What kind of lighting do you use?

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AaronW

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Oct 1, 2012
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Hey peeps!

I went down to my LFS yesterday and noticed something interesting. I saw that they were growing coral with a 300 watt lamp. It was the kind that clips onto the frame of the tank. It was a spot light sort of.

Does anyone use a setup like this?
I'd like to get a lighting thread going cause I wanna get as much advice about the different sorts of setups for salt and freshwater.

Thanks all!
 
It was probably a clip on Metal halide which can grow anything. I own 3 175w MH pendants and a 36" 6 bulb t5 TEK elite for my saltwater and a dual bulb coralife t5 for my freshwater.
 
Mrc8858 said:
It was probably a clip on Metal halide which can grow anything. I own 3 175w MH pendants and a 36" 6 bulb t5 TEK elite for my saltwater and a dual bulb coralife t5 for my freshwater.

Actually it was a LED light! But I'm thinking of getting one for my planted setup. I just haven't really looked into them. Do you know of any good clip on HO lighting?
 
300W LED WOW, that is a lot~!! To me as long as the PAR is enough and Spectrum is correct, it is more than enough. Anything more than it is waste of energy and overkill
 
I'm pretty certain at 300W it's a halide clip. I have (not in use- YET) a 400W blue spec HVO clamp on metal halide lamp and a 600W hanging red spec hanging reflector box light- these would be overkill in a normal tank situation- I'm involved in aquaponics and trust me- you don't want a normal sized tank anywhere near these, algae growth is a guarantee. Here are my tank light set ups.
10g fully planted- t8 flora max fluorescent in hood plus a marine land double bright led with moonlight blues
30g Hospital- incandescent hood
29g BioCube- 10000K 36W full daylight compact fluorescent (coralife) and .03 true blue 36W actinic, plus moonlight blue led.
All other mini tanks are unlit/ lit by desktop HO fluorescent compacts...
 
I'm positive the guy at my LFS said it was an LED. Maybe he was wrong?

A 300W LED would be a very, very, very intense light.

Let me put it into perspective. A Finnex Ray2 48 inch fixture (which is enough light to grow even very demanding plants) uses around 40 Watts. Or think about it this way. LEDs use usually around 1/10th the wattage of an incandescent and are as bright as 3 T5s. So it would be as powerful as a 3000W Incandescent or a 900W T5. Haha

I'm assuming it was a Halide :)
 
Haha perhaps it was a halide. It was a very nice looking setup. I want something like it.

What's a good fixture to run on a planted fw? I'm looking for something reliable and affordable.

Is metal halide too much light for planted tanks?
 
Forgive my lack of knowledge of the subject, but what is pendant? Does it beef up current lifting parameters or does it light up a whole tank all on its own? Would it be something that would be appropriate for my freshwater planted tank?
 
A pendant is a compact fixture used to target a specific area, where a fixture would cover a large area, IMO. You wouldn't call a 48" long light a pendant. You have many options for your tank. What size is the tank?
 
mr_X said:
A pendant is a compact fixture used to target a specific area, where a fixture would cover a large area, IMO. You wouldn't call a 48" long light a pendant. You have many options for your tank. What size is the tank?

My tank is 48' long. So I am aware of the vast amount of options for a fixture. But I'd like a HO lighting fixture because I want to get some more exotic plants
 
Ok. what size tank? 55? You would need 2 pendants or a 48" fixture. A pendant generally covers around a 2 x 2 area, give or take. As for output, I'm not too sure how much light plants need opposed to corals, but I would think a 6 bulb t5-ho fixture would be more than enough. A pair of 175 watt halides would also work. They Have dimmable LED fixtures that are super potent as well. I don't know if you need that much punch however. ..but, you can dim them to the desired potency.
 
I have a 30" Coralife Aqualight dual T5 NO for a low light 20 long planted tank. If I were to get another light it might be the Current USA Nova Extreme dual T5 HO.
However I like how LEDs are maturing; Finnex models look appealing. For the cost of swapping out new T5 bulbs each year it might be more economical to get decent LEDs.
 
mr_X said:
Ok. what size tank? 55? You would need 2 pendants or a 48" fixture. A pendant generally covers around a 2 x 2 area, give or take. As for output, I'm not too sure how much light plants need opposed to corals, but I would think a 6 bulb t5-ho fixture would be more than enough. A pair of 175 watt halides would also work. They Have dimmable LED fixtures that are super potent as well. I don't know if you need that much punch however. ..but, you can dim them to the desired potency.

Well my goal is to create a carpet on my foreground with dwarf baby tears. So to my knowledge they require medium to high light. What is your input on the subject?
 
Dallascowboys16 said:
I use the oddysea 48 in 108 watt fixture for planted aquariums, very good lights and would highly recommend them.:)

Did you get them from aqua trader?
 
Fresh2o said:
I have a 30" Coralife Aqualight dual T5 NO for a low light 20 long planted tank. If I were to get another light it might be the Current USA Nova Extreme dual T5 HO.
However I like how LEDs are maturing; Finnex models look appealing. For the cost of swapping out new T5 bulbs each year it might be more economical to get decent LEDs.

Hmm LED you say, how long do those last?
 
I don't have input on that except if you want high light, get a pair of these-
Amazon.com: TaoTronics TT-AL09 Dimmable Aquarium Coral Reef LED Grow Light (120W Output, Blue/White Ratio- 28:27; Two-Year Warranty): Pet Supplies
They will make your planted tank look awesome, plus there's enough light to burn stuff on the sand bed if you so choose. Not the spectrum people shoot for with planted tanks, but I have these fixtures, and with the blues turned all the way down, the light looks like 6000k or so, not 12,000k.
 
Hmm LED you say, how long do those last?

Years. Others can chime in on the useful number of years.

To put things in perspective, I was in Lowes the other week getting some dim-able LED bulbs to replace the halogen bulbs in the kitchen. The expected lifespan of the LEDs burning 3 hours a day was 22.5 years. Burning 6-9 hours a day will still come to 7-11 years.
 
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