Melissawater

I appolagize if this has been covered already, I tried to look through the posts under this forum already. I am in need of new lighting and probably a new hood, but I am not exactly positive as to what I will need. I read through the site on plant geek that was in the sticky, but I am not to sure as to what it said at this point.
My tank is a 60 gal 48in Lx13in Dx24in H and I am only planning on having low to med light plants because I am hoping to stay away from Co2. I was wondering if anyone had some suggestions?
Thank you so much.
Melissa

Shawnie

hi melissa!!
I have some plants ill share with you and some dempsey fry hahaha....but id go along the lines of 1-2 watts per gallon on the lighthing...sometimes its cheaper to find it on craigslist than to buy new....

Melissawater

Thank you Shawnie that would be great Not to sure on the dempsy fry lol, those are some BIG fish! I will definately check on craigslist, I'm just not to sure on what I am looking for...Looking online so far I have only found T5 High output lights around the 108 watts/gal, just not sure if that will work.

Shawnie

awww that 60g would love a dempsey hehehe...108w a gal would have you with some major green algae...or is it 108w total? im not a high planted kinda tank person so lighting isnt in my area ...i keep all the easy plants and would share some anytime

namehater

you can make your own light fixture with normal, every-day screw-in fixtures (about $2 each). just wire them to a switch, load it up with about 6 16w 6500k CFL bulbs and you should have plenty of light for low-light plants. just remember to keep water from being able to splash on them.

im pretty sure there are a few light setups in the DIY section, you will save a ton of money building your own light setup vs buying a prebuilt fixture

Melissawater

That was 108 watt total woops , so I will get a little under 2 watts per gallon. I wouldn't even mind a little less than that, we only want plants like anubia, cryptocoryne, etc. Thank you Shawnie
Namehater, as much as I would love to be very handy it is hard for me to nail a nail in straight, so electricty scares me! I will check out the section though...maybe it will "spark" an idea!

Shawnie

im not a good nailer either
sounds like it would be enough then!! phew on the 108w a gallon tho ..can see you cleaning your bum off daily!

Nutter

If I were you I would go for the T5HO fixtures you mentioned in your first post. The important thing to keep in mind with your tank is that it is quite deep but not very wide front to back. Given that fact you will be better served by the T5HO's as they are much narrower than standard T8 fittings. The T8's will take up quite alot of room over the top of your tank while not givving you a great deal of light. Using the T5HO fittings will give you more light while leaving you more room at the top of the tank for access. If you only want low light plants as you mentioned then the 108w would be ideal as you still need fairly intense light to penetrate all the way to the bottom of the tank. It would be nice to have that little bit extra to just in case you decide you want a few plants that have higher light requirements. The Compact Flourecents that Namehater mentioned would do the trick as well but if you don't want to mess with DIY then just buying the T5HO fittling will be much easier on you. It will put a bigger dent in the budget though.
When it comes to picking tubes, have a look on the boxes the tubes come in for the spectrum emitted graph. Look for tubes that have high peaks in the red & blue areas of the spectrum. Kelvin ratings between 5-10,000 are usually pretty good but try to work from the spectrum emmited chart as it is much easier.

I hope that all makes sense. I'm sorry if it doesn't, I'm battling a bad flu at the moment so if it's all gobbledygook then I do apologise.

Melissawater

Lol Shawnie!
Thanks Nutter, actually it does make sense! I will check out some more deals on the web and see what I can find.