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LED Lighting for 5 foot Aquarium

I've tried looking earlier for lumen output of kessils I can get what people are measuring PAR at but not lumens might email directly and ask
 
And then there is PUR 😀

Which is really the most applicable measurement 😉

This is a decent summary article

Fortunately you can just add "light" & plants will grow
- getting technical is helpful when designing a system & matching plant goals to light sources

If you run 45cm or less water column height, it's a lot simpler (& cheaper)

The only time I even glance at lumens is when it's the only information available, & then it's just the starting point, decent/suitable lumens means it's worthing pursueing PAR/PUR data
 
I honestly thought you was having me on for a second then :lol:, I gave it a check and i have actually come across it briefly before just not named PUR, I'll give me of a look now and we will see how confused I get getting head through this part before one of you tells me there is another factor to consider that an acronym to confuse me more haha

Interestingly I decided against doing a reef tank because I thought a nice planted tank would be easier overall and a bit cheaper, price gap is closing and still seems very involved, but I still can't wait to create the idea I have in my head and isn't that what it's all about, slightly unrelated note but is pea gravel ok to use to lift height of substrate thinking higher back than front and looking into best way to do that.
 
Lava rock is better as lighter & more porous, stick in nylon stocking bags with shift room so you can adjust the shape - I'll look for the awesome journal for this

Is the tank ordered or already present? Just switch to 45cm height & you're golden 🙂
 
I'll have to get some more lava rock the how fine should it be, near to powder or more like crushed?

Tanks is already here, actually got it for free just had to pay for delivery, very good shape apart from slight chips in top of glass, just cosmetically though and will be wrapping top once got the lights together so it will look like new as before that it was just used to mix water so no scratches at all.
 
Crushed to briquet size pieces are good, depends how much height you want to add
 
I'll order some more then, is the aggregate one the same as the one you get in fish shops, LFS says it is but it may require more rinsing which is understandable, however I know in this hobby just because they have same name it doesn't mean it's the same
 
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Just got the aggregate type ordered anyway if not can redo garden.

So after reading a lot of articles on pur par and lumens I believe that I understand, is it as follows; if lumens is high in the correct PUR then PAR for the plants will be high? Have I understood correctly or is there still something I missed?
 
Pretty much 🙂 - but you'll have difficulty getting PUR values out of retailers/manufacturers, especially for any lamps that are manufactured under licence in other countries (lights will be built to some "specification" but actual components used tend to vary between lots)
A company that manufactures & retails is more likely to have reliable data, but some of these companies won't report PAR as measurements can be subjective (especially wrt sensory array used - take a read on the method & equipment used by Sanjay Joshi 😉 - few hobbiests have anything like, or the technical skills)

You didn't supply a link to the aggregate you ordered so no idea on that 🙂
 
I meant just in general the ones that get supplied is same as in aquarium safe and there isn't any extra prep other than more rinsing, it's from a local supplier so no link but it looks the same visually just smaller.

I'll have a look at the equipment they use hopefully I will understand some of it. In regards to getting the correct PUR for high PAR there was a graph included so could we not choose wavelengths that match the graph to eachoeve the high PAR ratings?
 
Also something that I wondered let's say I like the tank to be a certain white but it's not beneficial in PUR could I use that couloir along with beneficial colours to obtain high PAR or would the wrong colour actually lower the PAR rating assuming the colour I want was in addition to the rest and not replacing one of the beneficial colour
 
Also whilst I was looking up leds I made note of one that could do 4500 lux from 5 watts now I know it was in the wrong spectrum it is useless but do them numbers sound right before that I was not finding much over 200 lux per watt never mind 900 lux per watt that this suggests, I will try to find LED that stated this but does this sound right?
 
Lux must be rated with the distance to the light souce at which the mesure was taken, lux by itself means nothing.

Michel.
 
Lux has nothing to do with distance. One lux is one lumen of light spread over one square meter. Thus if I project my 5000 lumen T5 light onto one square meter this is 5000 lux.
 
Just thought I would let everyone know I went the T5HO method and looking at it over the tank I am glad I choose it, it definitely was easier to find and then just choose some bulbs in right spectrum so much easier than LED's, thanks for the help 🙂
 
ian_m said:
Lux has nothing to do with distance. One lux is one lumen of light spread over one square meter. Thus if I project my 5000 lumen T5 light onto one square meter this is 5000 lux.
Click to expand...

At what distance? That does not sound right, take a luxmeter and you will see that the lux measure will go down a lot the more far away you are from the light source.

Michel.
 
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