Tearing down and just restarting-help

[FishayFishay]

Well basically I've done a lot more research and experienced a lot over the past month in a half or so with my 26bf. It's moderately planted with regular gravel, terrible lights, and dosing ferts but as of lately I've been kind of discouraged and too frustrated to even bother.
So, I decided that I'm going to just tear down the tank and restart with a fresh start and hope to succeed more so with plants as the past month or so my plants have shown little to any progress (even my water wisteria).
I already ordered a new lighting fixture and I decided to go with Coralife Aqualight T5 Dual fixture and according to the general light calculator, My depth is 13in with the substrate in I expect 10 and a half or 11in so that should be atleast medium lighting.
I'm also thinking of ordering flourite black sand or eco complete. I've read a little and am leaning towards flourite more but give me your opinion on the two guys. I want to tear down the tank and put in two bags of one the new substrates cause i know it will only benefit my goal of a heavily planted tank. will that completely restart my cycle? Or should I mix only like one bag throughout my black gravel I have now? Help me out guys, Thanks.

 

[bcarl_10gal]

Assuming we have the same 26 bow, the depth for me is 24inches and about 20 to the substrate. Im not too knowledgable about that light but you would benefit from CO2 over about 40 PAR. You could probably get by with dosing Metricide (Excel). As for substrate, the eco or flourite will be fine with this setup. My experience is flourite is an absolute mess. If you use your existing filtration you might have a mini cycle but it really just depends.

 

[FishayFishay]

Assuming we have the same 26 bow, the depth for me is 24inches and about 20 to the substrate. Im not too knowledgable about that light but you would benefit from CO2 over about 40 PAR. You could probably get by with dosing Metricide (Excel). As for substrate, the eco or flourite will be fine with this setup. My experience is flourite is an absolute mess. If you use your existing filtration you might have a mini cycle but it really just depends.

Thanks for your input man, I really want to get into co2 but at the same time the whole concept is intimidating and so is the price lol. I do have excel but haven't dosed it lately since I have Vals and Moss that's been melting because of it, I'm going to get rid of the Vals and keep the moss though, do you think it will affect the stock too bad? 2 Bolivian rams, Pearl gourami, Albino bristlenose Pleco. I will be using prime throughout this mini cycle but I just don't want anything to happen to them.

I also have a emperor 280 running on it so does that play a part when it comes to BB since it's a bigger pad to house the bacteria?

 

[bcarl_10gal]

In my experience changing the substrate did not affect my stock but everyones tank is a bit different.


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[Mebbid]

Proper fertilizers and carbon additions are key when it comes to increasing the light level.

In particular, the water wisteria are very very heavy root feeders (comparable to amazon swords) and will need root tabs to grow properly.

The Vals and mosses are a trade off for planted tanks. Increasing the light level without carbon addition will fuel horrifying algae blooms. It really comes down to what's more important, the specific plants or dealing with algae? If it helps, I had a lot of luck growing christmas moss with very heavy dosing of excel (50mL / day in a 55g tank)

So I would recommend taking a look here for root tabs. I added a picture journal of my tank. There is water wisteria directly to the left of my amazon sword to show what I mean by it being a root feeder.
http://www.aquariumadvice.com/forums/f24/mebbids-diy-root-tabs-308735.html



Go with either the PPS pro or Estimative index fert pack. They will make sure your plants get all the nutrients they need. Just leave out mixing the potassium nitrate.
Aquarium Plant Fertilizer | Green Leaf Aquariums
Fert dosing routine

Estimative Index
Estimative Index Dosing Guide - Fertilizing - Aquatic Plant Central

PPS Pro
Newbie Guide to PPS-Pro - PPS Analysis and Feedback - Aquatic Plant Central




Using excel gets expensive after a while. One gallon of metricide 14 is the equivalent of 2 gallons of excel.
Cidex Metricide Omnicide 14 Day Sterilization Gallon | eBay

 

[FishayFishay]

Thanks for the tips Mebbid, I'm currently trying out these DIY Root tabs you're talking about. I only dose Flourish and Flourish Excel as of now but I will soon start dosing iron and potassium. The new lights I ordered are actually only putting me into the low light range and I'm fine with that. I will get rid of my vals, maybe one of my two swords, and most of my dwarf sag. Gonna just take my turn with a planted tank slowly. I feel like I've been kind of ahead of myself, diving before I doggy paddle Lol. Thanks for all the help, I might start up a thread on the rebuild, you backing me?