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Hi:

A few years ago I used 65 & 96 watt CompactSeaLife power compact fluorescent bulbs. A long, T8-like thin bulb folded double with 2 'bonding points' with what looked like caulk, and a 'plug in' that used 4 pins. I also used that same brand of fixture, if memory serves. Been awhile, so I'm not so certain about that.

Anyway, the bulb is rather hard to get wedged into the connector, and the 2 (aluminum?) metal clips that hold the bulb in place are hard to hold open (I'm one guy, I've got 2 hands, there are 2 clips/clamps, and the thin, double bulb is fragile). One little slip up & you've just broken an expensive bulb that was shipped through the mail! When time came to remove them, the glass bulb would sometimes detach from the bulb's base, which then had to be pried out of the light fixture's socket.

I'm about to dispense some advice to some folks on lighting. These days I use hardware store shop lights with paired T-8 bulbs for lighting, but I want to be current in my info.

Are power compact fluorescent bulbs still as fragile & cumbersome to install? Is my experience representative of this class of product in general?

Thank you!

Richard.

Never had that bad of problems and I use rather cheap fixtures(Jebo off ebay). The bulbs I commonly see though are straight pin instead of square pin. You'll find both for sale on most sites. I don't know if it's just the square pin you have more trouble with or if it was the brand but mine never came apart and while I've broken a couple NO bulbs I've never broken a pc bulb. Only slightly annoying part to putting the bulbs in is the cheap bands used to hold them in place. They do sit in metal clips but the clips are loose when the bulb is inserted and then these clear, rounded, rubber bands go around it to tighten the clip after the bulb is sitting right. I've broken about half the bands so some of the bulbs sit a little loose. It also has an acrylic shield so if the bulbs did come loose they'd land on the shield and not get broken or go into the tank so I've just left them and haven't tried to get new bands yet. I doubt the more expensive fixtures have such issues.

Shoplight fixtures can be great but a couple problems. Even with higher wattage bulbs you just can't get anywhere near as much light on a tank as using pc bulbs. NO bulbs need to be replaced approximately every 6months or they start to lose spectrum and light output. For VHO I've heard 4months recommended but at least 6months where pc bulbs it's only suggested to replace at 1year and even then they tend to hold spectrum and work well beyond that time. A pc bulb also produces more light(lumens) per watt so several hundred watts of pc light is going to grow plants better, or corals if we're talking marine setups, than the same amount of watts in T-8's. Plus you've also got the fact shop light fixtures don't reflect light into the tank as well since they are designed to spread light over a room instead of directing as much of it down as possible. They are extremely useful to setup a low-medium light tank on a budget but you just can't pack enough on there to grow high light plants in most cases. I ran my 55 with two shoplight fixtures containing four 40w bulbs before switching to my 4x55w pc fixture. The light difference was quite something and since then I've used pc as the main lighting for every tank. I still have my NO strips for extra lighting such as to increase the red or blue spectrum on a specific tank or run dawn and dusk lights but I don't currently have any tank setup without at least one pc bulb over it and I have no real issues with any of them.

Hi,
I agree with Sham. I've never broken a PC bulb mounting
it. I guess if the bulb clamps had been that stiff in
my hood, I'd have spread them a tad. I am surprised at
one comment though, my hood did not come with rubber bands
to hold the clips closed. Between the heat and the
moisture I bet they don't last too long before they become
brittle. That's something new to me.

Frank


-->>> The Confidence of Amateurs, is the Envy of Professionals <<<--

Thanks for the input. While I realize watts measure power usage, not lumens output, I didn't know how '200 watts T-8 lighting' would compare to '200 watts Power Compact lighting.' Wonder just how large the difference favoring PC's is?

I know what VHO stands for, but what are 'NO' bulbs?

Richard.

Hi,
"NO" means no

Sorry, I could not help myself.
"NO" means Normal Output.

200 watts of CF bulbs would concentrate the light within
a smaller amount of area than T8 lighting because of the
bulb size, and because the CPF bulbs are "U" shaped and
only 1/2, or less, as long as a T-8 bulb.

You would have to have a hood capable of holding 5 "T-8"
bulbs (40 watts each) to give you 200 watts. That's a
BIG hood!

Frank


-->>> The Confidence of Amateurs, is the Envy of Professionals <<<--

I told you I'm using a cheap fixture.... Instead of making more expensive clips they put in these little bands that I just noticed another 2 are sitting around on the acrylic shield under the bulbs. They must have snapped just while sitting there.

NO, normal output covers all the regular straight tube flourescents like you would find for a shoplight fixture or those fixtures that come in tank packages at stores. Includes T-8, T-10, and T-12 bulbs. T-5 would then be VHO.

Somewhere there is an article comparing the actual light ouput of most of the common bulbs... but I lost it. I'll go hunting for it later. I'm suppose to be getting stuff done today.