Lighting question- probably beating a dead horse here but...

[touchofgrey]

Ok, in a nutshell, I cannot find any concise information about whether the lights I am looking at are suitable for my tank. I am setting up a 180 gal fw planted tank with pressurized CO2. The tank is 6' x 2' x 2'. So far, I've looked at 2 fixtures- first, a quad T5HO fixture (used, 2 80watt 10K daylight bulbs, 2 80watt actinics, lunar LED's, not sure of lumens, $100.00) vs an LED fixture with 320 0.2 watt 10K LED bulbs, 7000 lumen output, $180.00 (Beamswork fixture on EBay).
1) will either one of these fixtures provide enough light to keep my plants happy in a 24" deep tank?
2) If I were to switch out the 2 actinic T5s for regular full-spectrum, would that make more sense?
3) With a total of 320 watts output, does the T5 fixture actually use 320 watts of electricity (vs 81 watts for the LED fixture, comparing monthly power $$)
I appreciate any feedback to help clear up my confusion, I just want to be sure that my fish and plants are getting the proper light. Thank you.
Kelly Wade

 

[Coursair]

Actinics are useless for plants, so IME yes, that will help.

I'm a lowlight/low tech person so can't answer specifics. Sorry.

 

[Hawkins409]

First option: 80 watts x 4 is 320 watts. The tank is 180 gallons, so it less than 2 watts per gallon. With the tank being 2 feet deep (which is 4 inches deeper than my 75 gallon using almost 3 watts per gallon) I'm thinking your light level on the first choice is on the "too low" side.

 

[Scottyhorse]

Might want to ask Rivercats. I think she does metal halides over her 220g.

 

[ashleynicole]

I would go with LED's. Every tank ive upgraded to LED's has flourished. Just my opinion.

Sent from my SPH-L710 using Aquarium Advice mobile app

 

[Old Scales]

With a tank that big and it sounds like you want to get serious about plants, I suggest checking out buildmyled.com. They can custom fit the LED for your tank. Depth and width and from the prices on them I've seen they are reasonable for what you get compared to the big company's LED's. T5 HO's on that big of tank would be some serious cost in electricity and yearly bulb replacement. IMO. OS.

 

[Brian_Nano12g]

+1 on OS's suggestion.

Go with BuildMyLed. They have options in getting more focused optics to help penetrate that extra height of that tank. The upfront investment might scare you, but you get what you pay for and it's head & shoulders above that beamworks option, IMO. The BML is full spectrum, uses more powerful diodes, and you can dim them with the optional dimmer.

 

[Mebbid]

I'm going to +1 as well on the BML fixture. If you wanted to do T5s you would likely need 6 of them over the entire tank to get good coverage.

 

[Rivercats]

On that size tank depending on how high of light you want you would need at least 2 BML fixtures. You'd need that minimum on any Led fixtures unless you did a DIY high light Led build like many do for reefs (except you'd do for planted tank spectrum).

On my 30" deep 220g I have an Aquatic Life fixture that has 4- 39w T5HO's (very low light) and 3- 150w HID metal halide's. Then I also have a BML fixture in front of the Aquatic Life fixture to give more light to the front of the tank. I have a ton of non-green plants and use this very high lighting to achieve the intense color I get on them.

IMO an 8 bulb T5HO fixture or 2 BML fixtures would be a good choice if you want to be able to grow most plants. But also remember you will need CO2 when getting into higher lighting.

 

[Conorluc]

Amazon.com: Grow Crew Black T5 HO 4 Ft. 4 Lamp 6500k Bulb Fluorescent Grow Light Fixture: Patio, Lawn & Garden

Check out this light I just bought it the problem with buying those cheap lights is they are low quality and can break. This one has a 5 year warranty I'm about to try it out on my 55 gallon

 

[touchofgrey]

Yea, upfront with BML is almost a grand, WAY out of my budget. I'm going to have to rethink this, I believe.

 

[gilpi]

Actinics are useless for plants, so IME yes, that will help.

I'm a lowlight/low tech person so can't answer specifics. Sorry.

What is exactly low light/low tech in your case? What is your set up?
I'm also trying to go that way. I don't want to use CO2 or two much lighting. I'm struggling with lighting.

 

[Coursair]

What is exactly low light/low tech in your case? What is your set up?
I'm also trying to go that way. I don't want to use CO2 or two much lighting. I'm struggling with lighting.

My case is small tanks 5-10g and screw in CFLs (LEDs on one tank ).