just after some light starter advice please

[alan_uk]

hi everyone i currently have my 7 foot set up as an oncoming amazon project and i have 2 light starters 1 which is capable for up to 36watts which is running a 36 watt marine white tube and then another which is for 18 watts which was running the 24" marine blue 18watt bulb which i never used due to having black water theme the blue moon bulb just didnt light the tank at all especially being 24"

now i have another 48" white 36watt bulb which i have put on to my 18watt starterand its lit the bulb and all is working well but im a little worried as to weather it will blow

so my question is really will this be ok runing the 36watt bulb 48" long without blowing either the starter or the bulb but just not be as bright as my tank looks 100% better with the 2 on

thank you for any help advice as in my thinking it would be unsafe to use a higher power starter on less power bulb but ok this way but please feel free to tell me if im wrong thanks

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,
If the 18W ballast has fired the 36W tube, it should be all right, but it may not not be as bright as it would be with the correct ballast. Normally you would expect that the starter wouldn't provide a sufficient "short" to vaporise the mercury in the tube and provide an arc. You may find that the running temperature of the lamp is lower than it should be, if the optimum temperature, around 40 °C, isn't reached you will get a noticeable dark deposit (on the ends of the tube) and fairly rapid tube failure.

It is likely to be an "intelligent" high frequency electronic ballast, as many of these have quite wide wattage ranges, so in that case it would still be the "right" ballast for 36W. <http://www.lightonenergy.co.uk/18W-70W-HF-Ballast-EL1-p/el1-18-70hf.htm>

cheers Darrel