Using UV only at night?

[GSerg2]

I was considering setting my UV to run only at night in order to save dumping more heat into my tank during the day when the main lights are on. However I found some opinions that said that would be a bad idea. Anyone here have thoughts on it?

Thanks

 

[ledford1]

Interesting. I've neever heard any comments on running full-time vs only at night. I don't know that there would be any difference.

 

[jay-cee123]

Very interesting.. Some people actually turn off their UV's at night since thats when the Pods & other little goodies come out. They say with the UV off it will not zap the pods & other things.

 

[GSerg2]

One of the things I read was that shutting off the bulb would significantly decrease it's usuable life. That one didn't make much sense to me.

 

[Toddrtrex]

From my understanding ( and I don't know if it applies to UV bulbs) is that the hardest "thing" for a bulb is the firing of it.
In other words, if a bulb was only turned on once, it would last ( just throwing out numbers here ) 10,000 hours. However if you turn the same bulb off each hour ( for an hour ) it would last less amount of time, say 9,000 hours.
Again, I am just throwing out the numbers for example, but the principle behind the numbers is right.

HTH

 

[Tagareef]

According to Aqua UV, Todd is correct. Their tech support does not recommend turning the uv on and off on a regular basis.

 

[GSerg2]

Well, looks like I better find a different way of losing those extra couple of degrees.

 

[Toddrtrex]

Are you running any fans over your sump??

 

[GSerg2]

Yeah, I have two fans in the canopy and one over the sump. Still pushing 82 on some days.

 

[Toddrtrex]

Is that 82 in the just the winter? Does it get higher in the summer ? If it is 82 year round, I wouldn't worry too much.

 

[BlueYonder]

Sounds like time to save up for a chiller.

 

[GSerg2]

Yeah, I am thinking about the chiller. I know 82 isn't too bad. But 79 would be better.

 

[BlueYonder]

Serg - The BIG thing to remember is the 2 degree swing factor......If you keep your tank 24 hour temp swing to 2 degrees or less, you reduce the chance of an ich outbreak....I set my chiller so that I am ALWAYS in a 2 degree range, an advantage over the attempt of achieving that goal with heaters/fans (almost impossible)......Anyway, back to the UV thread here, it is probably better for your tank and uv sterilizer but not for your wallet to keep it on 24/7