Thanks!

As for lighting, I initially purchased two 110 watt All-glass compact
flourescent fixtures; after my plants grew in, I found this was really not
enough light. I made three additional 55 watt compact flourescent fixtures
using the AH supply kits (see http://www.ahsupply.com/). So now I have a total
of 385 watts CF lighting. Wayne Jones, a frequent contributor to this news
group gave me good advice on this.. Chuck Gadd undoubtedly gave me good advise
on something realted too.. his whole website is really terrific. (See
http://www.csd.net/~cgadd/aqua/).

I also installed some incandescent strip lighting under the canopy for moon
lighting the tank in the evening hours. It works very well when we have guests
over to the house and the regular lighting has gone off for the day. It is a
neat affect. I put this strip lighting in with sticky tape inside the canopy,
and bought a dimmer switch for the lights for next to nothing (at home depot).
The lights unscrew from the dimmer switch, so that when I need to remove the
canopy, that is easy to do.

I think my current setup seems to provide good coverage-- no shade anywhere
and the lighting seems to have good penetration. I would like to get a
waterproof light meter just to measure the actual light delivered, but have not
done this. The 2-4 watt per gallon rule seems more suited to mid range tank
sizes. My belief is that my lighting is on the high side, though the watt per
gallon rule puts me at a more medium lighting level. I think there is a krib
article describing a more rigoras way of calculating lighting, but I don't have
that reference..

I use the GE 9300K bulbs-- they produce a beautiful white-blue color---not as
blue as a 10000K (obviously)--- but more of a white blue. I really like it. I
have tried 5300K, which I thought too yellow. I might like the 6400K color
since its whiter, but I decided not to experiment (since that can be
expensive). I guess I got used to the bluer end of the spectrum. Of course,
you can use any CF bulb in these fixtures.

I have to special order the GE bulbs from a lighting company around here.
Getting them from the LFS is way too expensive. For some reason, the GE bulbs
cost more than other brands. I so liked the color, and disliked a 5300k bulb I
bought, that I just went for the GE bulbs even though they were a bit more
(approximately 10% more than AH supply's 10000K bulbs, and much cheaper than
the LFS).

The kits from AH supply are quite nice, with a good deal of variety in lengths
and wattages. I feel you probably get more lighting for your money with these
kits. They are really good on the critical stuff-- like their reflector and
ballast. However, I also very much like the All-glass fixtures. The only
negative with the All-glass fixture was the rectangular profile reflector. One
thing I wish AH supply would consider putting in their kits is a push-button
on/off switch. I have thought about adding such a switch, just so that during
water chagnes and such, I can easily turn some or all of the lamps off if
required. Obviously, this is not terribly critical.

Good luck; hope this is helpful to you.