lights - over glass? directly over water?

[skullplate]

i've read at www.hellolights.com that you should always have a piece of glass between your lights and the water to block out UV light. but i've seen countless tanks on the internet and in stores that have high power lights directly over the water. what do you guys think? i'm building a hood that will have 2 55watt PC lights and don't know if i should bother with putting glass underneath them or not?

thanks, rob

 

[fishaddict]

I might put glass on the tank even though i believe that the uv light might be helpful??? Maybe its for live plants or something. I still might bother just in case you add bubbles or something. Or if you have big heavy fish or jumpers that might collide into it. I always use plastic or glass unless the lights hanging above the tank. An two or 3 inches maybe if you have the air bubbles. They tend to put up a fine mist and the plastic i use know protects the light. Downside is you have to wipe down the plastic because it gathers water, condensation i guess on it. Id use glass if i were you. Im worried about scratching the plastic. If you have a strong enough light though and itll still penetrate to the bottom of the tank and things wont jump or crash into it then i guess you can use it withough glass even though i might put a reflector on the sides depending on how high above the tank the light is.

Did i answer your question? i hope so.

 

[skullplate]

yea, the more i thought about it, i think i'm going to use the glass just protect the lights from the water. hmm...now i wonder where i can get a custom piece of glass cut? home depot?...any sugguestions?

 

[Matt Nace]

I use no glass. My lights are in a framed canopy, and are very safe. I do get a small amout of deposits on the bulbs, but most is disolved and evaporated the second it hit the lights due to the heat.

I use PC lights, 5 65watt quad socketed.

Glass is useless over a tank except for safety IMO. It eventually gets to the point where you need to use limeaway on it to remove the calcium deposits on it(in my case). The glass becomes more and more a pain IMO

It also keeps the bulbs hotter in my opinion, which is not a good thing.

If you feel the lights will fall in, use glass, if not, lose it.

 

[skullplate]

you may have helped me change my mind about going with the glass. i've been doing some more research of my own and learned that the light output of a bulb will drop as the bulb gets hotter. so now i'm more interested in keeping my bulbs cool.

matt, how high above the water would you say your bulbs are?

 

[mann]

My bulbs sit maybe 2.5" above the water and I currently have a sheet of acrylic separating them from it. I think I'm going to do away with that, though, and let them sit exposed. I'm less worried about the bulbs falling into the tank than I am condensation gathering on the bulb, but there's a decent amount of airflow through there and I think it'll be alright.

 

[lightning]

just a quick note, i had an uncovered light on a tank once, an either the fish splashed or or hit it or something, but the bulb broke and all the fine fragments of glass ended up in the tank, which was a real pain to get out i might add

 

[skullplate]

i don't like the sound of that at all, now i'm starting to swing back towards using the glass, and maybe hooking up some fans to cool it down.

 

[mann]

lightning, was that a flourecent bulb? I've heard that that was very rare for flourecent bulbs, but happened regularly with another kind.

 

[SLO-Dean]

If you're worried about that you can get a clear plastic sleeve for the flourescent bulbs. It will protect them from both condensation and breakage. (I saw them at Home Depot)

I also have flourescent bulbs attached to my canopy, so far no problems with condensation or breakage.