Light of America 500 watt

[Tbrennan]

Okay I am in home depot I see a flo tube pendant style light I am thinking they are produce by light of America it says they have 500 watts output and the lamp color is is 65k. I currently run a 175wt metal halide 65 k with two 40 watt NO bulbs one 10k and the atinic. Question is has anybody ever used these lights on their setup and is it a viable (spelled cheap) alternative to my metal halide. Comments are appreciated Thanks

 

[liquid]

Did it say 500 watts of incadescent light? If so, they're trying to mislead you. In actuality the unit is about 65 watts of PC light. FWIW, I had one of these over a soft coral frag tank and things grew just nicely under them. Be aware that they are designed to be outside and that they get hot and if you don't dissipate the heat they will burn out. I went thru 3 of them in about a year. :?

Shane

 

[Blue Devil]

I have one over my fuge and the macro loves it. I took mine apart and drilled about 40 holes in the top to help with the heat. Its been running 10 hours a day for the past 8 weeks now and so far so good. Most people that have used them have had the same experience as Liquid. But for $24.95, I thought it was worth a try.

 

[Anonymous]

liquid, it is increasing ignoring that lamp and light industry keep labeling lamp that way, but it is understandable when they want to make it easier for consumer who is replacing incandescent bulb. It will be a bad experience for someone who went to HD, trying to get a replacement of his 100W light bulb, and pick up a PC bulb in the same wattage range, screw it in, and blind himself with it, don't you think?

Alternative is to consider light intensity, for example, instead of wattage, but we still will have a lot of issue with that metric.

 

[SpecialK]

I think there is a large thread on these lights, here is the link in DIY. http://aquariumadvice.com/viewtopic.php?t=1373

Hope this helps, it explain alot about these lights.

Kaye