I got my hood upgrade mostly completed today and it looks and works pretty sweet. I took my 4 x 96 pc hood and attached a 2 x 55 pc hood (original hood w/ the tank). I used a stainless steel piano hinge to attach the two. The 2x55 flips up and rests on the 4x96 giving me access to the tank. I put in a push button switch between the two, so that when I open it up, the 2x55 goes off automatically.
I also added in 4 moon lights.
I have a few thing left to do, like paint the side boards black but that will have to wait until it warms up outside a little. The cost was pretty minimal since I already had both hoods. The bulk of the cost was in the moon light stuff.
I have been waiting to change out my bulbs until I got the project complete. I didn't want to break anything during construction. I am really excited to see how it looks with all the new bulbs. I had the 2x55 (10k)on for about 6 hours today and figured I would ramp up over the next week and the change maybe one or two 96 bulbs next weekend. I going from 4 x 50/50 to 2 x 10k and 2 actinics. Does that seem to fast, should I space them out longer?