Lighting. (nm,T5, blue,white) Need input

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guppymonkey

AC Members
Sep 5, 2009
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Michigan
OK so there is A LOT of opinions out there even from LFS and I need some good answers.
What is a good resource for planing lights for tanks? I plan on growing in the hobby and not head in the wrong direction spending big$$$ getting there.

I started a 15gal and did ok with a 50/50 compact and a 6200K compact to grow kenya tree and xenia.
Moved and started a 5 gal with 1x10 led super bright led retro, 1 T8 10k, and 1 T8 atinic blue. (kenya tree, Green Star, Fuzzy tree sponge, green shrooms, and 20 some unknown Zoa) growing well. Moving on to a 20L in process, and one day a 130 or even bigger as I like to build custom tanks.

I like to grow trees, shrooms and such but I want to get serious and build my own lighting combo.
I here about metal halide and LED and T5 and preferences, but I need science stuff like 400nm or 450nm and such. What combo grows corals and still makes them pop colors to make them glow? I know some sellers use light at 390nm or such to make them glow for a pic, but is this ok? found this out playing with my scorpion lamp.
What color temps are truly helpful? The 10k washes out my corals now so they only look unique at twighlight hours of light cycle with blue Atinic. Running lights currently at LED painted blue for moon (constant), Atinic blue T8 15w 18" peak 420nm (9am - 9pm), 10k T8 15w 18" (11am-7pm).

Like I said, I want to custom build rather than buy, but would be willing to look at prebuilts for Ideas. I have a lot of equipment from a friend and years of collecting ( and I do mean a lot as in garage full, lol) so I am sure I just need to pull together part A from one unit and piece it with part B. just need specs to pull it together.

Future stock I would like to keep include birdnest, Monti, ricordeas, Clams....and just keep going..lol.
I have done fresh and such for years, but salt it is a little more of a challenge that I have found I like.
 

funkman262

AC Members
Jul 24, 2010
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Tampa, FL
Real Name
Michael
Well the first PUR peak occurs at 450nm, so that's what I used when I built my LED fixture. It makes the colors in the corals really stand out, and I've even run these blues only for months at a time and noticed considerable growth in my soft corals. I use a mixture of 6500K and 10000K white LEDs dimmed down to balance out the blues until I get the most aesthetically pleasing spectrum for normal viewing.
 
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