Aquascape Guide - Selecting a Light For a Planted Aquarium / EP 2 - Lighting

In this video, we define PAR and how that affects your tank. Why light spectrum, wattage, kelvin and lumens are important. And lastly, we cover some recommendations for lighting.

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[TheGodvszombies]

Nicely explained! Its so frustating now a days to get information on "what makes a good light for my aquarium/plant?" and outdated articles constantly saying "1 watt per litre" rule.
Lots of local fish stores say "get the lights with the highest wattage", that theory only applied 5 years ago when we had T5 light tubes. Now we have LED lights that are so much more energy efficient that measuring watts is redundant and inaccurate.
Best measurement right now for LED lighting is PAR

[ehsanhaidary]

Love you vids Phil. Short and sweet and always entertaining.

The light that I have states 48 PAR at 30cm distance. When you mentioned the ratings being low intensity below 40 and medium being above 40, at what distance are these quoted/measured? So what intensity light is mine? Low-med?

[dddmmm]

As far the the 120 par target... Is that at the tank bottom level or surface?

[jeffjarecki]

I have a question on my lights.
I'm starting my first tank, it's a 36g Bow Front. About 21" tall.
I purchased the Finnex Planted+ KLC. Reviews look good, etc.
I am installing CO2 system as well.

Now for the question. I saw mention of the ONF Flat One light, lots of amazing reviews. I went and looked and it's in the $500 range. My Finnest cost my like $140. So, I went and looked up the PAR. A little trick to decipher, but according to what I can find.
The Finnex PAR @ 14" = 79
The ONF PAR (doesn't have rating for 14", but has for 11.8 and 17.7, so I averaged the nubmers) = 88.5
(Little truth in lending statement here, lol. They had ranges for 11.8, so I added low to high and divided by 2, same for 17.7. Then I split difference and added to lowest average to be as fair as I could in factoring).

So, pretending my numbers are in ANY way accurate, this doesn't seem like a huge jump frankly. I realize there's a lot of wiggle room in both directions for both lights. But lets say these are factual. I'm assumin gand increase of 9.5 would NOT justify the extra ~$350..? And even if 9.5 extra PAR is very valuable, couldn't I just buy another Finnest and have 2 lights running? Would the PAR "Double" running 2 lights?

Sorry for the loooong, loaded questions, but I'm trying to figure what next step will be should I decided I need more light after I mature this tank.

[Kevin]

Is two Fluval 48 inch 3.0 planted led lights to much for a 75 gallon. I’m running them at 100% BBB for all whites, 85% for reds and 2% for blue. Thanks for all the great videos. Also I’m running CO2 and using Thrive 3 times a week.

[chrise]

Ok, but what do you do with the PAR information?

[jakabzsolt]

Unfortunately, based on the video, I still don't know what kind of lamp to buy. If I want to keep Parvula and my aquarium is 35 cm high, what kind of lamp should I choose? Do I need to look at the required PAR value for the particular plant on the substrate? But such information is nowhere to be found! Would the medium 60 PAR lamp still be suitable even if my aquarium was taller? I don't understand and I don't know what kind of lamp to choose.... I need to choose a lamp that can provide 60 PAR at the bottom of my aquarium??

[vinayakpalav]

Very nice guiding video. One question though PAR of 60-80 should be targeted at what height in my aquarium? At the bottom of the tank or top or mid? I am planning to have Fluval Plant 3.0 on my 75 gallon tank so how many of those lights i will need for mid tech system (like for PAR of 60-80)

[autumnhalaney]

Does my PAR value change when I have my white LEDS on vs my blue?

[dddmmm]

I understand PAR is the ultimate metric but I dont think the insistence on being the ONLY metric is doing the hobby any favors... 9 or 10 hobbyist wont have a PAR meter and are left to wonder what the par is at their very specific situation of height, angle, obstacles, etc. And some lights dont even publish that data. Assuming a LED light is of the right plant spectrum, size for tank, format, etc and etc, there should be a direct relationship between Lumens and Watts with PAR with a fairly acceptable margin of error... so I dont get why we cant establish an initial Lumens per Ga or Watts per Ga, at least as a rule of thumb so people can at least be in the right ballpark and then adjust from there... Making PAR the very first and only metric may be the correct approach but it is not the practical approach.