Re: Help shed some light -- or - help gain some light

["S. Hieber" <shieber at yahoo_com>]

Colleen McGuire asked if a single 55watt PC can be fit into
a standard hood.

If I rephrased your question correctly, and you're talking
about standard factory made aquarium hoods, then:

If you change to PC bulbs, you'll need a different ballast
than you use for the 15 fluorescents.


Basically, a 55watt PC will fit wherever a 20watt standard
fluorescent fits.

Depending on you light-level goals, a 36 watt PC (for
example from AHsupply.com) would also be good choice for
more light than a pair of 15 watt standard fluorescent
bubls and should fit into a standard hood that has at least
18" in internal width.  Imo, it's very easy to fit the AHS
kits into the prefab hoods and Kim at AHS sends you very
easy to follow instructions.

You could also fit a 55 watt kit from AHS if the internal
width is at least 23".  The instructions are the same and
equally easy to follow.

You can fit two 55watt PCs inside a factory made hood if
the hood is made for two 15 or 20 watt standard bulbs and
the hood is long enough (23") but you won't be able to use
the excellent AHS reflectors and you'll have to do some
carving to the existing reflector.  I've done this on a 30
gallon tank and the results are not bad.  I think the
dimensions of some 20 gallon tanks would fit also -- a 20
is usually not as long as a 30 but yu only need about 2
feet to fit the length of 55watt PCs.

Hope that helps,
Scott H.

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