Cooling DIY light hood

So I just finished my retrofit from a simple T8 to CFL and an having some trouble with the lights heating my water temp up. With the lights on for 10 hours I see about a 2-3 degree rise in temp. This is not overly concerning now but during the summer this could be a problem. Below is a link to pics of the light hood.



My question is can I use small computer cooling fans mounted at each end on the hood, and if so can I just wire them to a 12v power cord from an old digital camera?

 

if your light is causing water temp to raise...did you try setting your light higher away from ur aquarium? That could take away some of the heat issues. I don't believe you wiring the computer fans will help, fan cooling will only help dissipate the heat from the light unit itself that is generated so that the light itself doesn't get too hot. Best thing you can try is to set it higher up away from ur tank and see if that helps.

 

Yes you can use old PC fans to help dissipate excess heat. Best to use two fans with one sucking air into the hood the other blowing air out. That will remove the heat from the actual fixture very quickly & will also get that heat out of the hood area so that it doesn't get a chance to heat up the water.

A 12v cord from a camera should be suitable but if not then just go down to your local electronics supply store & tell them what you want to do & they will give you the cords you need. I got my cords from a electronics supply & it only cost me about $8.

 

To touch on what hsunami said:
Is there any air space between the lights and the tank top? If not, simply raising it off the tank top should help that immensely.
If that doesn't work, the next step would be the aforementioned fans (excellent advice from Nutter on that one).

 

Thanks for the info guys, I might have been a bit off on the temp rising. I had just got my new heater the day after completing the light and installed both, turns out most of the water temp change was due to the new heater running a bit higher than my old one. Either way I'm going to install some fans just to cool the lights and extend their longevity.