DIY overdrived T8. More power, less bulbs.

[dattack]

Hello, I currently have a 60 gallon tank with T8 light bulbs with a ballast with a high ballast factor of over 1.  My plants are growing well but I would like to cut my lights into 3 bulbs instead of 5.

Also, I recently started a reef tank and was investigating some lighting options and I stumble upon this experiment from reefers in Canada.  It appears that you can overdrive T8 even more in which case it could be comparable to power compacts with the right ballast.

Check it out.
http://www.reefcentral.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=&threadid=48133

This is going to work great. In my hood I have right now 6 30W t8's which amounts to around 2w/g. That is about medium light but there are some plants that I cant grow. By using this method, I can get up to 4w/g, which it high-very high light. Im sure excited. I actually tried one ballast already and it worked. I will be soon getting more.

After about a month of trying this method, I must say that it seems to work. The lighting I had before was around medium and some plants did not do to good (high light plants). Now those plants are growing. I have 2-4 lamp ballasts overdriving 2 tubes and 1-2 lamp ballast overdriving 1 tube. I might add more but I will see. Thanks Dattack for finding this. It solved my lighting problem. *miley* ley*

[dattack]

I was wondering when you fired them up did you notice if your tank was brighter?  

Yes! The 2 tubes that are being driven by 4 lamp ballast you can hardly look straight at.

[aznpanther98]

i finally tried this but with the thicker bulbs i think they're t12 or something anyways it's on a 30gal and using one 20watt bulb what i did insteadof useing one ballasti had two they wre froma pair of 20 watt lights used on a 55gal tank but the person i got them from upgraded hislights to 4ft ones wellanyways the ballasts were built into the plug itself so i just wired them together and hooked it up to one 20watt bulb(i also have 2 screw-in cf bulbs from homedepot) and when i plugged on in it looked normal and them plugged the second one in and u can tell the difference it even made the tank look cleaner before this it looked kinda incandessent but now i like it more maybe i'll add another overdrived bulb in to get better growth on my plants ;D

[equinom]

I was reading FAMA and there is an article that describes how using an IceCap 430 or 660 electronic ballast really increases the wattage:  normally 32-watt lamps tested out at 88 watts per lamp.  with a drop off of 17.8% after 10 months.  The author believes that if a fan had been installed in the hood.  
Here is my confusion.  The article is titled "A Much Less Expensive But Equally Effective Alternative to Power Compacts".  I'm asuming the cost savings is on the lamps.
But to use the cheaper lamps, you have to use IceCap ballasts, that run $150?  I guess I am missing the point.... Can someone explain???

[aznpanther98]

i dunno much about icecaps except they're pretty expensive but worth it from what i hear but i think it means cheaper to replace bulbs and easier to get ur hands on regular flouresents than pc bulbs
i'mno expert on this but i've looked into pc bulbs for my plant tank and well seems costly so did the homedepot version with the screw in pc bulbs and one 20 watt flourescent thats powered by two ballasts i dunno how much output it's giving in that i'm still confused about doing the math i suck at it lol but ii'm getting beter plant growth now my hornwort are growing faster and the sunset hygophilia is doing better with more pink on the top algea seems to be cut back thanks to my otos and sae's

[dattack]

WIth the icecap ballasts, one can overdrive 6500K bulbs which are only $6 or so.  With power compacts, the bulbs can cost anywhere from $20-40.  I believe that's the saving one is talking about.

The cheapest VHO setup sold is at www.hellolights.com which is already preassembled and contains waterproof endcaps.  It can run 2 to 4 bulbs.  It is essentially the same as icecaps except that the icecaps are dimmable.  The VHO runs around $130.  With the icecap, one has to buy the harness set with endcaps which can run then about $200.

Hellolights also have a $10 discount with purchase over $50.

I still think overdriving fluorescent ballast are still the cheapest. My set up includes 6 - 36" fluorescent fixtures/tubes, and 4 electronic ballasts all for $130. Total wattage output is around 480W. A 400W MH fixture is around $315. Quite a difference. Even the 4 lamp 36" VHO retro kit is around $160. The big difference is that I pay $3-4 per tube and the VHO tubes are around $23. Thats a big difference.

I love my fluorescents now. I have no problems with low light anymore. Plants grow like crazy.  miley*