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reflectors

paul.stopher

Member
Joined
12 May 2009
Messages
25
Location
Surrey UK
Hi there.
Starting out on my first planted tank. Have a juwel rio 400 holding 95usg with t8 lighting 2x36w giving me 0.75wpg. Will fitting reflectors give me a better wpg or just increase the amount of light being directed into the tank? Sorry may be a silly question but new to the planted side. Hopefully got the rest right. Tropica planted substrate topped with sand. jlb system 2 co2.
 
Thanks for the clarification on the reflectors. Wondered how as some sites suggested that reflectors doubled your output. Does anyone have any suggestions as to what lighting to fit my rio 400. The juwel high-lite T5 lights give off 108W combined giving me 1.1wpg Any suggestions as to how to upgrade this to about 2wpg and have the lighting still under the flaps on my juwel? Don't realy want to go open top.
 
Hi, I've got a better idea. Why not just simply not worry about the lighting in that tank, which is fine, and worry about the other factors of plant growth. Adding more light, if you are a beginning aquatic gardener, will just add more problems. You need to concentrate more intently on your CO2 delivery techniques and equipment (if indeed you plan on adding CO2) and you most certainly need to worry about your filtration and flow distributions. There is a 100% chance that you will benefit more by shifting your focus on these issues rather than fretting over light.

Cheers,
 
paul.stopher said:
Thanks for the clarification on the reflectors. Wondered how as some sites suggested that reflectors doubled your output. Does anyone have any suggestions as to what lighting to fit my rio 400. The juwel high-lite T5 lights give off 108W combined giving me 1.1wpg Any suggestions as to how to upgrade this to about 2wpg and have the lighting still under the flaps on my juwel? Don't realy want to go open top.

1.1wpg T5 is fine for most plants providing CO2 & nutrients are up to scratch, this iw the way more people are goin gthese days, and some even having success with plants such as HC. high CO2 is the key.
 
Thanks for the helpfull advice. I'm going to leave the lighting see how it goes. Would just like to say thank you for a very informative and usefull forum.
 
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