Hi all.
Has anyone replaced a defective T5 ballast on a Juwel Rio 180 tank? I need to know how to get into the ballast enclosure.
My Rio is currently about 3 months old, so everythings working fine at the moment but I don't plan on spending £25-£30 on a Juwel tube when they finally fail.
I know Juwel have messed with their lengths and wattages so your pretty stuck to their tubes if you want a replacement. The current tubes I have are 2 x 45W T5's and are approx. 892mm in length. Try buying that length to wattage ratio in any lighting shop.
My plan is to change the ballast to a 2 x 39W when ever the first tube or the ballast blows up and then get my future tubes from lampspecs or the like.
I know I'll take a hit of 6W per tube but at the Juwel rip off prices I'm prepared to do that and deal with whatever consequences arise (slower growth etc.). I also know that the standard T5 39W tubes are approx. 50mm shorter than the Juwel ones. So, I'll have 25mm at each end of the tank that may be a bit dimmer, I'll try not to lose too much sleep over that.
When you consider you can get a 2 x 39W ballast for £18.38 from National lamps and components, and tubes at £3-£4 you can replace the whole lot for less than the price of one Juwel tube!
So that's my plan, but I can't quite work out how to dismantle the Juwel ballast enclosure.
Therefore my question is, has anyone ever dismantled one before?
I've tried levering one of the end caps out but it doesn't seem to want to budge and I don't want to break it while it's still working.
Thanks in advance.
Chris.
PS. My day job is in electrical engineering, so fiddling with a few wires, ballasts and lamp holders shouldn't tax me too much.
Has anyone replaced a defective T5 ballast on a Juwel Rio 180 tank? I need to know how to get into the ballast enclosure.
My Rio is currently about 3 months old, so everythings working fine at the moment but I don't plan on spending £25-£30 on a Juwel tube when they finally fail.
I know Juwel have messed with their lengths and wattages so your pretty stuck to their tubes if you want a replacement. The current tubes I have are 2 x 45W T5's and are approx. 892mm in length. Try buying that length to wattage ratio in any lighting shop.
My plan is to change the ballast to a 2 x 39W when ever the first tube or the ballast blows up and then get my future tubes from lampspecs or the like.
I know I'll take a hit of 6W per tube but at the Juwel rip off prices I'm prepared to do that and deal with whatever consequences arise (slower growth etc.). I also know that the standard T5 39W tubes are approx. 50mm shorter than the Juwel ones. So, I'll have 25mm at each end of the tank that may be a bit dimmer, I'll try not to lose too much sleep over that.
When you consider you can get a 2 x 39W ballast for £18.38 from National lamps and components, and tubes at £3-£4 you can replace the whole lot for less than the price of one Juwel tube!
So that's my plan, but I can't quite work out how to dismantle the Juwel ballast enclosure.
Therefore my question is, has anyone ever dismantled one before?
I've tried levering one of the end caps out but it doesn't seem to want to budge and I don't want to break it while it's still working.
Thanks in advance.
Chris.
PS. My day job is in electrical engineering, so fiddling with a few wires, ballasts and lamp holders shouldn't tax me too much.