Cold Cathode Lighting

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Castro235

Gambusia
MFK Member
Apr 28, 2010
27
2
18
Agawam, MA
So, I've been looking at how I want to light my tank, it is a 55 gallon tank that is still in the process of being set up, It currently has a DIY pvc overflow, which in all honesty came out like crap, so I'll be rebuilding it soon with alot more attention to detail, and it has no hood, and a slightly melted light bar for two 24" bulbs.

I wanted to incorporate the lights into the hood when I build it, and I think doing white cold cathode tubes would be a very good option as far as price, brightness, ease, heat, etc. but I have yet to see anything about using cold cathode tubes in an aquarium other than moonlighting.


I plan on getting four sets of Dual 12" white cold cathode kits, so i can have two rows across the entire 48" of the tank(may have to be staggered depending on the size of the mounting, and I may end up only needing one row, but that parts not really what I need help with)
This is not necessarily from this website, but they have a good detail list of the bulbs.
http://www.mountainmods.com/dual-12-inch-white-cold-cathode-kit-p-104.html

I don't know much about light spectrums and such, other than that I need to have a varied spectrum in order for the tank to be healthy.
I plan on having the tank planted, but with low need plants such as java moss, possibly christmas moss, java fern, and anything else that can do good without needing much, and will survive in about 70 degrees.


I poked through here, and spent awhile searching google for other forums and such, but really just couldn't find any good info on if cold cathodes were any good in an aquarium.



Thanks alot for any help!
 
That is what I am using on my 240 gallon ply tank. I have 4 sets and it does OK for a 4' tank, so I am getting 4 more sets for the 8' tank. I also have 4 blue "moonlight" sets that work better than the white for some reason.
 
john73738;4120677; said:
That is what I am using on my 240 gallon ply tank. I have 4 sets and it does OK for a 4' tank, so I am getting 4 more sets for the 8' tank. I also have 4 blue "moonlight" sets that work better than the white for some reason.
Click to expand...

Have you had any bod or good luck with any plants or anything?

Sounds like having the 8 tubes total for a 55 gallon should be great if it's working out on such a large tank for you.

Glad that there's actually someone here who has firsthand experience, really I don't need anything more than giving the fish daylight, and being able to keep low need plants alive.


Thanks!
 
I do not have live plants. I am not sure it would support live plant growth.
 
john73738;4121140; said:
I do not have live plants. I am not sure it would support live plant growth.
Click to expand...

Drat, guess I'll be experimenting then unless I hear from someone else.


No other way to find out.
 
Are you talking the spiral CCFLs or the "daisy chained" tube CCFLs? I have only heard that the CCFLs come in 2700K which are to yellow for aquarium lighting(IMO).
If they make a say 5500K or 6000K then were talking...but then again, you could also achieve the same if not better results with a DIY LED panel and use half the watts and give off no heat at all. Just my 2¢.
 
boldtogether;4121583; said:
Are you talking the spiral CCFLs or the "daisy chained" tube CCFLs? I have only heard that the CCFLs come in 2700K which are to yellow for aquarium lighting(IMO).
If they make a say 5500K or 6000K then were talking...but then again, you could also achieve the same if not better results with a DIY LED panel and use half the watts and give off no heat at all. Just my 2¢.
Click to expand...

I was looking into leds, but it seemed that all the DIY projects involved some ridiculously expensive star mounted leds, and I really just couldnt get a stable point of good lighting with the small scale led bars/squares I set up, it was always just a bunch of spoitlights.

I was going to look into making some sort of reflective setup and have it for the leds, but then i thought about the cold cathode tubes I almost bought for a computer build awhile back.

They have a variety of colors, blue, purple, green, white, etc, but I don't know if they all have a yellow tint to them or something.

They seem similar to flourescent tubes, in that they seem to be powered from the ends and a long thin tube, but I really don't know much about them.

I have a link to the ones I am looking at(white) in the original post, and I'm willing to take the risk of a 20 dollar loss to see how it turns out anywho.


Unfortunately I couldn't find much as far as any of the ratings that would actually be useful in an aquarium setting, so I figure I'll just go with a "see how it works" method of testing, and at least then I can put it out here for anyone else interested if it in fact does, or doesn't work.
 
I have just done a bit of research about using LED's for growing vegetables indoors, and it seems plants need red and blue light in a 2/3 red 1/3 blue approx ratio to photosynthesize properly.
So a few red and blue ccfl's will be good for the plants, but of course make the tank look terrible!
 
Looks like i got a response in another forum, and they really just don't have enough brightness or wattage to sustain plants, LEDs seem out of the question as the ones suggested tend to cost a fortune, and the work that would be involved in mounting so many individual leds while maintaining even lighting, so I guess I'll just be sticking with two 24" flourescents, and if I can come across an easy enough way of adding another two 24 or 1 48" fixture I may do that.


Thanks for looking though.
 
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