light bulbs

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philhawk

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
May 17, 2006
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bellevue, ne
so i was standing in the pet store thinking to myself, am i retarded... i have a 40 bulb that came with my hood and im planting my tank. i hear that you need about 1.5 watts per gallon (i have a 75 gal). all the bulbs at the store had different things they were good for (one bulb was : freshwater, planted and another was a : marine, freshwater, invertabrates, plants) but they all said 40 watts at the bottom. any info on the subject would be great.

thanks
 
Heres a pretty good resource for lighting

http://www.aquabotanic.com/aquamenu.htm

The amount of lighting your going to need all depends on how deep your tank is and what kind of plants you are going to be planting. Do a search for 'aquarium lighting calculator' or something along those lines and there should be a few good calculators that will tell you more or less how much lighting your going to need.

As far as bulbs go, there are lots of different varieties, and some are probably better fit for your needs. Consult that link I gave you... some of it can get kinda complicated. Photopic curve and so on, bleh.
 
Howdy,

The different bulbs you saw emit different spectra, geared towards the described uses. Freshwater macrophages need a different light than marine corals. Watts/gal is not the silver bullet!

Make sure to check the bulbs before you purchase, ask the LFS if they use it in one of their tanks (good stores generally do). If it's purple - stay away from it. Those were "plant lights" in the old days, but have been shown to produce more algae. Although your vision won't tell you the exact spectra, a purple light is a good hint that you won't be happy with it in the long run.

Good luck,
HarleyK
 
First things first. What is your budget? Do you want a low tech or high tech tank? Are you going to invest in a co2 system? If you do then I would invest in a pressurized system. A 75 is to big for a DIY system. How about ferts? Give me some more info and I can help.
 
i have about 100bucks a week that i can spend on aquarium stuff, as for hi or low tech it really doesnt matter, my friends arent tech heads so they wont know the difference i just want a lush beautiful tank. i havent added any fertiliser but i have added nutrafin plant gro.
 
AHsupply.com
 
Mr.Geoff said:
AHsupply.com
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i second that, i just got one of the 1x55W kits for my 20G high, they're awesome.

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Here is what I would do if it was me setting up the 75 and I wanted to do it right the first time.

Substrate... Eco complete. Or you could use florite, or I use Soil Master (soil additive for baseball fields) in my 125 and love it.

Lighting...AHsupply 4x55 watt kit would be my #1 choice and I would build a homemade canopy to house them. Or you could go with a Coralife unit in the 4x65 watt and that would work also.

Pressurized Co2... Now that you have enough light to grow most any plant you will need a good co2 system. You can part and piece one together or you can order an all in one unit off the net and then get a co2 cylander form a local industrical gas supplier, fire extinguisher supplier, or home brew store.

Ferts... I would order from Gregwatson.com for your dosing needs. I also like to use Jobes hose plant spikes under my Amazon swords and some of my crypts.

Filter... I would go with a Filstar XP3. Its your choice but a canister is very helpful so you can plumb in your co2 reactor inline with the canister and you won't out gas your co2.

Test kits... I would have Ph, Kh, Gh, and Po4

Let me know if you have any more questions or if you guys see if I have left anything out.
 
philhawk said:
how hard/ expensive is it to set up a canister filter and a co2 system. i havent had any experience with them.
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Not hard at all. Generally, for larger tanks, the water inlet for the filter is used to perfuse a CO2 chamber before it is recirculated to the tank. Positioning the spray bar below water level will reduce loss of CO2 upon re-entry. You sometimes see bubble cascades used in smaller tanks, but for larger tanks, the use of water flow (e.g. provided by a canister filter) provides better results. Theoretically, you can also hook it up to a power head. If you already have a complete filtration system, and it does not include a canister, this might be your cheapest option. On the other hand, this might be the right time to upgrade your filtration.

Finally, I would like to add that not all plants require CO2 to flourish. As a matter of fact, I always recommend to try w/o CO2 to begin with and to not purchase it until you are absolutely sure that you need it. I dismantled the system on my 80 gal and sold it at ebay ... wasn't worth it, my plants grew perfectly without.

HarleyK
 
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