While compact fluoros are great they'r real pricey...

But they last longer.

I'm not so sure about that.

Me either. WHy would they? How is the physics different?

Wayne says that flourescent bulbs don't need to be replaced as often as people
think they do. He says the dropoff is very slight; basically, as long as the
bulb goes on, it's okay.

I've heard a couple of explanations of where the "replace every six months"
mantra came from. One is that older flourescent tubes really did have a sharp
dropoff at six months, though new ones don't. The other is that lighting info
came mostly from reefkeepers, and corals are much more sensitive to even tiny
decreases in lighting than are plants.

I don't know about that either. Somebody should call GE/Osram/Philips
and ask for an authoritative answer. Last time I called them (1989)
they sent me a graph of decay vs. time.

My answer to that was to use more tubes so the amount of light
is correct after they'd decayed.

--
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