# Successful mod on hex tank hood



## Fishfur (Mar 4, 2012)

I got a 5 g acrylic hex tank awhile back, used. Hood came with, but did not work. So I finally got around to fixing it. Since I could not get a new ballast, which is what I suspect the problem was, I removed it, by cutting the wires just at the soldered ends. I left the switch wires intact.

Bored a rectangular hole in the plastic liner, using a boring bit on my Dremel, and then pushed in a double ended socket with a bracket attached that I got from Westinghouse, through a distributor locally. It was a rather loose fit, so I stuffed pieces of cut plastic sheeting in behind the liner, and siliconed it all together, to make a support for it that was nice and solid. I also siliconed the line where the two edges of the socket come together, to make it more water resistant, though it will have a plastic lens that came with the hood between the lamps and the water. The plastic sheeting was from one of those sheets used for lenses or covers on big flat ceiling lights.

Then I used wire nuts.. Marrettes, properly, to attach the original wires to the wires for the socket and both the lights and the switch work perfectly. I will keep an eye on it for awhile as the orginal wires are aluminum and the socket wires are copper.. they can sometimes come loose from the wire nuts because of differences in the two metals rates of expansion and contraction, but I think the worst that can happen is I'll have to rewire the switch, maybe. Wait and see, anyway. 

I got mini 'Daylight' spiral bulbs for it, 13 W, and it will use two. I have 23 W bulbs but thought two of them would be both too large and hot for the plastic and way too much light for such a small tank. So I hope to install it tomorrow and see how it does on the plants in there. 

This is very mini version of the 30 G hood I'm building, and now I've got these twin sockets it's under way too.


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## JulieFish (Apr 8, 2011)

I'm thrilled to hear that the transformation went well. Do you have any pictures of the tank all lit up?


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## Fishfur (Mar 4, 2012)

I will get some... and post them for you, if I can ever get my laptop to 'see' my camera. For some reason it has been refusing to recognize it, and preventing me from downloading pics. Friend has been trying to sort it out for me, as I'd rather not pay the Genius guys to figure it out.


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## katfishbugooloo (Aug 8, 2012)

Why not just pop out the memory card and directly upload the pics?


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## Fishfur (Mar 4, 2012)

'cause for whatever reason, the laptop is not 'seeing' anything I hook up to it. When I connect my camera, or an external HD, or the little widget I have that will download direct from the media cards, it does not seem to know anything is there. It's a Mac, it's old and it has some problems, but I can't afford to take to a pro for repair at the moment. A friend is trying to figure out why it's doing this, hopefully he can fix it for me. It is quite frustrating.. it was working just fine up 'til a few months ago.


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## Fishfur (Mar 4, 2012)

I ended up removing the aluminum wires... I'd gone to The Source looking for a switch for my new hood build, and to find some wire to replace the aluminum bit with copper. Talked to a really nice, kind of geeky guy there, who, when I explained what I wanted to do, showed me I could simply remove the aluminum wires completely, as they were only needed for the original ballast the fixture came with. For the fixture as it is now, the power cord only needed to be wired to the switch and the socket, without the extra set of wires in between. So that solved that problem nicely. I also ended up replacing the power cord, with one I'd cut off some other dysfunctional appliance and kept around. The original had some damage I discovered was covered with a small piece of tape, and since it IS around water, I thought it would be more prudent to replace the cord, rather than take a chance of water getting under the tape if there was a spill at some point, which there is going to be, some day, inevitably.
So now the hood's back on the tank and it looks pretty darn good. There's a small piece missing from the centre front of the hood, I think it must have been a little handle for lifting it. Since the light shines right at me through the space, I'll find a piece of something or other just to cover it up.. I'm sure I have some black vinyl somewhere I can use for this task, leftover from something else. A bit of screen over the knock out holes in back that I won't be using, just in case of possible jumpers and it will be just about perfect. 

Earlier on, I also took the rim off this tank and filled the channel with silicone, so now I can fill it all the way up without having to worry that water will wick under the rim and leak down the sides, which it did before I put the silicone in. So that's a bit of peace of mind too, and was very easy to do. Silicone won't hold on acrylic like it will on glass, but it doesn't need to.. it only needs to be a barrier to the water wicking up, under and over the edge and it's working perfectly for that. 

I'll have to wait and see if the pair of 13 W "Daylight" bulbs provide sufficient light for the plants in it, or whether I might have to switch one of them for the higher wattage. But only time will tell me that, unless someday I can afford a gadget to measure PAR. I have pics of the whole thing now, if I can just get them downloaded !!


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