Switching to LED fluorescents - Advice needed by confused novice

[Stephen Crute]

Hi

I am new to the forum and live in the Middle East where access to good quality lighting is limited or extremely costly. So i am also new to the hobby and am looking to develop a planted aquarium and have a second hand tank 120 x 40 x 50 cms. It has a hood with two fluorescent tubes T8 (89cm) at 30 w each. From my reading this seems low if i wish to have anything other than the most low light tolerant plant species. I am trying to understand the best way of increasing light levels within the existing hood. I saw today in a normal lighting shop some LED tube replacements which were reasonably priced.

So will changing tubes to the LED fluorescents help or is there some other way to go? I have read plenty on similar issues on this and other web sites but have only confused myself.

thanks

 

[EnderUK]

You can grow nearly any plant with twin t8s, are you going high tech using liquid or gas co2? If so getting your co2, flow and nurients right is more important and lower light will give you more room to get these wrong. An easy way of improving the par is to get some good reflectors for the t8s.

If you're going low tech then twin t8 is more than enough, you might even want to take out the reflectors or get some floating plants. You can get a beautiful tank with paitence and an little effort.

 

[Stephen Crute]

Hi

Thanks for the advice, it puts my mind at rest. I will go ahead and make a start using the lamps I have and low tech to begin with and then develop from there as I learn and can afford more.

Stephen

 

[EnderUK]

Remember if you're going low tech you will still need to feed the plants some how, liquid, salt water column fertilizing or using root tabs or soil substrates. Keep to easy plants for now like crypts, swords, etc (you can see these on the tropica site for a list). Best of luck and glad you're not spending the cash on melting your plants with over powered LEDs.