Help With Lighting?

[RainyES]

I need a little help, I have the standard 29 gallon All Glass Aquarium and I need to get about 3 watts per gallon for lighting for my plants. I don't seem to understand how I can do this with my tank, I don't know what kind of lighting to choose. Could you please help me?


Thanks.

 

[anodized]

to upgrade for a planted tank you have tons of choices, personally i've had good experience with coralife. comes in 1x65W and 2x65W models which are compactflourescent. for a 29G tank it sounds like you'll need a 30" light.

other option are T5 or T8 systems where you can buy something pre-fab for your tank size or buy a ballast and end caps and assemble your own.

if low cost is your goal some people have retrofitted the compact flourescent bulbs used in regular fixtures into a hood. a pair of these at the right wattage might do the trick.

 

[RainyES]

Thanks a bunch for that information..

I was thinking about using a Twin-Tube Black Fluorescent Strip 30" and using Coralife Nutri Grow Plant Lamp? But they got so many different types of bulbs for plants/fish.. I don't know what to choose from really.

 

[iairj84]

If you look in the planted tank section there's a sticky there all about lights and their different colors and outputs. It has been really helpful to me in the past.... That being said I created my own lighting using standard spiral CF bulbs. I used daylight bulbs with a color rating of 6,500 It gives off the perfect light color for my plants and to show the colors of my fish. I used aluminum flashing made for roofing as reflectors and it gave me about 3.5 WPG on my 20 gallon tank.