Lighting Question For 60 Litre Tank

[worboyes]

Hello everyone, first post but not a complete newbee to fish keeping. However im doing my first Planted project in a 60 litre Marina tank i picked up from Pets @ home on the cheap.

The filter is fine for what i wanna stock it with and i got a spare heater for it, which is better then the one they provided.I'm gonna go down the JBL Route for nutrition and fertillisation, its a bit more expensive but prob a simple way to start.

im just a bit stuck with the lighting they only provide a 15 watt tube and i was hoping for at least 2 wpg which is roughly 26 watts. whats the best and most simple way to up the lighting? not sure if i casn just buy a higher wattage tube or not?

sadly i no nothing about electrics which im sure is clear from my post, so any help will be appreciated.

 

[Ps3Steveo]

I have a 24W plant pro Arcadia ellipse lamp in your interested? Google it and you'll see if it would fit.

 

[PJPJ]

The Watts per Gallon rule can't really be relied upon any more, the new T2, T5, compact fluorescents and especially LED's are much more efficient than the old T8 tubes that the WPG rule was devised for.

If that 15W tube is a T2 (It probably isn't) then that 15W could well be equivalent to a 30W T5 which is in turn much brighter than a T8.

What might be a problem is the light spread if the tube isn't long enough or positioned particularly well.

I would set it all up and see, you can always add LEDs to boost if necessary as it looks like there isn't much room in that hood. The cheap LED's don't really give off a light particularly suited to plants but I've seen posts from people happy with theirs for growing plants.