strip light and canopy

[wee andy]

Hey guys i'm wanting to make a small canopy that will fit over 2 3 gallon tanks but first i need to ask about my lighting plans. I bought a fluval roma 125 a while back but the canopy was bust so i phoned up hagen and they told me to dispose of the bust one and sent me a new one. So i then ripped out all the lighting ballast with wires and connectors and threw the rest out just incase i could use it all in the future for anything. So the bulbs that are needed are 2ft t8's and i wanted to know could i use an ordinary strip light from a hardware store for this ballast from the canopy as long as it was the same length and wattage? I'm not planning any real plants in these tanks but realise the wpg will be quite high, would that matter?

[mitchar19]

well, I'm not an expert or anything but I do know if you have a lot of watts over your tank and not many plants, algae is going to be an issue.