Bloo
~ I learn something new ~ ~~~~ every day ~~~~
A few people have asked me now to explain what I did with my hood and upgraded the lighting.
I always lose my pm's and end up re-writing the whole thing. So this is to make it easier for me to reference to - and refer others too
Now I'm sure a lot of you are going to say - it's so easy to DIY your own lid etc. BUT for various reasons this wasn't an option for me with limited hand tools - and no excuse for being female, but I just don't have electric saws etc. and fancy tools to put a DIY hood together.
As the Tropiquarium isn't of standard dimensions either, I couldn't just buy a new hood either (life would have been so much easier!)
I have a Tropiquarium 68 (72 litres / 19US gallons) that comes as standard like this:
(note, I just googled this first picture)
As you can see, everything is built into the hood and the two 15W lights are covered with a plastic plate.
Unfortunately, living in London, this cakes up with Limescale pretty quickly and I found that very little light came through. And the plastic was impossible to clean and remove the limescale successfully.
My only choice was to rip everything out and try and DIY from 1.5 WPG (2x15W) to 2.8WPG (3x18W).
Due to bad design, the lid cannot be unhinged. And I couldn't possibly gut the lid without having the lid on a flat surface to work on. So firstly the hinges had to be cut off.
My tools were a Stanley knife, a little hand saw and a pair of pliers.
(please switch off all electric supplies to the hood and use care with the tools !)
Unscrew all the screws you can find that hold the white part to the hood. Remove the white part and then proceed to just rip out the ballast etc. until you get to this stage :
As you can see (on the right hand side of the hood) there is a plastic ridge - and some other ridge a few inches high at the back too. The 18W tubes will not fit in unless ALL inside ridges are removed. For this I used pliers and the little hand hack saw to just twist and break pieces off - and then smooth it out with the Stanley knife. Also cut down the"funnel" of the small cylindrical "plug" and get it as flush or low down to the inside of the lid too.
Unfortunately some of the ridges (at the back) actually kept the back part of the hood together, so I simply had to cut them off and then silicone them back (once the ridges were removed). This is not visible at all when viewed from above and does no visual damage from the outside.
(pardon the condensation)
The next step was to saw a couple of pieces of wood to fit as a small "bridge" on either side of the lid, to hold the lamps & reflectors. These were the siliconed in.
This is a photo pre-reflectors - but please don't do this without reflectors, as they actually get screwed into the wood to hold the lights. To just silicone them (like I first had it for a few days) is just a botch job.
Reflectors are an absolute must, and I suggest the Juwel ones for ease of use and fit (as opposed to Arcadia).
Simply screw the reflectors into the hood and add light tubes !
I also removed all the battery/lcd/wiring components from the light timer and this now merely "sits" on the hood as a little feeding hole that I can just lift open to feed the fish.
I'm quite sure there are easier ways to modify this lid - but I'm very pleased with my end result.
Now obviously the lid is no longer hinged and just "sits" on top of the aquarium. This however isn't a problem and is till very secure. My cat jumps up and down all day long and it doesn't move.
This is a horrible old photo and my tank looks nothing like this (inside) anymore, but gives you an idea of the tank / hood.
Or for more info, see my Planted tank thread.
Hope that help. Please don't hesitate to suggest an easier way to do this or ask further questions
I always lose my pm's and end up re-writing the whole thing. So this is to make it easier for me to reference to - and refer others too
Now I'm sure a lot of you are going to say - it's so easy to DIY your own lid etc. BUT for various reasons this wasn't an option for me with limited hand tools - and no excuse for being female, but I just don't have electric saws etc. and fancy tools to put a DIY hood together.
As the Tropiquarium isn't of standard dimensions either, I couldn't just buy a new hood either (life would have been so much easier!)
I have a Tropiquarium 68 (72 litres / 19US gallons) that comes as standard like this:
(note, I just googled this first picture)
As you can see, everything is built into the hood and the two 15W lights are covered with a plastic plate.
Unfortunately, living in London, this cakes up with Limescale pretty quickly and I found that very little light came through. And the plastic was impossible to clean and remove the limescale successfully.
My only choice was to rip everything out and try and DIY from 1.5 WPG (2x15W) to 2.8WPG (3x18W).
Due to bad design, the lid cannot be unhinged. And I couldn't possibly gut the lid without having the lid on a flat surface to work on. So firstly the hinges had to be cut off.
My tools were a Stanley knife, a little hand saw and a pair of pliers.
(please switch off all electric supplies to the hood and use care with the tools !)
Unscrew all the screws you can find that hold the white part to the hood. Remove the white part and then proceed to just rip out the ballast etc. until you get to this stage :
As you can see (on the right hand side of the hood) there is a plastic ridge - and some other ridge a few inches high at the back too. The 18W tubes will not fit in unless ALL inside ridges are removed. For this I used pliers and the little hand hack saw to just twist and break pieces off - and then smooth it out with the Stanley knife. Also cut down the"funnel" of the small cylindrical "plug" and get it as flush or low down to the inside of the lid too.
Unfortunately some of the ridges (at the back) actually kept the back part of the hood together, so I simply had to cut them off and then silicone them back (once the ridges were removed). This is not visible at all when viewed from above and does no visual damage from the outside.
(pardon the condensation)
The next step was to saw a couple of pieces of wood to fit as a small "bridge" on either side of the lid, to hold the lamps & reflectors. These were the siliconed in.
This is a photo pre-reflectors - but please don't do this without reflectors, as they actually get screwed into the wood to hold the lights. To just silicone them (like I first had it for a few days) is just a botch job.
Reflectors are an absolute must, and I suggest the Juwel ones for ease of use and fit (as opposed to Arcadia).
Simply screw the reflectors into the hood and add light tubes !
I also removed all the battery/lcd/wiring components from the light timer and this now merely "sits" on the hood as a little feeding hole that I can just lift open to feed the fish.
I'm quite sure there are easier ways to modify this lid - but I'm very pleased with my end result.
Now obviously the lid is no longer hinged and just "sits" on top of the aquarium. This however isn't a problem and is till very secure. My cat jumps up and down all day long and it doesn't move.
This is a horrible old photo and my tank looks nothing like this (inside) anymore, but gives you an idea of the tank / hood.
Or for more info, see my Planted tank thread.
Hope that help. Please don't hesitate to suggest an easier way to do this or ask further questions
thanks - same thing happened with me. Before I knew it, I bought Dennerle Quartz, Laterite, a substrate heater cable and pressurized CO2 (JBL Profi 2) 
(you have been warned 
(saving those pennies!)
