Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Doug T. on July 22, 2012 at 6:03pm

That light isn't very powerful for a 28 gallon planted tank, I was thinking of getting that light for my 6 gallon. I personally have LED lights on 2 of my tanks but they are way more powerful than that. I'd recommend either the Marineland reef capable LEDs(what I have), or their aquatic plant LEDs, which are supposed to be even more powerful and in a more desirable spectrum, although my plants are growing out of control with the reef capable lights. 

How deep is your tank?

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Permalink Reply by Chris T on July 22, 2012 at 6:09pm

Yea was gonna make nano style planted tank using LEDs not for the 29 but I look for those I know fluvals use led if Im corre t

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Permalink Reply by Robert Jango on July 22, 2012 at 11:31pm

The light should be in the 6500K range and total about 10 lumens per square inch of tank surface area. It doesn't matter what kind of light you use. 

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Permalink Reply by Danny D. on July 24, 2012 at 7:42am

yeah u can i just suggest u do a double bright for plants... i have a single bright led beamswork and its a bit too much of a low light for plants but it does make the tank look really nicee...

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Permalink Reply by MrAtrophy on July 25, 2012 at 5:36pm

that light is not able to grow plants on its own .  i have one as a second light on a fluval 12 gallon edge . i am pretty familiar with marineland led's .  they do have plant safe led's but they are pricey . but they use less energy and need no bulb replacement .  

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Permalink Reply by MrAtrophy on July 25, 2012 at 5:40pm

marineland has a new one thats a triple bright with built in timer . 
http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod_display.cfm?c=3578+3733+...

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Permalink Reply by Lee on July 26, 2012 at 4:25pm

marineland LED fixtures aren't particularly powerful (even their reef capable ones).  you'll need more powerful lights if you intend to grow plants or corals (reef tank).  for the most part, they're mostly for lighting the tank so you can see the fish.  they need to make them 2-3 times more powerful than they currently sell them.  their fixtures either don't have enough LED diodes and they're not powerful enough.  they primarily use 1 watt (or 1/2 watt) diodes as the core of their fixtures with some having 3 watt diodes.  LEDs are relatively cheap and for what they're asking for their fixtures, they should use 3watt diodes at a minimum and more of them on their lights.    

when I searched for lights for my nano saltwater tank (10g), the marineland fixture for my size tank didn't put out the light I needed.  1300 lumens was a little more than the 1200 lumens my 20 watt fluorescent was already putting out and it was already too dim for coral.  I went with a beamswork fixture (marineland clone) instead.  One of the few cheap fixtures with decent amount of light output.   

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Permalink Reply by Doug T. on July 27, 2012 at 7:00am

I'm sorry but I have to disagree with you that the Reef Capable aren't powerful enough to grow plants. The Beamswork's are more powerful(and cheaper but don't know if the quality is the same), so they should to do fine with plants as well, but I wouldn't say the Marineland is weak and won't grow plants. I have one on my 55 gal and my plants are growing like crazy. I also know at least 2 other people who have them on their own planted tanks that are doing great with them. I have heard they are a little weak for saltwater, but I don't really know alot about saltwater lights. But the new Marineland Aquatic Plant lights are even more powerful than the Reef Capable.

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Permalink Reply by Lee on July 27, 2012 at 4:29pm

what kind of plants are you growing?  if you have their 48" reef capable light (3340 lumens output), that's equivalent to 1 T5 tube (5000 lumens). obviously that's at the light source.  factor in optics and those two will be pretty close (with LED losing less due to optics). that's pretty expensive lighting for what is essentially 1 tube of T5.  for $400, you can grow anything a 4-foot T5 could.  the newer plant version is a better value (4480 lumens) for $32 more.  still only slightly more output than a tube of T5.  longevity isn't reason enough to spend that kind of money.  despite what the marketing may say, LED diodes do fade with use (particularly the amount they are bound to get over a tank and especially the 1watt+ diodes).  the old adage of LEDs should last forever only applies to the old diodes that don't generate heat.

reef tanks are tricky.  what marineland sells as reef capable shouldn't even be called that.  "reef maybe" would be a more accurate name.  A lot of corals require some insane amounts of light (by freshwater standards anyways).  there are some low light corals as their are low light freshwater plants.

neither beamsworks nor marineland is in the same category as some of the fixtures i came across when looking for lights (they can easily reach into the $1000s for the good ones).  beamsworks, from what i can tell, is close enough to marineland that I would not spend the extra money just to have the marineland name on the fixture.  The fixtures are so close that a lot of people wouldn't be able to tell if they couldn't see the logo (I'm surprised they haven't been sued).  as far as them lasting, they're solid state devices, if they're gonna have a catastrophic failure, it's gonna happen at the beginning of their life.   

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Permalink Reply by Dave S on July 29, 2012 at 6:52pm

I have the freshwater plant LED from Marineland and my plants are doing great. You can see for yourself on my youtube videos. Put them on just now so you can see how good they work. www.youtube.com/user/dstbrg

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