Heat Cables?

[yohann976]

I'm still not sure if I should use heat cables or not. Some say they it works great, others say that they don't make a difference. Do they work or not? I have a discus tank so the water is around 84 degrees so I don't know if the heat cable will make a difference anyways.

Since the heat cable specifically made for aquariums is so dang expensive, can regular heat cable from a hardware store work? If so, what should be the wattage and volts to use?

Finally, when the heat cable is put into the tank, do I put the flourite (or whatever substrate) right on top of the cable?

 

[travis simonson]

Heat cables have been proven to have no effect whatsoever on plant growth. IMHO, they are a waste of money and wattage. Plants will do just fine without them

 

[yohann976]

Alright, so heat cables should be out of the question. How much flourite am I going to need to get for a 90 gallon tank 48"x 18" filled with a few swords and crypts?

 

[malkore]

so this is a 90gal tall? 48"x18" is about the size of a 75gal footprint. You'll need 7-8 bags of flourite to hit the correct depth of 3".

 

[yohann976]

That is going to be really expensive. A bag of flourite at Petsmart is about $25. Does anyone know an online store where flourite is cheap with cheap shipping?

 

[travis simonson]

www.aquariumplants.com has Caribsea's Eco-Complete Planted Tank Substrate for the best price going and I think they're now shipping it for free. It's a lot easier to use than Flourite and is a better overall plant substrate in my opinion. Check it out

 

[malkore]

yep, plant substrates ain't cheap. luckily, flourite and eco complete last forever. they don't have to be replaced.
you can cut plant substrates with pea gravel or matching black epoxy gravel if you use Eco complete, but I would still use 60% plant substrate. Anything less than 50%, and you're diluting the plant substrate, and basically wasted money.

planted tanks with high light...they aren't cheap. $10-$20 per gallon to setup, and that doesn't even include your fish or plants.

the lighting isn't cheap, even if you DIY some of it, you'll still drop some bank on it.
pressurized CO2 - budget $150 for that as a minimum
substrate - flourite adn eco complete are both usually $20-$25 per 20lb bag, which is about 10gallons of tank space.


if aquariumplants.com has it with free shipping right now, buy it...they put it on special like this every so often, and its the best deal to be had. ANY other place is gonna charge you an arm and a leg to ship hundreds of pounds of Eco complete.
a few plantkeepers I know on the various plant forums have been able to trick petsmart into honoring aquariumplants.com's deal, but I wouldn't hold your breath.