Habitat - Indoor :: Lighting Timer Problem

[ElectricTurtle]

So I bought some power strip accessory that can set timers for lighting. I tried to plug my light for my turt in it, and it won't light up when the timers hit the programmed time. :<

The lamp fixture itself has an on/off switch. Could that be why it's not wanting to work?

[VeipaCray]

Do you have the model of the powerstrip / timer thing? Hopefully it's not one of those coralife ones... I've chucked many of those against the wall.

The lamp fixture needs to always be ON if it's plugged into a timer.

Hey wait a sec... aren't you the one studying EE and named your turtle Tesla? Heck you're forum name is electricturtle. You HAVE to be able to setup a lamp timer as EE. You should be telling us how to do this... heheh J/K

[BRuTAL_HiTMAN_]

one thing that i had some confusion with my timer power strip was setting it to auto, make make you have the auto setting turned on, mine was off by default....

[ElectricTurtle]

Hahaha. Yeah I know, the irony kills me. Here is the power strip I bought (Probably a horrible waste of money, but I am going to be out tonight and was worried about the turt. :<): http://www.petsmart.com/product/index.j ... Id=2752178

Edit: I had the switch set to on also on the fixture. Plugged it into the stable power and it came on.

[VeipaCray]

That's similar to the coralife ones I despise. The one you have is digital so might be a little better than the analog one I tried.
I also tried a $15 brinks digital lamp timer. That worked much better, but died after 3 months. I gave up and bought an aquarium controller to deal with the lights and heaters and stuff. No more timer issues after that. Of course an aquarium controller is WAY overkill for a lamp timer, but hey now I don't have to mess with it.

[VeipaCray]

I'm reading this online... http://www.zilla-rules.com/assets/003/9534.pdf

Other than putting it in auto mode that Brutal hitman mentioned the only other thing I see is the yellow vs. blue outlets. Yellow are daytime outlets, blue are nightime. they can't be on at the same time. so if you programmed the lamp to be on during the day... make sure it's plugged into yellow i guess.

[ElectricTurtle]

I'm reading this online... http://www.zilla-rules.com/assets/003/9534.pdf

Other than putting it in auto mode that Brutal hitman mentioned the only other thing I see is the yellow vs. blue outlets. Yellow are daytime outlets, blue are nightime. they can't be on at the same time. so if you programmed the lamp to be on during the day... make sure it's plugged into yellow i guess.

The only difference between the nighttime and daylight outlets if that once the "daylight" ones go off, the "nighttime" ones will automatically come on (for like, a heater or something when winter comes). I guess I will run some experiments until I figure it out.

[VeipaCray]

and out comes the oscilloscope and volt meters...

[ElectricTurtle]

Okay, I'm thinking maybe the bulb I got was no good. I got a http://www.petsmart.com/product/index.j ... Id=4005372 with a http://www.petsmart.com/product/index.j ... Id=2753959 lamp fixture. I plugged it directly into the wall and now it will no longer come on. :< :< :<

Edit: Apparently after waiting a few minutes, it works again. What is going on?

[VeipaCray]

self balasted bulb. has a temperature sensor. they go into protect mode to cool down. Once the bulb is on, it needs to be off for a few minutes before it will turn back on. If you leave it alone... it will come back on by itself. You must be an undergrad EE (heheh sorry J/K couldn't resist)

I have the exact same bulb. My next one will be a T-Rex I think.


EDIT> I'm not a fan of this bulb. I don't have a UVB meter to measure output but I suspect with my turtle's decline in basking the UVB output isn't as strong. Mo loved this bulb when I first got it. Reading online reviews ... the decline in UVB output seems to be a common issue with it.

[ElectricTurtle]

Gotcha. Yes, I am an undergrad pretty much. XD (Just turned into a Junior, so yeah)

Hmm, alrighty. Maybe I just need to give it a few minutes after replugging it in or something. I'm still learning 'bout this turtle stuff ya know. Before you know it, I'll be a turtle wizard. ;P

[VeipaCray]

If you can exchange that bulb, I would. see the edit to my last post.

[BRuTAL_HiTMAN_]

really? your RES stopped basking when the bulb got older? do you have a heat lamp aswell? mine will only bask when the heat lamp is on, and could care less about the UVB being on or not, or even working for that matter. and try both yellow and blue outlets, after i programmed mine i realized it was reverse of what i thought, so actually my stuff is plugged into the night time outlets and i've been too lazy to reprogram it since it works let it go for 24 hours aswell, because if you set the timer AFTER it's passed the time it was supposed to happen, i don't think it actually does any switching of the outlets and leaves them both off, like if it's 2 pm, and you set it to start at 1:30 pm and end at midnight, it won't "magically" come on, you have to wait until 1:30 pm the next day to see if it worked or not. or just test it by setting it a minute ahead of the current time to see if it works and again, check both outlets after (night and day)

[VeipaCray]

I use a MVB, but yeah as the bulb got older I noticed my RES basking less. still basks, just less. I drove out to Chciago Reptile House today to get a new bulb, but they only had a 250 watt T-Rex in stock... I have to wait for their shipment next week. boo.

I had never been to Chicago Reptile House until this afternoon. It's connected to a reef shop. My wife is NOT going to like todays shopping spree.

[BRuTAL_HiTMAN_]

hmmm... i can't imagine they could actually "feel" a difference in UVB output, maybe your MVB was putting out less heat towards the end? or some unknown other variable. correlation != causation

they very may could be able to feel the difference, however!