i thought they were around the 6500k. next time i am at home depot or have canopy up so i can look at them ill post it.
What Plants Will Work For Me?
- Thread starter alex818
- Start date
the shoplight i got works for T12 AND T8, and i got it for $5 WITH LIGHTS from a thrift store. the lights that came with it were Verilux T12 6000k. i recently replaced them with Verilux T8 6000k and the difference is amazing.
Yoemen said:
Home Depot... Phillips Daylight Deluxe 6500K T8 and either $6 or $7 for a two pack. It has a mettalic green endcap on it. These bulbs are very bright! I am using a pair of them overdriven 2x on my 75G plant tank along with a flora-glo and a power glo. I havent seen a spectral graph of the daylight delux ones but I can tell you I doubt they are any better than a flora-glo for plants but I could be wrong thier. They are much brighter and pailer than most bulbs to my eye, but their main spectral spike has got to be in the green (most 'daylight' bulbs are). Plants mostly use the red and blue peaks but the plant bulbs often do not look as nice as the daylight bulbs to our eyes. Thats why I mix them so I can get the best of everything. To see a pic of these bulbs compared side by side click here. From left to right: Flora-Glo 40W T10 pinkish, GE Plant&Aquarium 40W T12 dull-ughh not sure what color to call it - yes it is actually on, Phillips Daylight Deluxe 32W T8 greenish/aqua, Power-Glo 40W T10 bluish. Note the colors are greatly exaggerated since the shutter speed was fast enough so the bulbs are not as bright and washed out, or else they would all look mostly white.
I recently tried the Lightning Rod Aqua-flora plus T6 bulb (40W) and to my eye it actually looks very identical to the power-glo (a bright blue with just a hint of purple).
BTW that article linked above was pretty good for the most part. I was thinking about writing something similar since I have a couple lighting articles/projects on my website plus lighting seems to be always confusing since there are so many ways to 'rate' a bulb like watts, lumens, cri, spectra, and alot of the ratings are not fully understood and often misleading.
Edit: forgot I was going to mention that usually t6,8,10,12 bubls are all interchangable. The difference is mostly the ballasts, older less effecient magnetic ballasts vs more effecient electronic ballasts. I am not 100% sure if you put a 40W bulb in a 32W ballast if it will still be drawing 40W or if the ballast will limit it to 32W. I really havent bothered to look into that yet... most T8 ballasts will be designed for 32W bulbs like the one I have, but I am overdriving it anyway, probably the equivelent of 50W per bulb I would guess.
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thanks loaches r cool thats what i have in my tank. i couldnt remember forsure the K. i also agree about them being really bright. put one next to a t12 bulb and the t12 bulb looks dull.
