# Highest Light and Lowest.



## karla (23 Apr 2015)

Just a fun thread, (I hope). 
I am curious to know all your light experiments over the years and which types, power etc gave you the best growth and plant health.
For example, High light category, 10 gallon started at 15 W T8 and ramped up to 75 W over a period of about 4 months. 2 x 30 W compact spiral florescent bulbs and one 14W T8. Short Lighting period of 4 and a half hours.
I got very good growth but it was clear I was on the edge of what the plants could cope with, no algae. Co2 was via an up inline atomiser.
Lowest light, ambient only, crypts no co2 weekly fert dosing. No water changes. Run for 18 months no algae.

All my efforts at running co2 with lower/mid-range more comfortable light end in failure.
I keep altering my light levels because I think its too high too low etc.
Be really interested to know the extremes that others have tried and what they feel gives them the best success.


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## banthaman.jm (24 Apr 2015)

going to watch this thread, like you this will be interesting to see peoples experiences...

Here is what i use and what i have tried so far:
Beamswork Green Evo 18-22inch lights as i have two of them on my 45x45x45cm  cube.  Below is the tech spec supplied by Beamswork:

·  Two light settings - 3 or 10 LEDs

·  10 x 3w LEDs 30 watt

·  6500K

·  1350 lumens

·  100 PAR @ 10 inches

What i think about the lights:

I have had these two units on my tank for 3 months and have had no problem from them.  They create a fair amount of heat when they are running on all 10 LEDs but not enough to cause any problems with the tank.  The colour rendition of the lights falls into the warmish light being 6500K, Red plants look great, greens kind of merge together a little.  Build quality of the light are great, they have a slim profile so do not distract from the tank.  The spread of light across the tank is fantastic due to the lenses and the penetration of light to the substrate (21 inches on my tank) is no issue.  These light can't have a dimmer added to them which is a shame, but by trying a number of combinations of the two way switch control is possible.

Below are the PAR measurements i have taken with a Skye meter and a waterproof sensor, measurements taken at 21 inches from substrate:

LEDS  PAR

3  25

6  31

10  46

13  62

20  82


Pro's

·  Cheap

·  High output

·  Some degree of control - PAR output

·  Slim line design

·  Good cable length

Con's

·  No way to dim the lights (have tried using a cheap inline one)

I hope this small review of the Beamswork lights will be helpful to some.

Have had some nice growth with Alternanthera and Monte carlo, until the snails attacked!!!!!!

Jim


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## karla (24 Apr 2015)

Good review! I recently brought a single 11w arcadia stretch led unit but thought it was not bright enough for my tastes. I really like the light though so I brought another one. Unfortunately, it does not appear that there is much more light than before. I'm going to persevere with them for a while and see how the plants like it.


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## PARAGUAY (25 Apr 2015)

Interesting topic this .Lets take t5,t8s.A lot of the community of aquascapers say plants dont care as long as they get light etc etc,but then when you see the expert scapes are they using B&Q or similar lights? No of course not its from specialist  aquatic companies lighting  specifically for growing aquatic plants.Often with a same make" Freshwater " tube(s)So I will pay a little more for for say a plant pro tube and leave the B&Q tubes for the garage ceiling. If unsure of intensity too little or too much my first option is raise the lighting or lower whichever.Suddenly inflicting HO T5s on a new set up solved with a cheap T8 initially used


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## Rahms (25 Apr 2015)

PARAGUAY said:


> the community of aquascapers say plants dont care as long as they get light etc etc,but then when you see the expert scapes are they using B&Q or similar lights? No of course not its from specialist  aquatic companies lighting  specifically for growing aquatic plants.Often with a same make" Freshwater " tube(s)



Stickied thread in this very forum seems to disagree with what you're saying though... I've not seen anyone saying they use aquatic plant bulbs, mostly just give the name and/or the colour temp (osram 880, 10K etc).  I've even seen a few good scapes with outdoor spotlights, £30 off ebay.  Can't find the links now though, annoyingly.


The fact is that people who are dedicated to the hobby are more likely to spend more money on it. It's quite a cheap hobby when you look at cost vs time. I doubt you'd tell me ADA tanks have some great benefit over other clearseal ones. Or the £30+ substrate rake thing (cannot believe it exists...) gives a better finish than a 30p protractor 

edit: and where do people get their PAR meters from? can't seem to find anywhere that even discloses a price...


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## karla (25 Apr 2015)

PARAGUAY said:


> Interesting topic this .Lets take t5,t8s.A lot of the community of aquascapers say plants dont care as long as they get light etc etc,but then when you see the expert scapes are they using B&Q or similar lights? No of course not its from specialist  aquatic companies lighting  specifically for growing aquatic plants.Often with a same make" Freshwater " tube(s)So I will pay a little more for for say a plant pro tube and leave the B&Q tubes for the garage ceiling. If unsure of intensity too little or too much my first option is raise the lighting or lower whichever.Suddenly inflicting HO T5s on a new set up solved with a cheap T8 initially used



Hi, do you mind me asking what your lighting setup is and if you consider it low,high, very high or moderate.
I'm hoping your right about the specialist lighting.


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## DrRob (26 Apr 2015)

I'm in the process (job for today) of replacing the lighting rig on one of my low techs. Growing mosses in abundance, with crypts and some cyperus growing beautifully. It's only when I went to change the bulb that I realised that I'd set up an old single T12 set. I appeared to have a ballast and bulb combo lying around still and hadn't registered when I did it that it wasn't a T8. Needed replacing anyway as the hood is falling apart. It'll have to be a T8 now as I'm now really out of T12's.


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## karla (26 Apr 2015)

Rahms said:


> [URL='http://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/cheap-ho-t5-fluorescent-tubes-update-with-photos.555/']Stickied thread





Rahms said:


> in this very forum seems to disagree with what you're saying though... I've not seen anyone saying they use aquatic plant bulbs, mostly just give the name and/or the colour temp (osram 880, 10K etc).  I've even seen a few good scapes with outdoor spotlights, £30 off ebay.  Can't find the links now though, annoyingly.
> 
> 
> The fact is that people who are dedicated to the hobby are more likely to spend more money on it. It's quite a cheap hobby when you look at cost vs time. I doubt you'd tell me ADA tanks have some great benefit over other clearseal ones. Or the £30+ substrate rake thing (cannot believe it exists...) gives a better finish than a 30p protractor
> ...



[/URL]
http://www.apogeeinstruments.co.uk/aquarium-par-meters/
http://www.apogeeinstruments.co.uk/aquarium-par-meters/

They also sell the electric calibrated sensor only, for people that do not mind hooking it up to a mutimeter, or want to use their own data logger.


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## PARAGUAY (27 Apr 2015)

[quote="Rahms,  
Hi Rahms ,  some confusion here,far from saying there is anything wrong with any particular lighting and having used T12,T8,T5 Sylvanna, Osram,warm white,cool white grolux you name it and had vallis filling a tank with 40watt tungsten,er  some time ago, all my take was having seen scapes,tutorials etc and now having HOT5s I tend to go for a tube manafactured for plant growth, a little extra maybe but not much.


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## PARAGUAY (27 Apr 2015)

karla said:


> Hi, do you mind me asking what your lighting setup is and if you consider it low,high, very high or moderate.
> I'm hoping your right about the specialist lighting.


Hi Karla, I using 4 t5 HO over a metre long 17" deep tank, at first using a couple of T8  tropical tubes until some growth started then changed with the Luminaire with T5s a foot above (using guesswork not par meter) now lowered to its bracket hieght of 6" above,using 2 Arcadia plant pro tubes  in combo with 2 Arcadia Freshwater,photoperiod of 8hours all four on for middle 4hours 2 tubes on either side.It was doing really well with my "easy" plants in just gravel substrate(trimming a bucket full of Polysperma weekly but just had a setback silly to let the disposable bottle run out of CO2 and have a minor algae problem. Although its classed as high lighting I think the floating plants must be balancing things out.When I refered to specialist lighting I meant in this case tubes specifically for plants, not ADA,,Kessil and some higher priced equivalents(lottery ticket is on though


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## karla (27 Apr 2015)

PARAGUAY said:


> Hi Karla, I using 4 t5 HO over a metre long 17" deep tank, at first using a couple of T8  tropical tubes until some growth started then changed with the Luminaire with T5s a foot above (using guesswork not par meter) now lowered to its bracket hieght of 6" above,using 2 Arcadia plant pro tubes  in combo with 2 Arcadia Freshwater,photoperiod of 8hours all four on for middle 4hours 2 tubes on either side.It was doing really well with my "easy" plants in just gravel substrate(trimming a bucket full of Polysperma weekly but just had a setback silly to let the disposable bottle run out of CO2 and have a minor algae problem. Although its classed as high lighting I think the floating plants must be balancing things out.When I refered to specialist lighting I meant in this case tubes specifically for plants, not ADA,,Kessil and some higher priced equivalents(lottery ticket is on though



Hi, LOL
I gave up buying lottery tickets long time ago. Perhaps I should start again.
It sounds a lot but it also sounds like where I would like my lighting, I do not like dim tanks, or pink ones. The arcadia leds make my plants all look pink, and the diatoms seem to still enjoy it.


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