4ft tank setup

[szesteve]

Hi experts! I'll be selling my arowana and setting up a 4ft planted tank. The dimensions are 4 x 2 x 1.5 ft tank with a Eheim Pro 2026 filter.

I currently have a 4ft Resun double tube light which amounts to 60W of light. My guess is that the tubes are 3 ft. I want to change the tubes to PL 6500K. [Anyone knows where I can get it?]

I'm also gonna get another same 4ft Resun so all in all I have 120W of light. Is that enuff if I wanna achieve a 2-3W/Gallon?

Btw, how do I calculate gallons???

Lastly, how many bps do I need for a tank with high CO2 requirement?

Thanks to all!

[David]

hello steve....the water volume of your tank is roughly 324 liters of water which is about 130gallons.....if you want to achieve 3 watts per gallon you will need about 400 watts of light.

before you embark on your lighting upgrading quest, consider the kind of plants or tank concept. You many want to consider using Metal Hylide Lamps. instead of regular FL tubes....

the reason for MH light is that you only need 2 hoods to acheive 300 watts of light and the light intensity is much better than FL tubes...running cost of MH is lower then FL light as MH bulbs last anything from 1.5 to 2yrs with minimum light lost will FL max is at 6 to 8mths max 1 year...of cause there is the PL light but the gains are margin agains the FL.

the only down side to MH is the heat from the ignitor and ballast and the light glare to the surrounding area of the home.

[eggz]

David, I think 324liters is a about 85 US gallons rite? When we consider watt/gallon, its usually w.r.t to US gallons? If so then Steve will need about 250Watts....

BTW, does MH lights contribute a lot to heating up the tank water as well?

eggz

[eggz]

Hi Steve,

My tank is the same size as yours. I currently have 6 X 36W PLs which is enough for most stem plants, even red ones.

My tank is quite heavily planted and my CO2 rate is about 2 bps (KH4, PH 6.6-6.

You might want to consider asking Chan at NA if he can convert your cover lights FLs to e-ballast PLs to get more wattage if you're not going to MH route.

As a rough guide, you get US gallons by dividing liters by 4. Otherwise, use www.convert-me.com []

Have fun!


eggz

[David]

hi eggz....you are correct on the coversion rate...the heat gain in the tank between MH and FL is about the same coz with MH, it is placed about 1 to 1.5 ft about the water line

sorry steve you need only one MH hood for this

[tawauboy]

are tubes in your present resun runs almost the whole length of the light hood? if it is, then each tube should be 36 watts.

if you want to change to pl, you can get the eballast and tubes from nature aquarium, sinter in sim lim tower and lighting shops along kelantan lane and jalan besar.

1 imperial (uk) gallon = 4.546 l
1 us gallon = 3.7854 l

[szesteve]

Thanx for everyone's reply!

For plants like lotus and APP, they require high lighting right?

MH lights are out of the question for me.

I was looking at getting 6 x 36W PL lights...which should add up to about 216W and if the top has space, i'll add another 72W if i need more light.

Does anyone know how much Chan sells 2 x 36W PL lights 4ft?

[szesteve]

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On 12/5/2002 10:51:16 PM

are tubes in your present resun runs almost the whole length of the light hood? if it is, then each tube should be 36 watts.

if you want to change to pl, you can get the eballast and tubes from nature aquarium, sinter in sim lim tower and lighting shops along kelantan lane and jalan besar.

1 imperial (uk) gallon = 4.546 l
1 us gallon = 3.7854 l
----------------

Sadly, no. the ones in my Resun are only 30W each.

[sherchoo]

30W are 3ft long. Anyway, If you want to achive 6X36W, you can try modofying the present fixture to 2X36W PL and get anoter 4X26W PL. If you require more lights (depending of the plants you have) you can actually get a 4X36W PL + 2X36W PL together with your 2X30W which would give you 276W = 3W/g.
But mind you, this configuration will be really really hot. So keep that in mind.

[eggz]

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Does anyone know how much Chan sells 2 x 36W PL lights 4ft?
----------------

I think they're about 100 bucks, give or take 10 bucks or so, can't quite remember.


eggz

[juggler]

It depends on whether you keep light demanding plants (such as growing Riccia and Glosso at the bottom of the tank) that you need more lights.
My current 5ft (127 Gal, 472L) is only doing on 216W. That's about 1.7w/g. Plants are not bubbling (probably too many fish?) but they are growing OK.

BTW -- I was about to recommend reading http://www.fitchfamily.com/lighting.html but somehow it seem to be forbidden.

[szesteve]

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On 12/6/2002 4:44:07 AM

It depends on whether you keep light demanding plants (such as growing Riccia and Glosso at the bottom of the tank) that you need more lights.
My current 5ft (127 Gal, 472L) is only doing on 216W. That's about 1.7w/g. Plants are not bubbling (probably too many fish?) but they are growing OK.

BTW -- I was about to recommend reading http://www.fitchfamily.com/lighting.html but somehow it seem to be forbidden.


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Hi juggler,

Thanks for your reply. I'm looking at keeping mostly about 40% of stemmed plants, 10% moss & the rest of the tank will consist of plants like blyxa japonica, elatine triandra, an some smaller plants similar to blyxa japonica but with red tips.

Elatine triandra did really well in my 2ft tank with 72W of light.

I don't plan to do glosso cos it drives me crazy![]

[sherchoo]

Looks like your plants are rather light hungry...suggest getting higher lighting.

p/s: glosso drives you crazy, E.tiandra won't be any much different.