I have a 55gal that Imade my own canopy and light for. The lights are 4x 32watt T8 with the appropriate ballast. I have heard about overdriving the lights by adding another ballast. How much more light would this give me ... will the output bring me up to the 165 watt range? Thanks
Overdriving my light?
- Thread starter kidnick
- Start date
Ever see an old fluorescent tube? Did you notice the ends start to turn black but still work? That is the starter coil vaporizing and then condensing on the glass. When you overdrive or over power a bulb, you are sending it to an early death. You will cook the starters and then they will loose their brightness. You will get the results you are looking for right now but you will be constantly changing bulbs to keep that brightness. You are better by adding additional fixtures and doing the job right.
Howdy,
better safe than sorry. I would stick with the lights as they came from the manufacturer. If "souping up" lights brought a safe advantage, the light industry would definitely take advantage of that. The fact that they don't would make me think...
An extra light strip is not too expensive. Or get a DIY power compact to install in your hood. That provides a huge increase in output!
HarleyK
better safe than sorry. I would stick with the lights as they came from the manufacturer. If "souping up" lights brought a safe advantage, the light industry would definitely take advantage of that. The fact that they don't would make me think...
An extra light strip is not too expensive. Or get a DIY power compact to install in your hood. That provides a huge increase in output!
HarleyK
I also built a canopy and lights for my 55. I bought 2 36" T12 fixtures from Home Depot and am using a Zoo Med 50/50 and a Zoo Med 10,000K. If I remember right, they're both T8 bulbs. I have them wired to seperate switches so I can turn on one or both if I want to, which is nice because it's like having three different light settings for your tank. And one bulb seems to be bright enough for the tank. Both bulbs is really bright.
I overdrive t5's all the time. The first one I did I just bought 2 cheap shop lights and pulled the ballest out of one and added it to the other one. I worked great. I am still using the same lamps and it is light for 8-10 hrs per day for 9months now. I think it is a great, cheap way to improve lighting. I have a 150gall with a custom made canopy with 4 seperate 96 watt c.f. lights and they bulbs I have only had to replace once in a year in a half but at $35-40 per each I will most likely replace the c.f. with the overdriven t5's.