Lighting ideas and questions.

[coyotethug]

I am designing my system of two side by side 245 gallon tanks. I am putting them on a 48 inch tall custom built wall unit and I am trying to figure out how to light them with the effect I am looking for. Alright basic concept of tanks

Black painted background with black sand. At least on tank will house stingrays and cichla, other tanganyikan community with moba fronts.

I want the tanks kind of dim with a blue tinted light and shimmer effect. I was thinking about two led spotlights evenly positioned above each tank. I really want the fish to stand out but be comfortable at the same time. Anyone have experience with this?

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[Fat Homer]

From what i've seen with LED spot lights, is they are as the name states, spot lights, so you will not have a very large spread of light over the tank...

An LFS i know uses LED spot lights on their approx. 10' wide display tank, and they have 3 on one side and that covers above 3' - 4' roughly.... so depending on the width of both tanks, you may possibly need quite a few to get a nice spread...

 

[coyotethug]

I have 2 feet of space above tanks so I can raise them up as muc as I need. I might just have to play with it some to get the effect I am looking for but any previous experience is always helpful.

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[Fat Homer]

I guess yeah, if you aren't using it in a planted tank, then raising the height of the LED might give you enough spread for your purposes...

 

[Aquaticfan]

To get the shimmer you want id say LED lights. No other light has the shimmer effect. LED lights already have a very directional focus. Then to put them into a spotlight format makes it even more so. Id recommend personally a LED light/strip/Bar/panel assembly. They dont have crazy brightness and if you get some more set up with blues in it, it should give you the hue/color/effect you want. Not necessarily cheap. But It should get you where you want. I think spot lights will be to directional and dark.

Here are some places ive dealt with that may be able to help you.

http://www.sunslighting.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=2501W-B&gclid=CPf1vO6knbYCFY1aMgodGjQA1w

http://www.aquatraders.com/LED-Aquarium-Lighting-s/22.htm

http://www.truaqua.com/aquarium-lighting.html

http://www.ecoxotic.com/

There are also tons of DIY LED light set ups as well.

 

[Chicxulub]

To get a good shimmer I use LED lights as well. To stay on a budget, I got the daylight (5000k?) spotlight bulbs from Lowes that have a normal light bulb base. They have one LED that puts out about 700 lumens.

At first the light was way too much of a spot light, so I used a glasses screwdriver to remove the lens and the spot effect went away. It was too diffuse at this point so I bought a $4 clamp lamp from Lowes and used that to direct the light back into the tank. It gives a good shimmer effect this way. I have 1400 lumens from them plus some more from my moon lights. Its more than enough to light my tank and looks good. To be honest, I kind of think the two spot lights are too much. My total investment for the two lights was about $50.

I have to use them spots in conjunction with my moon lights as they are a little too yellow. If I cold do it all over again, I'd try to get 6500k or 8000k lights off of the internet.

Heres a picture of my aro that shows the shimmer effect I'm getting. The bright light in the water column was from the camera's flash being fired from above the tank.

 

[coyotethug]

I like the look of that aro. I may go and see what the big box stores have. If I can mix in some blue led strips off ebay I may be able to get the effect I am looking for. Also, it may just take some tinkering to get it the way I want. I have found some spotlights on line which you can adjust the spectrum as well. They are pricey but not that bad when you look at the fully built units. Any videos of your tank to see the lighting effect in action?

 

[Gill Blue]

I bought 3 of these 50W LEDs for my 245, and I liked them, but they wouldn't grow plants.
I used 1 per 2 feet, 3 total. I had them sitting directly on the glass top, at the front of the tank with 2+" pvc spacers holding up the back edge and got pretty good coverage.
the LED's themselves are relatively cool, you can put your had against the glass no problem. the ballasts on the back get HOT. I had one fry after just 6 weeks. the other two I drilled holes and ran the for 8 months no problem.
very nice shimmer