How to retrofit a 36" light into a 48" housing

[kevinly]

I have a coralife 36" light and I was wondering how do I fit this into a 48" fluorescent housing?

[cichlid1409]

if i understand right... you want to put a 3ft bulb in a 4 ft fixture? why? i mean, you could do it by modifying the distance between the two plug-ins (the parts the bulbs plug into) on the fixture. this would be irreversable though. is this a cheap/inexpensive fixture?

[wvgdiscus]

Its not hard if you were close by I would do it for you.

[kevinly]

let me see if I can make this more clearly. I have a 48" tank that has a 48" fluorescent light. I dont like that light but I do have a 36" t5 light I really like but I cannot put that on the tank because I dont have a glass top. So I was wondering if I can retrofit that light into the 48" housing?

[cichlid1409]

gotcha. as long as it will fit into the depth and width of the 48" hood, i dont see why not . unscrew it all take out the guts from the 4ft fixture and put all the guts from the 3ft fixture into the 4ft. thats all there is to these light fixtures a ballast, wires, sockets, reflector and a few screws. pretty simple all you should need is a philips screw driver.although some mods might be necesary if its not an exact fit.

[Mzungu]

Is the 48" fixture a T5 fixture? Or is it just a regular NO fluorescent fixture? I'm no expert on this stuff, but I think if you're trying to put a T5 bulb into a normal fluorescent fixture you are going to need a T5 ballast, and will definitely need T5 sockets if they're just normal fluorescent sockets.

Do you not have the 36" fixture anymore? I'm guessing that's the fixture you're selling from your planted tank.

[eklikewhoa]

Should work out fine.

If you are gutting the old 48" fixture to use as just as a housing to house the 36" then it's not a problem.

[Roujin]

Do you have a Dremel?

[blacksmith37]

It should be a no brainer; However, putting a 48" tube into a 36" hood is difficult.

[Mzungu]

I guess he got it to work somehow...?