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Hey

I have a 29 gallon setup at work. To keep things clean I used an Eclipse 3 hood. I want to mod the existing dual T8 NO lights and would love to get your feedback/suggestions before I get started.

Thanks in advance.

Shane

How are you wanting to mod them?

I was thinking about either pc/ho/vho. I want to get as much extra light as I can without have huge heat issues within the canopy. Burning down the office is not conducive to long term employment.:lol:

Shane

Retrofit a couple HO T5's in there with individual reflectors. That would be my official recommendation.

Who would be my best bet for all the fixins?

Not sure about the dimensions of your tank, but there's always something like this:

http://www.jlaquatics.com/phpstore/s...ID=sl-t5tret24

Tank is a standard 29 gallon so 30" in length.

Yep, the T5 retro seems the way to go.

There's some back and forth on RC though which is the better reflector, the Icecap SLR or the TEK II.

What is the heat off of the t5's going to be like, any idea?

more light, more watts, more heat

The measurements that I got from J&L for the t5 kit make me think that I will have to look at PC lighting iinstead. The t5's won't fit inside the light cover in the Eclipse hood.

You could leave the ballast outside the canopy would that make for more room?

I'd recommend a set of 24" HO T5 retrofits like what J&L sells too because they are much more efficient than PC lights. Two T5 bulbs would be more intense light output than 4 PC bulbs.

You could cool your case with little VGA or "chipset" fans from a computer store like NCIX. Cut the "blowholes" in your canopy with a hole saw and use fan grills to keep it tidy. Power it with a 12V 1A power adapter from the source or canadian tire.

http://img.ncix.com/gif/16829.JPG
http://www.ncix.com/products/index.p...%20Corporation

This will give you lots of light output and will deal with the cooling of the canopy quite well.

Or maybe consider a new tank and canopy? That might be the easiest and best solution?

Bump