Well, if there's one thing that the Eclipse hood lacks, it's lumens. The 2100 lumens provided from the two flouresent bulbs just don't get it done as well as it could be. But who wants to shell out $100 for an official retrofit kit? I don't know about you, but I don't have that kind of money sitting around. So here's what I did.

First I bought a GE bright stick type of light fixture. It's a 2' (also comes in smaller and larger sizes for smaller or larger hoods) flouresent fixture that's thin enough to fit with plenty of room to spare still between the filter and the other lights. I cut a 1 cm x 1 cm notch in the plastic wall that supports the filter ( but to the right of the water way ) to run the cord and used some 3M double-sided tape to stick the light to the plastic filter wall. I then removed the bulb itself and covered it in clear blue cellofane to give the light a blue tint. I then re-installed the light, and put the white opaque cover back on. Because the light was first filtered blue, then again with white, the light appears JUST like moonlight, at least to my eyes. My plan is to leave this bulb on all the time, and turn the other two on only durring the day, because when the other two are on, the white light overpoweres this blue light and it looks like normal daylight.

Sounds cool. Post some pics!

Now that my tankwater has cleared from the substrate change, I was able to observe it in action. To be honest, I really didn't think it would actually function as a moonlight for the tank inhabitants, but I was wrong. I left the moonlight on tonight for about 15 minutes, then checked the tank. Sure enough, the sandcrab that I had never before seen until I did the substrate chage, was out scavaging algae. The other inhabitants were all out also (with the exception of the black mollies, who were out initially, but now seem to have been spooked into hiding by the heater, by something (possibly my arm reaching into the tank to reposition the live rocks). Here are some pictures:

This one is of the top of the hood and shows where the light is positioned. If you look to the right of the moonlight, you can see where the cord runs to the right side of the bio-wheel. This is where I had to put a notch in the plastic so the cover would close completely.


Here you can contrast the two, to the left is the normal daylight (the camera dimmed the daylight picture just a bit, so it is actually brighter), while on the right you can see the tank under just the moonlight.
[doHTML]<img src="http://i27.photobucket.com/albums/c158/Gatbunton/Daylight.jpg" alt="Normal Conditions" style="float:left;" />
<img src="http://i27.photobucket.com/albums/c158/Gatbunton/Moonlight.jpg" alt="Under Just Moonlight" style="float:right;" />
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That's awesome Sergeant Major. Great post.

Now you're making me want to go out and get some new lunar lights or make my own, even.

Very nice Sm on the light.