Very Basic Lighting Upgrade Questions

[lifetapestry]

Can someone point me to a reference or answer some basic questions about lighting?

I have a standard all-glass 55 gallon planted tank, inhabited by amano shrimp, ottos, a small school of harlequin rasboras, 2 angelfish, and a dozen corries of various varieties-- and 1 cardinal tetra leftover from a school of 6 that didn't adjust well. The tank came with 2 standard lighting fixtures (each with a 15 watt bulb), half the width of the tank (about 22 inches). I'm growing crypts, onion plants, java fern, anubias, red melon (these aren't doing so well, but surviving), dwarf sag., just added banana plants, java moss, apon. bovianus, moss balls, and when my plant order arrives I'll be adding some tiny water clover, another anubia, and another species of crypt. I have a hagen co2 unit that works pretty well (I had no luck with DIY co2), I dose flourish excel and regular flourish 1/week. I have some hard green spot algae but otherwise the tank looks pretty good. In general growth has been slow (as I expected) but good (tank's been up since July, and that was upgraded from a tank that was not planted but started in April). My water parameters are pretty stable -- Ph is 7.2, kh = 5, phosphate between .5 and 1 and nitrates around 10-12ppm.

I'd like to upgrade my lighting, but I'm very confused. I've tried to search and read about lighting, but I'm still confused. Here are what I think my options are: 1) buy all new lighting units that I just plug in and use, like the coralife units for freshwater, with k6700 bulbs; 2) retrofit my current fixtures, which I think means taking off the electric guts and installing new electric "guts" in the plastic surround-- I see terms like "ballast" and "straight pin" and get confused; and 3) buy an inexpensive but good kit like the sort they sell at ahsupply.com and build a light fixture with a gizmo that contains it. I'm unsure what is possible for me to do (as a DIY idiot) or even if I want to buy new lighting units, how do I know what will fit on the glass top of my aquarium without getting the light blocked.

My purpose in upgrading the lighting is to get better growth and to be able to grow more plants, specifically of the red and more challenging varieties.

Thanks if you have any advice.

Karla

[phanmc]

A ballast is an energy converter necessary to light all fluorescent lights.

Straight pin and square pin adapters refer to the connector portion of compact fluorescent light bulbs. This means that certain compact fluorescent light bulbs will only work with certain units.

Compact fluorescents are basically very efficient fluorescent tubes that are doubled over to cram as much light as possible in a smaller space.

Buying an already assembled lighting unit like the Coralife unit is obviously the easiest way but it is also significantly more expensive, sometimes costing twice as much as going the DIY route.

www.ahsupply.com essentially sells retrofit kits that you can screw into your existing hoods, it's basically the lights, ballast, switch, and a very good reflectorwhich shouldn't be overlooked.

With your plant selection, you'll want to have about 100w over your tank to be roughly around 2wpg. If you're going the pre-assmbled route, look for the fixture within that wattage range than is the same length as your tank. If you're going the DIY route, I've heard ahsupply's customer service is very helpful in getting you the right parts for your tanksize so give them a call.

[reality]

you could go with a standard 2 bulb shop light, they're usually 48-50" that'd give you about 80 watts. and it's a whole lot cheaper (~$30 w/bulbs @ home depot) no sense in spending 5-6 times more money for the same thing.

[TEES_91]

I bought to retro kits from A&H Supply for my 55 gal. Love them. I know nothing about wiring and was able to do it myself with no help from hubby.
I just took out the light tube, plastic reflector and wiring out of my old light hoods that came standard with the 55 gallon and followed the diagrams and directions from A&H Supply to install the 55 watt CF. Now I have 110 watt over my 55 gal and plants are doing well now. I did buy my CF tubes elsewhere though as I heard A&H ones do not last long.

[lifetapestry]

Thank you all very much for the opinions and advice. Karla