bulb replacement...

How long should I go before replacing my PC bulbs? I'm using Coralife Compact Fluorescent 50/50 65W's. I've heard everything from 6 months to 18 months.

 

Pisces23, when i was using that hood I was replacing the lights every 6 months. They lose there par fairly quick and are not beneficial to the tank. Also when replacing them do not change all your bulbs at the same time. Do one bulbs then wait a week and do the other bulb. The reason for this it your coral will acclimate to your lighting as the time goes by and the shock of new lights, your coral will not like it at all.

 

Thanks for the input. I thought it was just about time to replace them. But I believe that the fixture I'm using only has one bulb, so it won't be possible to gradually replace the bulbs. Additionally, I've been thinking about replacing the 50/50 with a 10K...good plan? I've heard that you can put nylon screen across the top of the tank to dim the brightness of new bulbs and slowly remove layers to acclimate the corals to the greater intensity. True story or just thousands of posts all blurring together in my head?

 

Kudos 90 berlin joe. Very important and I cant stress enough, how important it is to replace bulbs over a span of weeks not all at the same time or you will stress out your corals especially and cause an excess of oxygen in coral tissue due to the zooxanthellae trying to convert co2 to o2, causing bleaching to take place and possibly the death of your coral!!!
PC bulbs should be replaced after a year or so with the actinic (bluer bulbs) being replaced sooner than that!