budget planted tank light?

[Kelly_Aquatics]

Hello im seting up a ten gallon planted tank to surprise him for his birth day I came up with the idea after he showed some interest in my big tanks I had pretty much everything exept a good planted tank light of course I had spare lights but since I keep big cichlids no planted tank lights so I looked around and found the nicrew lights for 35$ canadian its a pretty good deal its advertized as a planted tank light so would it work for medium light plants? the tank will have a good substrate too and stocking would be some cherry shrimp maybe a scarlet badis pair and either ember tetra or chilli rasbora

Thanks!!

 

[fishguy1978]

10g are great because you can use a fluorescent bulb fixture to grow just about any plant you want just replace the bulb with a grow bulb. Check out Beamsworks DA LED lights as they are reasonably priced too.

 

[Kelly_Aquatics]

ok will look into it but do you think the nicrew light would work?

 

[esoxlucius]

ok will look into it but do you think the nicrew light would work?

I've got a little 10g tank which had a standard plastic hood on with the usual tube as lighting. However, everytime I lifted the lid up the condensation would drip all over. It was just a badly designed lid, so I took it off.

I got a small led nicrew light fitting for planted tanks and put that on. It's great so far. It's programmable and i'm very happy with it. When it comes on in the morning it goes to sunrise setting, like a beautiful orange glow as if the sun was coming up. During the day it's at its brightest and at night it gradually goes into moonlight mode before switching off.

It's not heavily planted, just a bit of val, but it's growing. It's just a bit of a QT tank at the minute for my chocolate cichlid and a couple of female red rainbows.

Realistically though, because of the depth of the tank, and as fishguy1978 said, you can just get a basic bulb and have success with a 10g.

The picture below doesn't exactly show it at its best because it's daylight, but you get the idea.

 

[Kelly_Aquatics]

ok just like a lamp with speicel bulbs?

 

[fishguy1978]

ok just like a lamp with speicel bulbs?

Yes, needs to be a grow bulb. 10g tanks are the exception to the watts per gallon rule. Due to the tank size and depth any grow light that fits the length of the tank will work. Don't go super powerful though as you could burn the plants.

 

[Kelly_Aquatics]

ok I can only find led lamps what about reptile lamps with grow bulbs? would it produce too much heat?

 

[Kelly_Aquatics]

what about somthing like this?

 

[fishguy1978]

yes

 

[Kelly_Aquatics]

ok my only cencern is that it is the exact demensions of the tanks foot print I cant just set it on top and Hanging it is not a option I guess I can build some sort of wood stand