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hey i just bought a bunch of stuff for the tank today and i wanted to knwo if u guys know anything about this lamp.

http://www.zilla-rules.com/products/combo-dome.htm

i bought it and figured id could atleats try it. if it works it'll be great but there is no 5.0 or 10.0 rating on the light so i have no idea if it will be enough or to much or what. it says 50 microwatts of uvb but i have no idea what that accually means.

It looks fairly new, I'm not familiar with it. It sounds like the heat light is a spot light (it says it's focused), and if it is, I'd monitor the temp carefully (a flood light or regular incandescent bulb provides a more gentle heat). Can you use whatever bulb you want in it?

As you know, you're limited to buying only Zilla's circular UVB lights. I think Zilla used to be ESU, and their UVB lights do not have the greatest of reputations...What's the recommended distance from the basking area?

yeah its a halogen bulb and i noticed they had there own way of attaching but if it works i wouldnt mind just using there. they might have a less intense bulb on there site i noticed they have a selection but i have to look at it.

You are limited to the desert bulb too. 50uW/cm² from a fluorescent is pretty high, I would suspect the decay to be fairly rapid. A quick search also yielded no one selling these bulbs. It's an attractive design but with too many flaws.

im gonna give it a shot and see, if it ends up being a pain i'll just use 2 lamps.

ok so i have my tank 50% set up now. i tryed out the lamp and it seems to work fine. the temp stays at about 86 degrees. the only thign is no where with the lamp did it mention the power of the uvb tube. im gonna use it and keep an eye on the turtle. what problems might i see if the UVB is too much or 2 little?


other then that i think its fine. onyl down side is being stuck buying their bulbs cause of the special way they go in but thats not a big deal as long as they dont go out of business.

Watch to see if the bulb causes any eye problems as well (swelling, closed eyes, rubbing at them, for example).

You might call the company and ask them what the UVB output of the bulb is.

ok so i've had this combo dome for a while and i must say it is working out fine. it has cept the basking area at 90 degrees give or take a degree, i have seen no uvb related problems with gaian (too much or too little). the onyl down side is that u cant use it with a timer. it has one plug so if u use a timer it will turn off both the light and heat. but other then that i am quite happy with it.

Why don't you want both bulbs off at night?

Yeah, you should turn off both at night. You don't want to encourage the turtle to remain out of the water during the night, and in the wild, the night temps would drop dramatically enough to induce sleeping in the water.

oh wow. well im glad u told me. and that makes it alot easyer. now if i can only figure out HOW TO USE THIS DANG TIMER!

steve wrote:You are limited to the desert bulb too. 50uW/cm² from a fluorescent is pretty high, I would suspect the decay to be fairly rapid. A quick search also yielded no one selling these bulbs. It's an attractive design but with too many flaws.

I didn't have to much trouble finding the bulbs. I still would rather have a MVB, but here are a few sites selling the bulbs...

http://www.petdiscounters.com/c176/Dese ... p8055.html

http://www.petsmart.com/product/index.j ... Id=2811521

yeah when i bought it there were plenty of bulbs right next to it.

LOBO - after having this setup are you still happy. I'm in the process of setting up our 15 gallon tank and this looks perfect for size, etc

LOBO, did you get any bulb damage from any humidity raised up form the turtle's water? I cracked my 7" circular bulb from a high humidity in my reptiles cage and wanted to know if is was possible to conserve the bulb.

The heat works good on the Zilla desert 50 combo dome, yet I will have to wait to see if the uv lamp will work in a tropical setting. In my next bulb mail order shipment of 2.