Source for inexpensive CF fixtures/bulbs?

S

Skippy

Grand Poobah of Fun
Aug 22, 2000
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Dallas, TX
web.of.slacking.net
Guess who got a garage full of tools, including a table saw for Xmas?!?!?!

This bring me to my first project, building a nice canopy and stand for my 100 gallon. I found great stand plans on line, and have already sketched out most of the canopy design in my head by visiting some local stores and tanking some surrepitious notes.

My question comes along when I look for lighting. This is a heaviliy planted tank currently at 2wpg , I want to up to that to 3-4wpg with the new hood. I currently have two all-glass CF strips with dual 55w bulbs in each giving me 220 watts over it. I have considered cannibalizing these to "assimilate" them into the canopy design but want to try to build from scratch and use those lights on other tanks.

The one option that seems most logical would be CF fixtures. I have had little sucess finding all the parts I would need (bulbs and actual sockets) at the local home depot. I was wondering where you guys had found the best source for usable lighting?

I have heard about the Lights of America lights, but can't find them anywhere around dallas. I saw some "replacement bulbs" which seem to put CF bulbs in regular light sockets, I saw them up to 42w but that would require wiring in 6 or so light sockets into the canopy just to accomplish my current levels.

Anybody else run into this one?
 
ahsupply has some DIY kits that include a reflector, ballast, wiring & socket for a decent price... I think many people use those.

I've been checking out bigals and found some Custom Sea Life CF lights pretty cheap. I'm thinking REAL hard about that :)
 
I have been considering the AH supply kits. But I have also been wanting to see if perchance there were any sources for just the parts and do it even less expensively. As I am trying to see how low a cost I can do a good hood for.
 
I have done exactly what you are attempting, but on a much smaller scale. I have built four different canopys and stands for some of my tanks, but so far, the largest is for my 75 gallon. For that I just used a dual-light shop light that is T-8 and puts out quite a bit of light! No where near the level you are after tho! My tanks are lightly planted, so the 1.5 watts/gallon or so most of mine have is fine. Several of my smaller tanks have the CF screw-in type bulbs, but I agree that you would need quite a few of them to make it work! Could be done and I've actually found some decent sockets at Home Depot for mine. But I've only done this on a couple of 20 gallons, so I only needed two sockets per tank.

On my 30 gallon tank, I used a dual 36" commercial fixture that uses T-8 bulbs... so the hard part has been finding decent 36" T-8 bulbs! Only ones I can find locally are "home shop" type and only have a 4,100 K temp. I think most of the light is in the green spectrum as the plants have slowed down, but the green/blue slime algae has started growing with a vengance!

Best of luck... can you indicate to us where you found the plans?

Thanks,
Bill C.
 
The stand plans are from www.garf.org.

THe canopy plans i'm doing ad lib as I go along. WHen done I hope to supply information to garf with euqations and such and maybe they'll add my plan in thier DIY section.

The most "radical " thing in my design is for a dual hinged top/front.

This would be so that you could just open the front panel for things like feeding, or open BOTH for access to the light fixtures and such.
 
What are the dimensions of your tank? I am going to assume that it is 48" long. Anyway, another thought would be to use your two dual 55W CF (220W) and add two more 40W NO bulbs but overdrive these 2X. This should add about 100W more for a total of 330W. This is done by using a 4 bulb electronic NO ballast and using two outputs to power up one bulb. This will make the bulb a little brighter. The theory is that in normal operation, bulbs are run at about 80% effeciency by limiting the current supplied to the bulb. If that current is increased the bulb will burn brighter. Using an electronic ballast and combining two outputs, will let you do that and still control the current to prevent the bulb from shorting out. I'm not sure if I got it right but do a search in the reef forums and look for overdrive NO bulbs for more info. These guys sometimes overdrive their bulbs by 4X! Anyway, thats my $.02... Have fun!

Pricing would be about $25 for the ballast and 6500k Daylight bulbs for about $5 each and $4 or so for misc. Not to bad IMO.
 
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Hurm...

THat's a good idea with the "overclocking" of the bulbs. I might have to give that a go. I saw some 55 watt cf "replacement" bulbs meant to fit into standard sockets mentioned on another post here, I believe it was http://www.fullspectrumsolutions.com/Fluorescent.htm that I was also looking into.

Actually the tank is 60.5 inches across at the outer edge of the brim, and 20.5 wide I believe, but the exact measurements are out in the garage at the moment.
 
Oooohh, 60" tank... I think I would bite the bullet and go to AHS and order the 2X55W kit.

I saw on a thread somewhere that the outdoor lighting area of Home Depot has the Lights of America fixture that has a 65W CF for $29. Get two of those or maybe even four to stick in your new canopy. Might want to do a search on that also. I can't remember where I read that though. Just another idea....
 
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