Light for aquarium, is this the right forum?
- Thread starter brcacti
- Start date
You can get aquarium lights in both single and dual linear strips at petstores. The shoplights are the same basic thing, but they don't have the fancy piece of molded plastic.
brcacti;1397218; said:
Since you list so many plant eating fish, I have to assume that you will be doing a fish only tank. One think I started doing on my tanks (which are planted tanks) is going to Walmart and buying the compact flourescent light 6500 K (the kind that fit in common screw in bulb fixtures) and then in the automotive department you can get clamp lights (concave aluminum fixtures with a clamp). These blubs get hot and the fixtures cannot sit flat on aquarium glass or plastic because they will get no air circulation, so suspend them over the tank using the clamp or add spacers to let air in (the fixtures have holes near the top to let air out).
The nice thing is you can use as many or as few as you need, they use little electricity, the 6500 K are very close to natural daylight, and if one blub goes out, you can replace it easily. I have eight of these over an 80 gallon planted tank and combines with CO2 they make the plants go nuts. I have two over a couple of planted areas in a 150 as spot lighting in a cichlid tank too. For a 300 fish only tank, four should be plenty.
Plus they are CHEAP!
If your goal is to end up with something that looks good as well as does the job then you can always make a full or even a partial hood out of sealed wood to hide the shop light fixtures. If you are talking about a single tank thats 8' long then I seriously doubt a single tube or rather a pair of single 4' tube fixtures will produce enough light for your needs.
I'm not a huge fan of suspended lighting for aquariums because far too much of the light is reflected back into the room and I don't have the option of watching my fish in a darkend room by tank lights alone.
I'm not a huge fan of suspended lighting for aquariums because far too much of the light is reflected back into the room and I don't have the option of watching my fish in a darkend room by tank lights alone.
Well I was thinking of two, four foot single flourescents running the eight foot lenght. 30 inch deep tank but silver dollars and some of the others listed below like dim light I was told by people who keep some of the fish listed below. I want it lighted but not bright.I think I will buy the singles and ask if I dont like them if I can exchange them back for the double bulb lights
I've never used it but I don't see why it won't work, just keep the balast in a dry area and use aquarium end caps that are waterproof of course...two 4' lights should be plenty enough to light a 240 gal. nicely with some reflective backing on the canopy to direct light inside the tank.