Question about lighting fixture

[AdamHorton]

I have a 20G long tank that I want to upgrade the lighting on: Right now I have a hood like this:

Full Fluorescent Hood - Black - 30" - Lighting - Fluorescent Hoods at BigalsOnline

with a 20W bulb in there. I really like the hood and I'd like to keep it if that's possible, so I did some looking around and I found this:

All-Glass Fluorescent Twin Tube Strip Light- 30" (Black) - Lighting - Fluorescent Strip Lights at BigalsOnline

I could put two 20W bulbs in there and get some more light into the tank, but I don't know if that would fit over my hood. If I want more light am I stuck with getting a new hood?

 

[mfdrookie516]

why do you want the hood? thats the first thing i take off when i get a new tank. open topped tanks look so much better imo, and make it alot easier to clean and feed. T5HO is really the way to go on a planted tank, though with the depth of a 20l, you can easily keep low-medium light plants with the twin tube light you linked

 

[AdamHorton]

Hmm, well in my opinion the capped tanks look better... agree to disagree I guess?

I'm thinking about getting a fancy schmancy light fixture like that, but I want to see if there's a low-cost solution that will work. I don't plan to have anything in the tank that requires that much light, so if that fixture will fit then I think it's the cheapest way to get around 40 wpg in the tank. My worry is that it's too big to fit on that canopy, which is sort of my original question...

 

[mfdrookie516]

yeah it wont fit on the canopy, only the fixture that came in it will... which i forgot to say in the post, but talked like i had... sorry

 

[AdamHorton]

I see, so if I want more light, it looks like I need to go with the fancy schmancy stuff. Thanks for your help.

 

[BigJim]

I'm a fan of the Versa-Tops. I've got an old incandescent hood with two CFL bulbs on the back half and a 36W T5 fixture on the front half of the tank. I think it's about 70W on a 20L and my plants grow like crazy.

 

[AdamHorton]

I have something like a Versa-Top for one of my 10G tanks, and also for my 150G, it's OK but I like the black hoods better.

I'm thinking about ordering a T5HO and putting the lights right over where the plastic for the light I have now is. I need to take some measurements to see if it would fit, and I would need to find a way to make it fit semi-gracefully on top of there. It might involve a little bit of Dremel-ing but I might be able to make it work... if I'm lucky, it might even look good...

 

[AdamHorton]

I've done some looking at the hood I have now. The hole that the light goes through is 28" by 4", which should be enough room for the lights on this fixture I'm looking at:

Current USA Nova Extreme 30" 2x24W T-5 10,000K - Freshwater - Lighting - Fluorescent Strip Lights at BigalsOnline

Looks like it won't be too difficult to attach it. We'll see how it goes though...