Cold Cathode and the Reef Tank?

[scaryperson27]

What's going on here? A little bird told me that Cold Cathode Fluoros is an adequate solution for lighting corals in a small tank!!

From what I was also told, there are some other Nano freaks trying this out.

Please post some information, I'm really interested in learning about this.

 

[ludnix]

I don't imagine it would be half bad if you could find cold cathodes in a decent spectrum and get some individual reflectors on them.

 

[scaryperson27]

That's what I was thinking! I have a 7 gallon bow they would work great on.

 

[Agu]

I've been using cold cathode on a 5.5 for over a year. Got them at this site, http://www.xoxide.com/coldcathodes.html

There are two blue and four white bulbs on the tank. I retrofitted them to use the reflector from and old coralife fixture. Here's the preliminary setup. I ended up dumping everything except the reflector in the final configuration,

Cold Cathode bulbs

I researched different bulbs and found a place that sold bulbs with identifiable color temps but the specialty bulbs were way more expensive.

Here's a pic of the tank after 18 months under these bulbs,

5.5

If I were to do it over I'd probably go with eight bulbs and rewire the inverters so I could hide them better.

 

[saltwaterfishlover]

Agu do you think you would do this over a 12gal vs a 150MH
I know coral types may be a consideration but...
thanks

 

[Agu]

Cold cathode is minimum lighting in currently available bulbs. I suspect on a 12 gallon tank you'd be disappointed. The LPS corals in my tank are known to be tolerant of lower light and are still placed high in the tank. They grow slower than the same corals under PC lighting. Not that I'm complaining, that's a good thing in a five and half gallon tank.

Perhaps for a soft coral tank they could be OK.

Now I'm waiting for them to come out with this fixture with a white LED.

 

[scaryperson27]

I had a spare set of computer Cold Cathods and I hooked them up to an old Wall wart.

Here's how it came out

The camera doesn't do the tank justice at all.

 

[scaryperson27]

Here it is during the daytime.

It is still a very young tank.