Cost effective light replacement?

[keansor]

My BF and I are new to fish keeping and we inherited a 30 gallon aquarium (36 inches long) when a family member moved. We really want to have live plants, but I'm unsure of the lights that we got with the aquarium, and need some help. The canopy (? I think that is what the light housing is called) is about 30 inches long. The actual light is housed in a white plastic trough about a foot long. There is a dual socket fixture (Leviton) in the middle with what looks like two elongated incandescent light bulbs and a very faded sticker that says "something something (illegible) maximum 25 watt". Part of the white housing appears to be burned from the heat of the bulbs, but they are still working. As a total newbee wanting to start up our first tank the "right" way, I guess my question is what is the best and most cost effective way to replace the light fixture so that I can at least grow low light plants (assuming that the existing lights are not adequate, which I am)? My bf is quite handy, so DIY projects are fine. Many thanks for all of your help, and I am really looking forward to actually bringing home some fish!

[babblefish1960]

Welcome to the OVAS club website. I shall begin by suggesting that there really isn't a "right way" so much as there are several ways to approach a problem. The unique problem that is aquarium fish keeping would be, that there are so many variables and certainly opinions and declarations of experience to re-enforce the proof which claims this to be a most inexact science.

Having scared you right off straight out of the gate, I shall answer your question with a recently commonmand fairly inexpensive route to take.

Compact flourescent screw-in light bulbs should work in this situation very easily, no modifications or tons of money involved.

Give that a try first before you start spending oddles of money on something more you don't necessarily require.

[kennyman]

Babblefish's suggestion of screw-in compact fluorescent bulbs is undoubtedly the simplest and most cost effective choice provided the bulbs fit in the housing. Another alternative to building a custom canopy or buying an aquatic lighting fixture is to suspend a fluorescent fixture from the hardware store over the tank and replace the plastic canopy with a glass lid. That was the choice I made for my planted tank to save some money. I think it cost me about $40 for 80W of fluorescent light plus the glass tops bought at an ovas auction of $7.

Good luck and welcome to ovas 

[KLKelly]

No help with the lighting - but I am a big fan of fishless cycling - here's an article on it: http://thegab.org/Articles/FishlessCycling.html

[charlie]

Welcome to OVAS, my advice is to read as much as you can on plants, lighting , nutrients ( fertilizer ) & ask a lot of questions .
here are some articles to get you started,
http://ovas.ca/index.php?page=3
http://www.rexgrigg.com/
http://ovas.ca/chateventlogs/2006-11-01_Planted_Tank_Chat_MODIFIED.pdf
Good luck

[sniggir]

I would start with the CP screw in, and if you want more light latter you can easily build a T5 fixture, go to litmore and buy a workhorse 5 and then you can put 4 24inch bulbs over your tank for like less than 45$ well for equipment you would have to build the canopy and get the bulbs but for the bulbs talk to Redbelly on ovas...PS he haslots of EXP with planted tanks...even though he now into SW


welcome to OVAS

Pat

[dpatte]

get some daylight-colour compact flourescent bulbs and discard the incandescent ones. You will save money, the tank brighter, and the hood wont overheat.

[Fishnut]

I have 2 bulbs above my planted tank.  One is recommended for growing plants and the other is a simulated daylight bulb.  Neither are super cheep, but the plants are doing very well.  In 4 weeks, my bunch plants have grown A LOT!  I already had to prune the foxtail plant and the bacopa has grown 2".  Here's a pic to show what happened in 4 weeks...the green fluffy one near the filter was pruned before I took the picture to 1/3 of what it was, but since it's a bunch plant, I just stuck the clippings in the gravel and I'll have more to prune soon

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[Fishnut]

Oops, those are florescent bulbs!  Also, it never occurred to me that the screw in compact florescent bulbs would be good for plants.  Do they produce all the right kinds of light?  I always thought they were like the regular fluorescents you can find at home depot...ok for some growth, but definitely not optimal.  Do any of the super plant growers here use compact florescent bulbs?

[babblefish1960]

Over our smaller tanks, I have found very little in the way to fault the type "A" base compact fluorescent bulb, as pertains to growing plants, they have enough of the yellow green wave lengths that at that shallow depth, seem to provide enough useful light to aid photosynthesis.

In my opinion, these bulbs are definitely money well spent for smaller tanks.

[keansor]

Thanks to all for your help. I will definitely try the compact fluorescent bulbs to start; my only worry is that they may short out the old looking fixture.

[babblefish1960]

From an electrical standpoint, if the light fixture is sound and works with an incandescent bulb, it will work just as well with a compact fluorescent type A base bulb. Shorting is not actually exclusive to one type of cf versus an incandescent bulb, shorting either occurs from incomplete wiring grounding out, or it doesn't happen. Check the fixture out carefully, and if you're concerned at all, don't use it.