On Tue, 30 Sep 2003 07:06:11 -0400, "D&M" wrote:

I've seen the rule about 2w per gallon of water, question is, what's with
the specialty lighting, such as powerglow and aquaglow, is that a way to
artificially increase energy output for the plants without increasing the
wattage?

No, the powerglo and aquaglo don't put out any more light than any
other type of tube. They are simply different spectrums, and the
difference has more effect on the tank's appearance to our eye than it
does on plant growth.

What ideas can you guys give that actually increase the wattage that high or
do the specialty lights actually do the trick? Is there an aquarium branded
light that goes that high wattage, or do you switch to shop lights and make
your own set-ups?

The Compact Fluorescents pack more wattage into a smaller space.
Check out www.ahsupply.com for their light kits.

An alternative is "overdriving" conventional tubes. You can get a
relatively inexpensive ballast from home depot. It can run 1, 2, 3 or
4 4 foot T-8 tubes. But, if you wire two sets of leads to each
tube, the tube will run brighter. Much brighter, but not twice the
wattage brighter. The tubes will supposedly burn out sooner, but
using cheap standard home-lighting T-8 tubes that is really no big
deal.



Chuck Gadd
http://www.csd.net/~cgadd/aqua