lucky Reptile- Bright Sun

[Geomyda]

http://www.luckyreptile.com/products/145/en/pid1,7776828$pid2,7776978$pid3,7776829/products.html
I hear lots of good reports from European hobbyists and Turtle breeding specialists about this product.
does anyone here in the UK use them?

[ClareandCo]

Originally Posted by Geomyda

http://www.luckyreptile.com/products/145/en/pid1,7776828$pid2,7776978$pid3,7776829/products.html
I hear lots of good reports from European hobbyists and Turtle breeding specialists about this product.
does anyone here in the UK use them?

Yes, we've got this on our indoor turtle pond:

Lucky Reptile range Bright Sun UV Desert 70w with a Bright Control Pro (the electronic ballast) together with a reflector lamp and porcelain lampholder.

(I copied and pasted the wording from our post on another forum).

We got it all from Surrey Pet Supplies. It was recommended by Graham and we have not had any problems. I think only about 3 times has the bulb not come on first time, so we've switched off and tried again half an hour later, and hey presto!

[Geomyda]

Originally Posted by ClareandCo

Yes, we've got this on our indoor turtle pond:

Lucky Reptile range Bright Sun UV Desert 70w with a Bright Control Pro (the electronic ballast) together with a reflector lamp and porcelain lampholder.

(I copied and pasted the wording from our post on another forum).

We got it all from Surrey Pet Supplies. It was recommended by Graham and we have not had any problems. I think only about 3 times has the bulb not come on first time, so we've switched off and tried again half an hour later, and hey presto!

Interesting! These are used at the Munster zoo Asian Turtle breeding centre in Germany, and a couple of Swiss turtle breeders have given rave reviews about them.

[romski]

Paul,

I cant find any data on the lamp performance.
Power output in uw/sqcm or UVi and some sort of irradiance spectrum chart should be made available.

I understand that they will be at the symposium so it will be good to see the product there.

Rom

[ClareandCo]

This is what is says on the bulb box:

Bright Sun UV Desert 70w Metal Halide lamp

Distance 30 cm UVB uW/cm2 130 UVA mW/cm2 9,20 Lux 67.000

50cm 50 3,20 32.000

There are more details relating to the 50w, the "Flood" uv Lamp 160w, Compact UV Lamp (with Reflector) and the UV Rohre/UV Tube (with reflector).

[Kirkie]

I've used these. At one stage Lucky Reptile decided to produce different versions with different outputs. I was sold a "normal" output bulb that turned out to be a low output bulb so buy with caution. LR claimed it was a packaging mix up.

The original was a nice bright bulb.
Its all in here..

http://www.shelledwarriors.co.uk/for...reptile+halide

[Gordon]

That a bit spooky i was looking at these yesterday would they be any good for torts in a viv?

[Arcadiajohn]

Two points on this lamp.

Firstly that is not as powerful as T5! And like M.V over quite a narrow area. A24w D3+ HO T5 would cost you up to £50.00 a year less to run and offer similar light levels and more UVB over four times the area.

Secondly because of the method of manufacture they have been shown to need replacing every 3-4 months to be sure of consistent UV output.

Huge quantities of cool light make halide attractive but the Uv depreciation of current brands is very worrying. This is the sole reason we did not include one in our range up until now.

This may change if we can again break down the limitations of science.


I will keep everyone up to date as this project progresses

John

Originally Posted by ClareandCo

This is what is says on the bulb box:

Bright Sun UV Desert 70w Metal Halide lamp

Distance 30 cm UVB uW/cm2 130 UVA mW/cm2 9,20 Lux 67.000

50cm 50 3,20 32.000

There are more details relating to the 50w, the "Flood" uv Lamp 160w, Compact UV Lamp (with Reflector) and the UV Rohre/UV Tube (with reflector).

[Kirkie]

Originally Posted by turnip

That a bit spooky i was looking at these yesterday would they be any good for torts in a viv?

This particular halide lamp produces a lot of heat both in in the "beam" and residual heat in operation. It would depend on the size and specifically height of your viv. A standard 12-15" viv would not allow the height required to mount the special bulb holder required for this lamp. It would be too close to the substrate. I recorded a temperature of 51C at 8 inched from one of these bulbs. Please be aware that this bulb requires a kit of a ballast unit, the lucky reptile Thermo socket pro lamp holder (they claim it fits a standard E27 holder but if you use the LR ballast unit it has a snap in connector which is only found on that particular bulb holder) and the bulb. Heavy startup costs and my experience with the UV life expectancy of the earlier bulbs suggests regular bulb replacement as with other halides.

[ClareandCo]

£50 a year less to run! I don't quite understand this.

Ours is only on the turtles' indoor pond from October - March (subject to weather conditions) and then only obviously during the day.

Based on that and the average kilowatt price how much would the T5 cost per annum?

Irrespective of the area it heats the turtles all "pile up" on top of one another anyway.

Where's Graham when you need him?