Recommendations please

[ADA]

I have just got my hands on a 120x45x45 and I'm currently committing the aquascapers worst crime of filling it with random crap and leaving it sat under our side board in the bedroom. I'm really taking time to plan this to (crosses fingers and touches wood) get it right first time, in the past I've only scaped up to 100L tanks, high tech with real success so as I'm jumping to a high tech 240L I'd like to get a good plan in my head. I'm gonna be using this as a stepping stone to my 6ft so will be setting up a few scapes in it and don't want to keep switching light units, I'd like to be able to carpet HC or UG if I wanted so what's the bare minimum recommendations wattage wise with T5's do you think? I'm also gonna rig up a small hidden LED unit for the shimmering effect that won't effect lighting levels much.

Thanks in advance,

Steve.

 

[mr. luke]

Not sure what wattage lighting you should consider but the 'shimmer leds' will almost certainly be overpowered by the T5's.
Why dont you go soley with LED lighting and ditch the T5's?

 

[ADA]

Cost is why lol, the LEDs will do fine trust me, I used them on my last tank along with T5's and it gave it that shimmer effect.

 

[ADA]

Anyone??

 

[ADA]

90 views and 1 reply??? Anyone???

 

[Andy Thurston]

2 t-5 the full length of the tank should be more than enough maybe 1 t5 if co2, flow and ferts are good

 

[ADA]

I was thinking 4 x 54w t5's so I was way off lol

 

[tim]

Have to agree with Andy 2x54w unit will be plenty, I use a 4x39w over my 3ft tank and only ever use all 4 tubes for photos.

 

[ADA]

Hmmm I shall buy the 4 x 54w as it comes with 2 plugs, that way I can do as you say and use 4 for photos

 

[viktorlantos]

LED and shimmering..... the ones which has good shimmering effect is overdriven power leds with short lifetime. We've tried a couple ones and after 1-2 years i see many failures.
The other thing is most of the LED unit has cold color. Which is ok, kind of a techno geek style but if you want to please your eyes T5 and HQI gives a better rendering.

So i would go with 4x54W dimmer unit. Would add in 1 or 2 color tubes and would see the sunset on the evenings with 2% dimming. That's my 2 cents

 

[ADA]

Wow dimmers? I'm gonna more than likely use this kit, don't think you can dim it?

http://www.allpondsolutions.co.uk/a...g/120cm-t5-fish-tank-lighting-four-tubes.html

 

[foxfish]

You would have to be at the top of the game & very familiar with you tank to successfully use 4 x T5, you certainly don't need 4 to get a great display.
I have tried 4' tanks several times & found them very time consuming & to be honest very difficult to manage even with 2 x T5s.

 

[mr. luke]

Others have stated 4x t5's to be overkill but if you dont mind spending the extra for the flexibility id go for it.
I take it that it has the option to run 2 or 4?

 

[ADA]

I consider myself to be pretty good with maintenance etc and getting the balance right, I've had a few 100L set ups with very high light, flow, ferts and maintenance, I know more kith means more room for mistakes, I think I will get the 4 x 54w and yeah it has an option to have 2 x or 4 x so that way if I want to I could run 4 for just a couple hours maybe if I need to speed up the growth etc.

 

[Iain Sutherland]

2 if enough, 4 is good for photos. 4ft tanks are a whole new beast... 40,60 and 90's are pretty easy, hardest part is flow. Low light, high co2 is the path you should tread.

 

[ADA]

Yeah I'll give it a go, I have around 3300 lph from an eheim and a jbl filter so looking around 14 x turnover, gonna use premade ferts to start with till I have all the ingredients for EI, also have unlimited CO2 extinguishers plus inline diffusers so hopefully all looks good, any other advice would be great tho.