Working out lumens and watts

[glorifiedfisher]

Ok..... I'm struggling to get my head around lumens/watts etc and was wondering if anyone could help. I have 2 banks of LED lights, each holding 36 bulbs with an individual lumen of 6. Therefore a total of 432lm. Surface area of tank is 288 square inches which equates to 1.5 lumen per square inch? That seems extremely low. I'm aware that depth is also an issue but not sure how it fits in.. My tank is 18 inches tall. I was told at my lfs that these lights would give me the recommended 2 wpg but after reading around I'm getting all really confused. My plants are doing well, apart from some localised whitening on a few Java Fern leaves which I believe may be down to it needing 2 ferts dose a week instead if one, or even too much light??!!
Any help would be much appreciated. Apologies for the some what confusing post!!


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[Mebbid]

Lumens and warts are pretty much useless for measuring.light intensity. There are just too many factors involved.

What light fixtures do you have? How big is your tank?

 

[glorifiedfisher]

Tank is 20 gal tall, I have 2 ISTA LED clip light. Each light has 36 LED bulbs with each bulb giving 6 lm.


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[Mebbid]

With both of those fixtures I would say you are at low light at best. From what I can tell they are made with very low power normal output LEDs at 56mW per bulb. The standard for aquarium lighting are 3w bulbs which alone are more than all of the bulbs in one light fixture combined. I am going by the ebay listing statistics so if you find something contradicting that let me know.

You could probably figure each fixture to be the equivalent of a t8 fluorescent fixture of the same size. Sorry

 

[glorifiedfisher]

I found the same info on them. I had figured it would be low light and have planted accordingly.... Could you tell me how the 56mw and watts work?



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[Mebbid]

I found the same info on them. I had figured it would be low light and have planted accordingly.... Could you tell me how the 56mw and watts work?



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1000mW per watt

 

[glorifiedfisher]

Cool, thanks so much for the help!



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[BBradbury]

Tank Lighting

Hello glori...

Lighting a tank is simple if you keep to the dark green aquatic plants. There are good number of them and they require only low light. I keep these plants and use two florescent lamps from the hardware store. GE makes a good aquarium plant bulb for just a few dollars each. I use either T8s or T12s whichever is the best buy. Both will work well.

The low light plants are generally slow growers and don't require supplemental fertilizers. I have a lot of fish in my tanks and change out a lot of tank water. The combination seems to provide the proper nutrients and appears to work well for the plants.

I think you could save a lot of money and brain damage, if you simplified things a bit. The water keeping hobby is supposed to be relaxing and fun not a working chemistry lesson.

Just one reporter's opinion.

B

 

[glorifiedfisher]

Hi B. Thanks for your input. Unfortunately I have made a classic beginner mistake and listened to my lfs without really looking deeper into it myself. I have planted all low light plants as this was the route I wanted to take and, so far, things are going
Ok. My reason for this thread was to get a greater understanding of the processes etc involved. If I'm honest I really enjoy getting into the finer details and learning more about the processes. As funny as it sounds I find it very relaxing and rewarding!


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[Mebbid]

Hello glori...

Lighting a tank is simple if you keep to the dark green aquatic plants. There are good number of them and they require only low light. I keep these plants and use two florescent lamps from the hardware store. GE makes a good aquarium plant bulb for just a few dollars each. I use either T8s or T12s whichever is the best buy. Both will work well.

The low light plants are generally slow growers and don't require supplemental fertilizers. I have a lot of fish in my tanks and change out a lot of tank water. The combination seems to provide the proper nutrients and appears to work well for the plants.

I think you could save a lot of money and brain damage, if you simplified things a bit. The water keeping hobby is supposed to be relaxing and fun not a working chemistry lesson.

Just one reporter's opinion.

B

There are plenty of nerds like me that enjoy it being a working chemistry lesson though

 

[BBradbury]

Tank Lighting

Hello glori and Meb...

Totally fine. Guess the lighting thing isn't a chemistry thing, but you two knew what I meant. If it floats your boat, then great.

B