Too Much Light?

[Spiceweasel69]

Finally completed my lighting rebuild in my rena 600 aqualife. Replaced 4x 58W T8s for 4x80W t5s totalling 320 Watts. Is this too much bearing in mind i plan to time 2 tubes to come on for total 12 hours and the other 2 tubes for 6 hours (3 hrs after start and before end of the first)?

Make sense?

Looking to go heavily planted w/co2 but dont want algae bloom.

 

[aaronnorth]

320/ 160 US gal = 2wpg = high light = CO2
although running just 2 of the tubes should be fine as it wont be as high.

you would of been better off sticking with the 4 x 58w (1.5wpg) IMO.

As for the photoperiod (using numbers as an example)

8am (2 tubes)
12pm (4 tubes)
2pm (2 tubes)
4pm end of photoperiod

this way you will have a midday burst. 8 hours will also mean the plant wont need as much nutrients and algae will have less chance to grow.

 

[Spiceweasel69]

320/ 160 US gal = 2wpg = high light = CO2
although running just 2 of the tubes should be fine as it wont be as high.

you would of been better off sticking with the 4 x 58w (1.5wpg) IMO.

As for the photoperiod (using numbers as an example)

8am (2 tubes)
12pm (4 tubes)
2pm (2 tubes)
4pm end of photoperiod

this way you will have a midday burst. 8 hours will also mean the plant wont need as much nutrients and algae will have less chance to grow.

Cheers Aaron. I am looking to go CO2 and EI dosing. I have heard that larger tanks dont need 2wpg to require the use of co2, so i was concerned that this setup has 2WPG but since the wpg rule was for T12 and not T8 tubes, its the equivalent of nearly 3wpg.

Its very very bright.

I will run it on only 2 tubes until i put the plants in.