Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I have four lights set up in my 55 gal tank for the lizards. Two strip lights (UVA/UVB), 100w basking bulb, and a 75w light bulb for supplemental heat in the winter.

Yesterday, I noticed the tank was dimmer, and found that my 100w basking bulb had burned out. I wasn't about to run right to the store, so I put in a 75w regular lightbulb to hold me over.

To my surprise, the temperature remained the same! So, either that 100w had lost power, or a 75w regular bulb puts out as much heat as a 100w basking bulb. I'm not going to bother replacing the expensive basking bulb since the regular bulb works just as well at like 1/10 the price!

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1.0 Common Snapping Turtle (Goliath)
1.0 Brown Anole (Anubis)
1.0 Green Anole (Baal)
1.1 Great Basin Collared Lizards (Amon, Amaunette)
0.1 Chilean Rose Hair Tarantula (Spiega)
1.0 Chesapeake Bay Retriever (Logan)
0.1 Spoiled Mutt (Storm)

Same thing happened yesterday with Tobias. His 100watt basking bulb burned out, and I put in a 90watt normal lightbulb... It didn't produce much heat, but enough to hold him over till I got him a normal basking bulb.

I've used 100watt regular bulbs many times, I think someone on here actually suggested it.
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Amanda ^_^

"Animals are reliable, many full of love, true in their affections, predictable in their actions, grateful and loyal. Difficult standards for people to live up to." ~Alfred A. Montapert

Yep,i've got 2 clamps lights for my 30 gallon tank. And on the one end,alls I have is a 75 Watt Reg Light bulb. I have a thermomater close to the bottom of the cage under that Reg light bulb,and it keeps it in the high 80s/low 90s.
Its a way to save a good bit of money

It is true that a regular bulb can and does work for some situations, however, the advantage of the basking bulb is the design of the bulb is to focus the light into a small site for basking, where as a reg. bulb dispearsers heat and light everywhere in all directions, If you want to consider this, I have had comments from some of my friends that they buy the hlogen lights from home depot for theap and they are focused, less expensive and do the same job. This is what I've been told so you might check that out as well. I do prefer to have or use a basking bulb but I'm not locked inot any particular brand, cheaper the better....Cheers!
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Phrynosoma.com

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signature file edited. [phw 11/14/04]

Fortunately, this does not seem to be an issue for me. Since I have a large tank, I still have a good heat gradient...

Right now it is 104��� in the basking end and 74� in the cool end.

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1.0 Common Snapping Turtle (Goliath)
1.0 Brown Anole (Anubis)
1.0 Green Anole (Baal)
1.1 Great Basin Collared Lizards (Amon, Amaunette)
0.1 Chilean Rose Hair Tarantula (Spiega)
1.0 Chesapeake Bay Retriever (Logan)
0.1 Spoiled Mutt (Storm)