didn't see this price on any florescent fixture. Which one was it?

Q

 

[rwilliams254]

Can you get a pictur up for us?

 

[247Plants]

I purchased my shoplights at Wally World for $9.99 wach without bulbs.

I then bought two plant/aquarium bulbs and 2 6500K bulkbs and Voila!

Total Cost $$33.00

 

[Yankee Dog]

be careful with the el cheapo shop lights. I use two of them over a 75 gal tank. One of the ballasts had a melt down and started to emit some sort of acrid smelling fumes. Killed almost every fish in the tank.

Yankee Dog

 

[mellowvision]

non-electronic ballasts are less than desirable for this application. also, you need to make sure the ballasts are rated for the bulbs you put in. not all ballasts are alike.

 

[Nolapete]

http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=113671&page=3

I missed the questions on this post somehow. The thread above shows the pics.

It's a 2 bulb 4' shop light usually stacked at the bottom row in large quantities at Home Depot.

 

[Nolapete]

You definitely DON'T want to take apart the shop lights and mount the ballasts inside your canopy. I don't know why anyone would mount any kind of exposed ballasts inside a canopy. That's just asking for heat and trouble. Ballasts get very hot.

Yankee Dog: Did yours meltdown inside its enclosure or was it taken apart?

 

[Yankee Dog]

The ballast was inside it orignal housing. There were two of them mounted underneath a wooden cover. I suppose the heat build up under the wood cover was too much for the ballast.

I ended up rebuilding with new ballasts mounted outside the tank/cover. The new ballast cost twice what the original shop light cost. Still the shop lights are a fine way to mount your bulbs. If I were to do it again I would still buy the shop lights just to use a fixtures for the bulbs. Just pull out the ballasts and replace with higher quality remotely mounted ones.

Yankee Dog