75 gallon Planted Office Tank Journal

moi-eater said:
Looks like it is coming along nicely! I am planning to replace my planted 55g with a 75g soon (hopefully).

One thing I want to mention, if the light you have is the Catalina 3x54 T5HO then you would be running very high light with all 3 bulbs (about 165 micromols of PAR according to Hoppy's graph on TPT) and 2 bulbs gives you high light and 1 bulb medium light (if I read it correctly). Here is the link to that thread: PAR graph

Be sure to keep the updates coming! :thm:
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Regarding this thread (about PAR):

http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/lighting/105774-par-vs-distance-t5-t12-pc.html

I finally read through it, and it's simple enough. But it seems that this is only one person testing a few bulbs. Granted, this type of data is extremely appreciated, and there are not enough people producing actual data in much of the online aquarium threads. But has anyone else confirmed the results? Or have the points at which the High/Med/Low light gets delineated (e.g. that a PAR of >80 means HIGH light) reached a consensus?
If I am reading the graph correctly, it looks like a single T5HO bulb in my tank, which is about 19 inches at the max (bottom of light to top of substrate), is around PAR 65. My light sits 3 inches above water and my soil is 4 inches deep.
So one bulb means that the top of my plants are in High light, and the bottom of plants are smack in the middle of Medium light. So, if I were to run two bulbs, I would think everything in the tank would be High light. My light fixture was fairly cheap, I wonder why if 1 bulb can get people by with a typical 20 inch tall tank, why do people go crazy with 4+ bulb setups that are like 6 wpg, and must be off the PAR chart into extreme light.
I don’t want to give plants too much light or too little. After reading that thread, I don’t know if I should run 1, 2, or 3 of my bulbs. The thread would suggest 1, maybe 2 max. But I am looking at tank now, and I don’t know if visual inspection counts much, but my tank “looks” to have a nice amount of light. If I back it off to just one bulb, the tank looks rather dark to me.
Again, this is a situation where I thought I had the right light, and now that I read more, I am thinking too much light. If I read something new tomorrow, I will think I have too little light, LOL. :wall:
Can someone confirm I understand that PAR thread correctly, and maybe give me some feedback on what to do in terms of number of bulbs to run?
:crazy:
 
moi-eater said:
Where did u get the tubing from? Also did you contact Orlando at GLA about your problem? He is very helpful.
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I got tubing from Don at http://www.freshwateraquariumplants.com/. Very shiny and stiff compared to most all other tubing I have seen for air and co2. I think the co2 loss is greatly reduced using this tubing, or so Don tells me. I have read this elsewhere too.

I have no issues with GLA. I purchased all my dry fertz from them, two peices of glass, a check valve, etc. They ship fast and well packaged, so I dont really want to complain to GLA. It is more a design flaw (my personal opinion), in regards to some of these all-glass bubble counters / diffusers. The glass ends should be tapered. Maybe I will call Orlando, but only to see if he has any other tricks, or very slightly larger ID silicone tubing.

Thanks for the suggestion. I will let you know if I end up calling.
 
geekpryde said:
Again, this is a situation where I thought I had the right light, and now that I read more, I am thinking too much light. If I read something new tomorrow, I will think I have too little light, LOL. :wall:
Can someone confirm I understand that PAR thread correctly, and maybe give me some feedback on what to do in terms of number of bulbs to run?
:crazy:
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Welcome to the world of aquaria! There is a lot of opinions and even a lot of different proven approaches to keeping fish and even more for keeping plants. :)

As far as light is concerned I leave those crazy high light tanks to people with FAR too much time on their hands and a better understanding of planted tanks. What kind of plants are you planning on growing, in particularly foreground plants? And what kind of maintance are you looking to put into the tank? Before you can know what you need, you need to know what you want (to put into the tank and what you want to get out of it). Also don't doubt your light purchase! That is a very good light with good reflectors and you can easily not use all the bulbs, if you needed more light that be a different story.

In reference to that particular thread about PAR, Hoppy is a well know name over at TPT with much ecperience & I'd trust those numbers to be pretty accurate. Like you said there is not a lot to compare them to but they are an EXCELLENT starting point for sure. As far as what qualifys as low, medium or high light in terms of PAR I can't say much but it would seem much more accurate then low, medium or high light in terms of WPG, especially because WPG is based on less powerful light (T12) than what people use these days.
 
Here is the color I am getting on the new drop checker. The new glass from GLA with the reference solution and the 4dkh are working much better than the tank water + Red Sea indicator I had in the begining.

DSC_2412.JPG
 
RisiganL. said:
Hey,geek, could you post some more pics of your tank at the moment?
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I dont have the correct lens at the moment, and nothing has changed in the last few days. Plants are either tomorrow or Friday (fingers crossed), and then there will be alot of pics. Here are some crappy shots (cant get whole tank in one pic).


DSC_2420.JPG


DSC_2421.JPG


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DSC_2424.JPG


See the crap floating on top of water?


I think on the shot below, the amazon sword is less happy in this high tech tank then it was in my kids tank. :mad:

DSC_2425.JPG
 
myswtsins said:
Welcome to the world of aquaria! There is a lot of opinions and even a lot of different proven approaches to keeping fish and even more for keeping plants. :)

As far as light is concerned I leave those crazy high light tanks to people with FAR too much time on their hands and a better understanding of planted tanks. What kind of plants are you planning on growing, in particularly foreground plants? And what kind of maintance are you looking to put into the tank? Before you can know what you need, you need to know what you want (to put into the tank and what you want to get out of it). Also don't doubt your light purchase! That is a very good light with good reflectors and you can easily not use all the bulbs, if you needed more light that be a different story.

In reference to that particular thread about PAR, Hoppy is a well know name over at TPT with much ecperience & I'd trust those numbers to be pretty accurate. Like you said there is not a lot to compare them to but they are an EXCELLENT starting point for sure. As far as what qualifys as low, medium or high light in terms of PAR I can't say much but it would seem much more accurate then low, medium or high light in terms of WPG, especially because WPG is based on less powerful light (T12) than what people use these days.
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:iagree:
You have a good fixture and you have all the light you need to grow pretty much anything. So depending on the plants you are growing and what they need you can adjust your light to fit (by turning on only 1 or 2 bulbs, or hanging it above the tank).

As far as how bright the light looks, that is measured in lumens I believe and plants don't really care about lumens, they care about PAR. Of course, you don't want your tank to look dim when your viewing it. :p:
 
geekpryde said:
I think on the shot below, the amazon sword is less happy in this high tech tank then it was in my kids tank. :mad:
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It's pretty early to tell now, but with good CO2, lights, and ferts that sword is gonna take over that half of the tank. :grinyes:
 
:iagree: It still looks beautiful & it is probably just adjusting to the new environment.
 
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