Marineland Single Brights

[Jozle]

I'm a cheap lowtech guy (Slowly progressing away from being cheap). If it works, it works. Couldn't find info on how many kelvin that these lights provided. I have three of them and they're all three different sizes. Smallest one is 10", second is about 16", and the last one is about 22". From what I read, it won't grow plants, but I'm running these on nano tanks that are 4g, 6g, and 10g and my plants seem to be growing with CO2 and ferts.

The only thing that's bothering me is the light ranges. I know these lights don't have high levels of the necessary colours for optimal plant growth but does anyone have any idea what the estimated Kelvin for them are?

I might be picking up some LED strips from city pets soon for my newest nano tank, the Mr. Aqua 12g Long. I like how bright they are per single strip when I saw them at Sunny's house, on his swimming pool size tank that he some how recently Houdini'd into his little apartment.

[TexSun]

Re: Marineland Single Brights

I think the LEDS you're using are close to the spectrum the plants need, just not optimal.

Also, the nano tanks you have provide a shallow platform for plant growth allowing plenty of penetration. If you had a deeper tank, I doubt you'd see the results you are currently witnessing.

Hmmm..... I wonder if we could somehow get a PAR meter and test the LEDs usable height above the tank.
I bet if you placed the LEDs about 3" above the substrate you'd grow some HC like a champ, but at say >15" above the water line you have trouble getting it to grow. Experimentation time!

[Totenkampf]

i was under the impression the the BIN quality of these LEDs is so low that it is hard to say what temp they are, they probably vary greatly from fixture to fixture. you have the perfect tank in mind for sub optimal lighting though. just because they are visisbly bright doesnt mean the plants can use them at all. I put some bright freaking T2VHO lamps in an eclipse hood and a cant grow anything with them, and they are supposedly 6000k.