25wt. bulbs

[Snail Tail]

Hey everyone,

I have always used 40wt lightbulbs as basking bulbs in my chameleon room. The room is kept in the low 80's. However the cost for electricity is pretty high here on Long Island and I would like to switch to a lower bulb. I have never used 25wt bulbs because I could never find a cheap place to buy them, but recently I did. Anyway, my question is, are 25wt bulbs hot enough for a basking spot for panther chameleons if the ambient temp in the room are in the low 80s? Or will that be too low for chameleons to do well?

-Adam.
Snail Tail Inc.

 

[Will Hayward]

A 25 watt bulb is cool enough to touch with your hands. Its similar to a florescent tubes heat. I think you should bite the bullet and put up with the cost.

 

[lowendfrequency]

I agree that 25w would be too low to be worth it. I switch my 100w and 70w bulbs out for 40w bulbs in the summer, but that in itself is costly. A good solution is a dimmer switch. Then you can adjust your current bulbs down to the desired temp. In fact, I recently got to see ZooMed's new unreleased products and they are starting a new line of high quality dimmable light fixtures. I'm an official distributor for ZooMed, so PM me if you need anything.

 

[Snail Tail]

Thanks for you're help guys.

I might have another solution. Since all my cages are right next to eachother, what if I split it up two cages per heat dome? I mean, if I put the heat dome overlapping onto two cages. If I am using 40wt bulbs now with one dome on each cage, what size bulb do you think would be sufficient to overlap onto two cages?

-Adam.
Snail Tail Inc.

 

[ChameleonsTree]

replace the rest of your bulbs in the house with those new energy saving flouresant bulbs...when i did it i saw a 15% reduction in my electrical bills...if you save money in the rest of the house you won't worry about the electricy in your reptile room
p.s. if you get them from costco they are like 2 bucks a bulb

 

[Fate X]

25 watt bulbs create some heat with a horizontal reflector , it depends on what type of reflector you are using, i used 25 watt bulbs in the winter for 2 of my veils and the one made so much heat i had to put higher , that was the incident where i thought i burned Sonic.

 

[Random]

a single 40w bulb left on 12 hours a day everyday only costs about 2-3 bucks a month. switching out to a lower wattage bulb will save a a little, but you arent paying a lot to begin with. if you have 40 40watt bulbs it would be a different story.

 

[Fate X]

i run 4 40 watt bulbs , 2 25 watt, 1 60 watt , 2 80 watt fixtures , 1 40 watt and a 18 watt and a 17 or so watt for 12 hrs and they all cost about 9 dollars a month. total is about 500 watts