New Hood Lighting

[amf17]

i making a new hood for my 20 gallon planted. Is there any problem with placing a piece of glass in the hood below the bulbs to protect them from water, etc.

Will there be any change to the light quality by it going through the glass before it reaches the water???

What about using a piece of clear acrylic instead of glass???

 

[Anguilla82]

Only problems i can foresee are that it may get very hot if the hood is all enclosed with no circulation going thru it i.e. fans.
Also the underside of the glass may get covered in algae or deposits, so will need cleaning every once in a while.

 

[Wolfenrook]

I made my DIY anti child/cat cover out of acrylic for safety, but you do however have to keep an eye on it as it can go cloudy with age. You might want to cut some ventilation slots in the hood above the glass/acrylic however, as light tubes do indeed give off a lot of heat (luminaires usually have a sheet of acrylic between the tubes and the aquarium, they also have ventilation slots, and in some cases cooling fans). If you need additional cooling 80mm (you can get smaller ones, but they tend to be noisy as they rotate faster) PC cooling fans are quite cheap and can be connected to a 12 volt adaptor for additional cooling, just keep them away from water or condensation.

Ade