JRunyon21

I am looking to layer the inside of my canopy with Mylar to get all of the light usage as possible. Is there a specific kind of Mylar I should be looking for or is it all the same.

How does this product look?
http://www.misterart.com/g568/Hyglos...C&WT.mc_id=568

How about this?
http://rollsoftape.ecrater.com/product.php?pid=3056181

The second one looks more useful for my application but would both products work?

sirdarksol

Both should work. Be very careful that they are out of reach of any splash (put a glass guard in if you have to.
Water has a habit of leaching the metal out of mylar, leaving clear plastic. The metal is pretty likely to be bad for your aquarium.

wabash

Interesting, so it is used to reflect more light? Can you control light color to some degree by the color you choose?

Tavel

the metal is aluminum, which is biologically inert.

I've used mylar in hydroponics and it is simply awesome. It increases light output by about 50% for only a few dollars.

JRunyon21

Sounds good. Thanks for the advice. I just purchased the mylar tape as I beleive it should be easier to work with. I will post pics so you see how it goes.

sirdarksol

Very few metals are truly biologically inert, and aluminum is not one of the few. It is used in treatment of certain fish parasites, meaning it reacts with at least some low-order animals in a negative manner. However, this likely means it won't harm the fish, at least (not sure about inverts).

So it's probably not all that likely to be horrible for the tank (I was thinking it involved copper, for some reason), but it's still not something I'd want floating in my water.

Aside from that, if the metal gets leached out of the mylar, it would ruin the reflective properties.

Fla_Larry

especially when aluminum foil will work just as well