Hi. I have a small tank and I’m really confused about lighting and all the info on ‘watts per gallon’. It 22x44cm and 23cm high and there will be no CO2. So from what I’ve learned it will need to be low light. I’ve been looking at clip-on nano tank filters but I’m still not sure of the Watts it should have. I do have a dimmer in case it’s too bright.
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5 gallon tank (Wattage?)
- Thread starter Daalamist
- Start date
Such a tricky question as it can depend on many factors like ... how many hours the light is on for, how much ambient light the tank receives, how close the light is the the tank, how many plants you have.
Try a 4w led for 8 hours a day and see how that goes.... luckily they are pretty cheap to buy!
Try a 4w led for 8 hours a day and see how that goes.... luckily they are pretty cheap to buy!
Edvet
Member
watts per gallon, lumens per gallon, sadly all these have little to bear with the lighting for plants.
In general the only real info we could use is PAR, sadly very few manufacturers give these numbers.
If you browse the posts here you will get some info on the types people are using and how they function.
I would find out ( internet search of the most common names here, Chihiros, Fluval, Twinstar, Eheim etc etc) what you think you want, and then see if people here are using them.
I used a 20W LED floodlight suspended over my low tech 50x50x50 cm with good succes, cheap and easy.
zozo
Member
LED and wattage is also tricky to answer.. 
And with LEDs the times are over that brightness and wattage could somehow be related as it used to be with oldfashion bulbs and tubes.There are so many different types of leds in a range from 15 to 100 lumen per watt and some calculate lumen per led on the pcb.
Than in the old days it was simple with a tube light giving x amount of lumens at x watt it was pretty steady..Than common practice was if 2 tubes are used, simply add the lumen of both tubes together for a total. But nowadays a led tube is build with for example with 72 small led as single light source per metre that could produce 50 lumen per led. 50 lumen is about nothing only good for finding a keyhole in the dark, 50 x 72 = quite a bit stronger. But if the total is 3600 lumen is rather very doubtfull, more likely far from it. But that is still the formula used by vendors and the general publiic. Just to get an idea which is brighter and then stick a fictional number to it for convenience. And still with the general idea more watage is more light.. But it aint anymore with leds. Without any flux/par measuring equipment it is all the customer has to go with you never know if they sell you the truth.
But indeed
For example read the Journal section find setups in comparable dimensions and plants they grow etc. Most journals have their equipment specified usualy also amount of lumens for the lights and or what kind of light is used from which you likely can look up its performance to compare. See the results they adchieve and use this information to get an idea what you might need for your own setup.
I used on a simmular dimension 40x25x25cm tank 2 x COB led lights - specified with 1350 lumen each and 30 watt total, installed it with a dimmer and it performed like a charm at 70% with easy t grow plants. And or searching around i also find other/newer types of leds alledgedly performing the same at 20 watt..
And with LEDs the times are over that brightness and wattage could somehow be related as it used to be with oldfashion bulbs and tubes.There are so many different types of leds in a range from 15 to 100 lumen per watt and some calculate lumen per led on the pcb.Than in the old days it was simple with a tube light giving x amount of lumens at x watt it was pretty steady..Than common practice was if 2 tubes are used, simply add the lumen of both tubes together for a total. But nowadays a led tube is build with for example with 72 small led as single light source per metre that could produce 50 lumen per led. 50 lumen is about nothing only good for finding a keyhole in the dark, 50 x 72 = quite a bit stronger. But if the total is 3600 lumen is rather very doubtfull, more likely far from it. But that is still the formula used by vendors and the general publiic. Just to get an idea which is brighter and then stick a fictional number to it for convenience. And still with the general idea more watage is more light.. But it aint anymore with leds. Without any flux/par measuring equipment it is all the customer has to go with you never know if they sell you the truth.
But indeed
Than find something dimmable and take something rather over calculated and you can't go wrong if it prooves to be to much at full power.
For example read the Journal section find setups in comparable dimensions and plants they grow etc. Most journals have their equipment specified usualy also amount of lumens for the lights and or what kind of light is used from which you likely can look up its performance to compare. See the results they adchieve and use this information to get an idea what you might need for your own setup.
I used on a simmular dimension 40x25x25cm tank 2 x COB led lights - specified with 1350 lumen each and 30 watt total, installed it with a dimmer and it performed like a charm at 70% with easy t grow plants.
And or searching around i also find other/newer types of leds alledgedly performing the same at 20 watt..
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