My new light, what do you all think???

[Hearthemchainsdiscus]

Hello All,

I recently purchased a new light from a friend of a friend for my newly refurbished 75 gallon freshwater planted discus tank. It is an Orbit Compact Fluorescent with Lunar Lights. The light retails on drfostersmith.com for $250 USD. I manged to get mine lightly used for $140 USD. I'm totallly chuffed with the savings. It is the 48" version with 4 bulbs totalling 260 watts. The light includes the SunPaq Dual Daylight (6700°K/10000°K) and Dual Actinic (420 nm and 460 nm) bulbs. The light also has LED lunar lights.

I beleive the general rule of thumb for light intensity is 2-5 watts per gallon? So with my tank at 75 gallons and the light at 260 watts, I'm running about 3.5 watts per gallon. This is a big difference to what I had before. I was running a 40 watt single 48" normal Fluorescent. So I've gone from .5 wpg to 3.5. I"m sure my new plants will appreciate the upgrade.

Will the lunar light negatively affect my discus and plants? Do I have an ok level of *K for the discus?

To see a pic go to the below link. As soon as I can afford to I'm going to by a freekin digital camera!

http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/detailed_image.cfm?pCatId=15690&large=/images/Categoryimages/larger/lg_26273.jpg

What do you all think???[/img]

[FishLover]

Just watch the algae growth. I have 4x55w on my 125g tank and the algae is grwoing like crazy. Had to use the timmer to shut it down for 3 hours at noon in order to do that. Plus, discus don't like strong lights.

lunar lights are good. I have mine turn on before and after my main lights are on/off. That gives the discus a chance to adjust to the sudden light changes. Less impact on them.

[Hearthemchainsdiscus]

yeah I know what you mean, I've only had the lights on for about a week now and I have noticed considerable algae growth on the glass. My pleco's are loving it! I hope they can keep up. My buddy in England has a planted tank and does the time break method to tackle the algae problem and it does the trick. Will adding multiple periods of dark and light mess with the discus???