what to do?

[jehudson]

Hey folks ... I've got christmas money burning a whole in my pocket and I'm thinking of upgrading my lighting ... The problem I've got is that my hood is exactly 48" inside and about 10" tall. The single 48" tube that came with my system doesn't fit unless I put it in sideways. What have some of you done to solve this problem?

Right now my system is a 90 gal FOWLR (21" deep). I wish to move to reef and want to avoid MH lights due to heat. I'm pretty new so I'd put mostly softies and easy to keep corals.

[txstateunivreefer]

with a fixture that is exactly 48 inches i might try a retrofit light kit then you get to pick what you put in there just make sure that you add some fans that blow IN not OUT because of the salt for evap and cooling

[lhoy]

Why not do 4 or 6 36" T5 lights and stagger them?

Lee

[Mr_Cool]

Why not do 4 or 6 36" T5 lights and stagger them?

Lee

The 54 watt t-5's are only 46.5 inches long. They would fit perfectly in your canopy. This way, you wouldn't need to stagger them. I think the difference in price would be only like $5-10.

You could put 2 (or 3) 2-bulb retrofits in there and have 2 (or 3) different ballasts and plugs to let the actinics come on earlier and stay on later (dawn/dusk).

[jehudson]

I think "retrofit" has been a hang-up for me. I teach band ... I'm really good at that ... however, messing with electricity and water makes me a little nervous. How involved would a retrofit project be and how would the cost stack up against buying "pre-fab" lighting? Thanks for the advice so far.