good cheap light for 20 gallon school tank

fishyfish22

fishyfish22

Premium member
hello everyone!
after a long email, i convinced my teacher to allow me to start a saltwater aquarium at my school! hurrah! there was an old tank (had been set up and abandoned years before) and it's a 20 gallon tall.
i am wondering, what would some good cheap lighting be fore a 20 gallon tall? i am hopint ot make it into a reef tank (corals coming from my own tank)but i need proper lighting. what i had in mind were a whole bunch of softies, and some extremely easy sps like montipora and maybe a birdsnest. definately no acros.
unfortunately, i'm rather low on money at the moment so i was wondering whether anyone knew what kind of cheap lighting i could use for it? not in the 100s range, but rather in the 20s. right now the tank has a stock hood with an AQUAGLO 18" 15w t8 bulb. i don't think that'd be enough for it... would it? this is the last thing i need before i can start a build thread... if anyone has some lighting theyre willing to trade i can trade for frags! any help is greatly appreciated :D
 
fwadiver

fwadiver

New member
for just softies a couple par38 would do it, but that would run u almost as much as a full groubbuy/ebay fixture.
 
fishyfish22

fishyfish22

Premium member
Yeah... A par38 bulb is kind of expensive... What other options are there? How about a certain kind of t8 bulb? I know that petsmart and petco have tons of differ bulbs, not sure if they are actually different or if they are just different color.


-Giancarlo
 
fwadiver

fwadiver

New member
you could go T5, t8 is not really going to grow corals, there are some t8 HO bulbs, but they are rare now with t5 dominating the market. Power compact is also an option i suppose, but i personally hate the expense of power compact. The real advantage of led over the t5/power compact is bulb replacement, with a t5 or other fluorescent you are going to need to replace the bulb every 6 months.

something like a fishneedit or odysea fixture would be your best bet there, fair warning the included bulbs really suck, but thats what i started my first aquarium with.


http://fishneedit.com/t5ho-24quot-2-lamp-aquarium-l.html
 
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