these are my new tank specs:

Tank Specs

bowfront
Height 500mm 20"
Length 980mm 39"
Depth 400mm 16"
196000 cc
50 US Gallons

Lighting

3*30w 10000K overdriven

The light bulbs are jebo and they are an odd size 89cm/35" so I will change those to something in the 6000-8000k range as soon as i can find some tubes that fit.

90w*1.7/50=3wpg

CO2

sera CO2 fertilization system
sera GmbH ::*CO2 fertilization system II

Filtration

eheim professional
Eheim GmbH & Co. KG | EHEIM professionel (GB)

Substrate - not sure which to use, any red flags for the below mentioned products?

sera floredepot substrate
sera GmbH ::*Substrate

tetra completesubstrate
Tetra Aquaristics Tropical Ornamental Fish Food Care Medication Aquariums Equipment

prodac fondovivo
prodac fertiplant
http://www.prodacinternational.it/en...dex.php?link=9

I am in south africa and most of the decent products are very hard to come by or very expensive to import so I hope the stuff I have available will be ok.

I currently have a 20 gallon bow front with 40watts of lighting and no co2, which is happily growing algae, the crypts, anubia and cabomba do ok, not fanatastic, but ok, so I am hoping to be able to grow some more demanding plants in my new setup.

Any comments or recommendations on the above?

If you don't already, I would suggest getting or making a drop checker and 4KH solution for your co2 enriched tanks to determine your co2 levels, and fertilizing all your macros and micros in all tanks. This would enable you to grow more plants and help get rid of any algae issues.

Also 10,000K bulbs are fine for plants, but most people prefer lights in a bit lower spectrum just for looks.

hi carissa,

i will be dosing ferts using the ei method using:

kno3 - potassium nitrate - saltpeter
k2so4 - potassium sulfate - potash of sulfur
mgso4 - magnesium sulfate - epsom salts
kh2po4 - potassium phosphate - salts of potassium
iron chelate

hope this is ok?

Sure, that sounds great! Since you're dosing both potassium nitrate and potassium phosphate, you can probably go pretty lean on the potassium sulfate. Also if your GH is higher than 40ppm or 3 degrees you may not need to dose magnesium sulfate. If it is lower than that, to cover all possibilities it would be good to dose both the magnesium sulfate and calcium chloride or calcium sulfate to get both the magnesium and calcium for your plants.