Refugium lighting....

[mujtba]

do I need special lights for my fuge? or can i just use your normal house fluroscent lights??? or any normal cheap lights?

[kookerson]

check this out.............

http://www.melevsreef.com/fuge_bulb.html

HTH!

[MarkD40]

I use a PC floodlight from Home Depot to light my fuge. 5500K I think. Cost about $39. I have used the bulbs shown on melev's site but did not get adequate growth of my chaeto for some reason. I use it over a 20 gallon tank and it really works well.

[mg426]

I use a 10k coralife PC fixture over my fuge. My chaeto grows like mad. I have used the Melev light and it does pretty good too.

[jeweldamsel]

I use PC (65W) as well and my chaeto loves it.

[NealNano]

I use a coral life pc 50/50 chaeto grows fast. I have also used a spiral flouresent. That worked too.

[ozman3803]

I've been using the Daylight 100 by Feit Elec from Menards that burns at 23w and comes in a three pack for $7.97, seems to be working great.

[jeweldamsel]

I think any kind of lighting will do. I wouldn't spend a fortune in it.

[ActinopteryGuy]

I plan on 28 wt pc on mine hope its enough for my in sump fuge.

[JACOXVIII]

i use one of these but i got it loca home store
http://order.store.yahoo.com/cgi-bin...7LXzoa6L0OaoE-

[bhdmc]

I use 2 30" T-5 6700K bulbs. Cheato and Caulerpa Prolifera growing well.

[mujtba]

k i have a regular light that goes on top of freshwater tanks.. u know those white tube type lights? is that enough?

[jnarowe]

you can go to Home Depot and get Plant lights to fit the fresh water lamp. That's the easiet thing to do in your situation. Since we don't know the color temp. of the existing ones, we cannot tell you whether it will be good, and if they are old, the color has probably shifted anyway.

I bought the ones Marc recommends on his site, but it just wasn't enough light in my case to grow plants well. But that is because my refugium is quite large.

I ended up building my own:





I built this 4' long lamp using parts available through most aquraium suppliers. Those are NO (normal output) lamps @ 6500K color temp. over-driven by an IceCap 660 Ballast.

The most important thing is to get the right color spectrum. At HD, Lowe's etc. just ask for a plant bulb. It should be in the 5500 - 6500 color temp range, and you should verify that by inspecting the label printed on the bulb. Do not trust it if there is no color temp. on the label.

[808-340]

Originally posted by mg426
I use a 10k coralife PC fixture over my fuge. My chaeto grows like mad. I have used the Melev light and it does pretty good too.

same here... i'm using both a 10K current and the cf one that Melev suggests, in my fuge...

[mujtba]

well i guess i will try a 15w 5000k light tube..

i saw tube lights at home depot that said: indoor plant and freshwater aquarium light... 15w and 2700k.

i thought the kelvin for saltwater needs to be higher, so i went with 5000k.

wat do u all think?

[mujtba]

my fuge has a LOT of brown algae.. is it because of my lights (15w 5000k light tube) or because tank is 2mnths old? Lights have been on maybe 3 weeks during nights..

[jnarowe]

fuges seem to go through cycles. JMO of course, but I have seen it from time-to-time.

[reefCrawler]

Originally posted by kookerson
check this out.............

http://www.melevsreef.com/fuge_bulb.html

HTH!

I follow above thread about 2 months ago, and I can only find 2700K flood bulb from home depot (mark/Melev's Reef suggests to find 5100k), but even under 2700k bulb, my chaeto still growing like crazy, I have to harvest my refugim tank every 2 days now!