putting a dimer timer on your lights.

hello everyone i have had my tank up for about 9 months now. and i think my light system can be improved.

i want my tank to look like the ocean i mean i want my lights to work like the sun.

right now i have my blue lights come on at 12 and at 1 my day lights come on.

but i want to have all of my lights ease on like dim and everyone minute they get more less dim until they are all the way on.

does anyone know what I'm talking about.
i hate when I'm sleeping and the lights just flash on. like it is when a teacher had the lights off for 4 hours and then turned on the big lights. i do not like that as a human, I'm sure my fish do not like it at all.

 

what type of lights do you have?

 

i have the one from reefgeeks.com

here is the link
http://www.reefgeek.com/lighting/T5_Fluorescent/Sunlight_Supply/Tek_Light_Fixtures/36_inch__4x39W_Tek_Light_T5_High-Output_Fixture_w!_Bulbs_%28Black%29_by_Sunlight_Supply


if link does not go to lights t5 lights and i have the 36" 4x39W Tek Light T5 High-Output Fixture w/ Bulbs (Black)

 

You need to have ballasts that are designed to be dimmed before you can consider starting this project.

 

Sorry to tell you, but you cannot put fluorescent lights on a dimmer in the traditional sense... you would need a specially designed ballast to dim these bulbs.

There are ways to do it, but you'd need to look into dimmable ballasts, and then some kind of controller that ramps it up for you automatically...

Here is a dimmable ballast, for starters...

Dimming fluorescent lighting

It would be nice if some fixtures were made using these kinds of ballasts, but I image if they were, they would be very expensive... not to mention, I'm sure the color of the bulbs are going to change depending on the setting, so it's probably not an effective way to run on a reef.

In which case, you're probably going to want to go with LED's, because some fixtures already have this controllability, will maintain correct color output, and are going to be more efficient in the long run... This is one reason why so many folks like LED's.. there are some truly awesome sunrise/ sunset/ cloudy day features on a few LED fixtures...

There's also plasma light fixtures which do a great job of dimming and keeping color true, but I haven't seen much development on these lately, for some reason LED technology has really overshadowed them, though, I believe plasma bulbs to be the better tech for our tanks, because they ARE more efficient than LED's (believe it or not) especially when dimmed to even 80% of output... with these you could have the best of all worlds, and truly simulate the sun's light energy throughout the day.. maybe some day we'll see these take off, but everyone is going crazy over LED's right now.

 

as for me going led idk i mean i spend 300 dollars on this light and i only had it for about 7 months. i really do not want to put out other 600 dollars for a led light.

and as the ballest goes. thank you every much for your help going to talk to a friend of I'ming. he is a election and i hope he can help.

but this will work with t5 lights right, just not as good as led.

sweet can't wait to try this i really want to do this for me and my fish.

 

Well, whatever your solution is, it probably won't be cheap or easy. Or display the correct coloration of T5 bulbs when dimmed. That probably won't be an issue if it is just slowly dimming up and down for an hour or two each day...

But I suggested LED's because there are more than a few fixtures that already accomplish this, and it may be worth your time and be just as economical to sell your current fixture and go that route if you are seriously considering it...

I'm interested to find out if you decide to go with a dimmable ballast and find or create an automatic controller for this... it sounds like an interesting project, but not one I'd want to take on myself, and I'm an electrical engineer... mostly just because there are better options available for about the same cost.

 

o btw how cool your a electrical engineer that is what i'm going for collage for and...
I'm going to be upgrading my tank to a 75 gallon so i might see my light and then buy a leg. thanks for your input gabbagabbawill

 

Dimming is also stressful to coral because it changes the wavelength of the light...and corals don't have eyes, and are only aware of a compensation point, so a "sunrise/sunset" does absolutely nothing for them.

 

uhhh... ok, good luck with it, then!