Confusion over DIY Lighting

[Riss]

Hi,

I would firstly like to start off by saying how confused I am about DIY lighting. *??? As so many people have already said, I too would like to have a cheap, but effective means of alternative lighting.

Firstly, can you just buy any old light fitting, such as that in your house, and just exchange the bulb for something suited to aquatica? Or do you need specialized fittings for certain lights? And do you just screw them into the inside of your hood? I have a wooden sloping hood that came with the tank, so I have limited space at the front.

Also, what are retrofit kits, and T8 and T12, PC lights....I'm soooo confused. What's with the light spectrum and power usage???

Any information would be greatly appreciated as I'm in university at the moment and can't spend much money. BUT...my poor plants do need light!

I'm also in Australia and can't get much of the things you guys use on your tanks. My tank is 60"L x 15"w x 20"h. Currently I only have a 36" 30w light that came with the tank, so my plants are all planted under that in the middle *:.

Basically I just wanted to know if you can kinda just buy normal household light fittings, like that in the kitchen, and replace the normal household flourescents, with special bulbs from the aquarium shop. Will this work? Or do you need special ballasts and stuff to have maximum output of the light.

Sorry this is so long but I am at a loss at the moment. *???Thanx for your help.

Cheers *smiley*

[wayne]

Yes lighting is a little confusing, but start with basics and work up.
Spectrum - what colour or wavelengh dominates the light coming out.  Defined in K, don't know the definition of a K.  Red light is about 3000 K, full white about 6000 - 10000 K depending on mix, blue greater than 10000, Ultra violet greater than 20000.
 Plants like red bias, so tubes like grolux are approx 4500K.  Fish don't care, marine organisms prefer blue mix, (also called actinic) with lots of light >10000K.  Marine organisms (corals, esp algae like this as they typically live in deeper water - blue light penetrates better than red (much better) so they are tuned for blue not red light.
Power - how strong is the light.  Light intensity diminishes quickly in water so for plants in deep tanks you're going to need some light wattage.  Ditto inverts in deep marine tanks,but more so.  BEWARE STRONG LIGHTS - if you're not big into plants don't go crazy with lights in a freshwater tank - the fish don't appreciate it and may respond by washing out/fading or even losing their colours.  This is especially noticable in african cichlid tanks I think,  maybe because they often have a light coloured substrate  but it's true of most fish.  
 Bearing the above in mind you then look at the types of lightfitting available.
 Household lightbulbs - too hot
 Normal fluorescents - good enough for fish, maybe plants.  I use a white and a grolux and I do ok.
 VHO- very high output fluorescent.  I saw somebody growing corals with VHO's recently and they looked great, tho' water depth wasn't too much.  Need special starter I think
 PC or Power compacts - very, very good.  Not too much money.  Best value for marines?  Need special starter.  I got a very cheap, weak one from Ikea, and use it
 Metal halide - brightest you can get, VERY hot, very expensive.  

More people will have lots of opinions on the above.  

Retrofit kits - often people buy an aquarium package with filter, heater etc. inc. a hood with a light.  This light usually is rubbish, esp. for marine inverts or plants, so you pull this rubbish out, and stick in the retrofit kit that fits the hood instead, saving you the hassle of working out how to fit all the bulbs, wires etc in.
 Yes you could, for a 6 foot tank, go to the hardware shop, buy some big florescent holders, plus starter cartridges, then get a white and a grolux , and see how that is.  If it's inadequate pile in some more.  You may be able to recycle this stuff as well.  I recently found a twin fluorescent table light (2 * 15 Watt) anglepoise lamp in a junk shop - this is more than usable

[aznpanther98]

well it does sound confusing at first butu'll get the hang of it
just a lil warning it sounds complicated and long but worth reading hey knowledge is nothing without learnin  ley*
anyways most flourescent tank lighting is the same as house lighting i'm not the most expierienced on this but i will try and help as much as i know there are guys on here that know more than me but heres what i know if u have a custom canopy that is the best to do custom lighting IMO just goto the hardwarestore and buy whatever length light strip u need they sell sometimes sell them in 1-4 bulb setup they work good for plants...
there are some differeces in the light bulbs that u use in ur home and in the tanks but if u can find it at a hardware storelook for the sun light bulbs i forget what they're called but it's a GE Chroma 50 labled on the bulb itself they work great on plants also cool white bulbs works too and u can mix diff bulbs if u can use more than one i think these bulbs only come in t12's
now on to the lil more complicated t8's t12 are the diameter of the flourescent t8's i think they're 1/2" diameter and t12's are 1" and if u get a light strip make sure u know which bulb is used on it it'll have it somewhere on the box or on the light strip itself t8's are more brighter from what i've seen(just replaced the lights in the kitchen with 2 t8's) and they are alot brighter than the 4 t12 bulbs i had on... now getting to the PC lighting they are power compacts that are better than regular flourescents they cost a bit more, get a bit hot and i haven't had much expierience with them except the screw in bulbs that they sell it's supose to replace the incandescent bulbs in housees they work too but with a big tank like urs i'm assuming it's around 55gal tank i'd go with 2-4 t8 bulbs... one more thing i forgot to mention is what type of plants u have will depend how much lighting u need most plants do fine with 2watts per gal to figure the wpg take the total amount of watts ur using on lights and divid that by the gallons of water u have in ur tank...

retrofitkits are just upgrade kits PC lighting that replace the old lighting like if u have a regular 4ft 40watt bulb in ur light strip u can take it all out and replace it with retrofit kit it's just like upgrading ur cars stereo system with a better one

confused more? lol sorry for writeing so much

anyways hope this helps a bit i knowit's kinda long but worth it there are guys on here i know i learned a few things from reading what they wrote, look around in the DIY forum and there is a whole bunch of info on the net, gotta start somewhere right? i first started with two 20watts on a 30gal tank as i learned more i was able to upgrde the lights and right now i got someting called overdriven 20watt (there's a post somewhere in the DIY forum thanks to the guy who posted that!!!) and two screw in compact flourescent bulbs plants are grwing fine dam hygros takin over my tanks lol good luck!
BTW what plants do u have? and filtration(another imortant part of plant keepin but u just asked about lighting) and fish

Wow! Some very long posts!

Easiest is to get a shop light with a cool white fluorescent. If you dont want plants, dont worry about spectrum, watts/gallon etc. Im not sure what your hood is like but somehow fasten it to the hood or just lay the light on top of the tank.

If you want plants, I would still go with cool white fluorescent shop light but you might need more of them and addition to that you can 'overdrive' the fluorescents with electronic ballasts. Dont worry to much about spectrum and get sucked into buying 'plant' lights. Just nonsense anyways. Read http://www.myfishtank.net/articles/flourescentlight.php


That is the cheapest. PM for more details if you are interested. Check out my photos to see my tank. I did almost everything myself. *miley*

[rdracer66]

ronrca
you have a great looking tank, thisi s what i want mine too look like when im ready to try a 55g right now i'm  trying a 20g and not had much luck even using florite
up until yesterday it did have just the standard bulb in it im guessing 20w ?
but i got a idea from a guy on plantedtanks.net
and he has a 22g he did this with, he got a old incadesant hood and put in 20w phillip marathon bulbs thre compact flourecents they do run a bit warm but not bad enough to melt the plastic so far, i'm thinking about doing a co2 setup
not sure if i need it yet, i have 4 javafern and some sort of swords
Kurt

[Riss]

Hi...thank you all for the great replys *miley*

I currently just have hygro, giant val and wisteria (i think), and I have an internal power filter doing 1500Lph. The hygro seems to be doing really well...(grown to the waters surface in less than a week of putting it in), first time pruning that one, the wisteria looks healthy too, but the val looks a bit sad. *:-/

My hood has 3 sides, front and 2 sides, so because there is no back to it, does this mean I will have enough ventilation if I just use household fittings? Otherwise, will I have to use a little fan?

Anway...thanx for your great replys.

[glow=red,2,300]Cheers[/glow] smiley*

[aznpanther98]

i'm not sure how ur lid looks but u could always hang the shop lights abovethe tank and leave it open top unless u gotfishes that are jumpers or build a canopy and just put the lights inside would make it look nicer if ur good with wood... hey that rymes lol u might not need the fan unless ur going to put pc's or vhos as long as there's vents for the heat to escape on ur ligts they might be fine of course i can be wrong anyways the vals might need a bit more lighting and maybe a fertilizer tablet just a lil bit bury it into the gravel (by the val) that worked for me when my vals didn't look so good those other plants i know are gonna grow like crazy once u put more lights in my hygros taken over my tanks practiaclly and it all started from a few stems couple months ago lol i got like a bucket full of extra hygros polysperm anyone want them?  ;D

[luvfishies]

Here's the easy way. I've got 2 of these, for a total of 80w on a 33g tank. Works just peachy!

http://members.carolina.net/hyrb/lighting.html

I didn't build it, I got some "old fashioned" incandescent hoods at auctions etc and just used the screw-in compacts. My plants are thriving and growing like weeds.

[rdracer66]

nice setup Luvfishies I did the same when i read some guy did it on plantedtanks.net but i didnt make it i had a friend that wasnt using his incadesant light anymore and it fit my  20g nicely so i just put some foil insdie the hood and bought 2 marathon compact lights for 8$ each that put out 23w and 1500 lumens each i do have flourite in the substrate
i have 2 swords that i got talked into and well they were kinda dying before i put this setup in so not sure if they will make a come back
think so :?
if not ill remove and replace with other plants what kind u think ?

Kurt

[luvfishies]

I think the swords will make a comeback as you have the iron they need in the flourite substrate. just cut off any dying leaves so the plant can channel the growth to new leaves. Often swords will die back before really starting to take off.