Plant growing lights for corals?

[JonPhillips]

So, living in colorado, I've realized there is a great market for lighting. looking at picking up a pair of these bad boys the guy claims are great at growing plants.

Here are the specs:

300 watt, full spectrum (9 band) LED light panels
base color: white
view angle: 120 degree mixed

Guy says they are manufactured with all LG components...

For those with experience in the lighting department, will these be good coral lights on a 65g? depth of 28 inches?

Also, do plant lights make a good crossover in general because I've got my eyes on a couple others...CHEAP!

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

sorry reef lights. Not Reefer.
Spectrally different. so youd have to check.
not sure your budget, but mars aqua is a chinese ebay black box, reef radiance is american and SBreeflights and Reef breeders too. not much difference in price , pretty big difference in quality.
and warranty

 

[kschweer]

Agree with above. Those grow light will more than likely be more on the yellow/orange side as opposed to the blue that makes corals look good. They will more than likely grow corals but I would suspect they won't look very good.

 

[xaxiu]

How about ocean revive t247.they are full spectrum for corals

 

[JonPhillips]

sorry reef lights. Not Reefer.
Spectrally different. so youd have to check.
not sure your budget, but mars aqua is a chinese ebay black box, reef radiance is american and SBreeflights and Reef breeders too. not much difference in price , pretty big difference in quality.
and warranty

wonder how to check the specterum? unlimited budget, money to burn, and time to kill I am just no sure if my current lights are strong enough for all that depth I got going on...

 

[JonPhillips]

How about ocean revive t247.they are full spectrum for corals

To me, these seem too inexpensive to work well. could be wrong though. Seems like you've really got to spend an arm and a leg to get something decent and I know lighting is like the second most important element to growing coral. One could hypothetically DIY some LED, but I don't graduate journeyman school for another six months... Thank you for the input!

 

[JonPhillips]

Agree with above. Those grow light will more than likely be more on the yellow/orange side as opposed to the blue that makes corals look good. They will more than likely grow corals but I would suspect they won't look very good.

True. astetics is important. Thanks!

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

wonder how to check the specterum? unlimited budget, money to burn, and time to kill I am just no sure if my current lights are strong enough for all that depth I got going on...

ant of the ones mentioned are bright enough with ex spectrum

 

[Bdog4u2]

Find a metal halide system someone is selling cheap they work great just get a 14k -20k bulb for it. I have enough metal halides to light up a 3000 gallon tank but none for my 150 unless i want to light up my whole living room.
I was quite the gardener before i grew up.

 

[Bpb]

+1 if you've got money to spend then just get some metal halides with t5ho supplements and buy yourself 3-4 years worth of bulbs. You'll be invested as deep as you would if you bought top shelf LEDs but get better results this way. Old school just flat out works. And there's a reason you don't see people using grow lights over corals. Wrong spectrum. The light that terrestrial plants get isn't the same as corals get at 50 feet deep. You want lights with a strong blue/violet component with very little red. Vegetative state grow lights are usually aimed at 6500k color temp. That'll grow corals but look hideous and you'll grow a boatload of algae as well. Flowering phase light spectrum (magenta LEDs or hps mh) will kill every coral in the tank. Use lights proven to work for our applications.

 

[JonPhillips]

Find a metal halide system someone is selling cheap they work great just get a 14k -20k bulb for it. I have enough metal halides to light up a 3000 gallon tank but none for my 150 unless i want to light up my whole living room.
I was quite the gardener before i grew up.

Yup. Sound advice, sir. Thank you.

 

[JonPhillips]

+1 if you've got money to spend then just get some metal halides with t5ho supplements and buy yourself 3-4 years worth of bulbs. You'll be invested as deep as you would if you bought top shelf LEDs but get better results this way. Old school just flat out works. And there's a reason you don't see people using grow lights over corals. Wrong spectrum. The light that terrestrial plants get isn't the same as corals get at 50 feet deep. You want lights with a strong blue/violet component with very little red. Vegetative state grow lights are usually aimed at 6500k color temp. That'll grow corals but look hideous and you'll grow a boatload of algae as well. Flowering phase light spectrum (magenta LEDs or hps mh) will kill every coral in the tank. Use lights proven to work for our applications.

Looks like old school is the way to go...thank you.

 

[Gordon Marvin]

I am just curious would a grow Light work if it’s covered with a blue piece of plastic?

 

[Jekyl]

I am just curious would a grow Light work if it’s covered with a blue piece of plastic?

No. Just changing the color doesn't work out. Coral need a different spectrum than plants.

 

[Bpb]

I am just curious would a grow Light work if it’s covered with a blue piece of plastic?

One must understand how light filtering plastics work. They don’t change the color of light, the simply remove wavelengths and allow through whatever color they appear. So if you put a blue filter on a white light, it doesn’t change it to blue. It simply removes everything NOT blue. If you put that same filter over red leds, it will just absorb a ton of the LED’s energy and let through the trace amounts of blue present in the diode, as well as a little of the red (since it can’t catch it ALL). So you see it doesn’t change any colors. It only removes colors