# Cube Garden 60p high



## Jbennett (Oct 8, 2008)

Just picked up an ADA 17 gallon cube. Thinking of going with LED's and don't have much experience with them. Looking for suggestions. Also, I was just in Aqua Forest Aquarium in SF and they had some fancy new light that wasn't ADA or Archea, the two brands they carry, does anyone know what brand this was? It was like an 800 dollar light from China. I forgot the name brand after driving back to San Luis Obispo.


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## TropTrea (Jan 10, 2014)

An 800 dollar lighting fixture for a 17 gallon tank? This sounds way out of range you should be able to get a fantastic light for a 17 gallon tank for under 100 dollars. The only thought I have is that your not talking US dollars but an exchange rate of 8 of your dollars to 1 US dollar. 

With LED lighting you want to stay away from fixtures that have a lot of blue LED's in them. Many are made with 50% blue leds and 50% cool white LED's that produce excessive blue light and insufficient red light for planted tanks. They work good for Reef tanks but not planted fresh water tanks. If they have cool white bulbs I would not add blues but possibly even add some red LED's. I;m having good luck with a mix of cool whites and neutral whites.

As far as wattage goes with LED's unless you know the fixture and its components it is hard to estimate total wattage required. Some lower cost LED's are as low as 60 lumns per watt and other high quality ones are now around 150 lumns per watt or more on custom built fixtures.


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## Jbennett (Oct 8, 2008)

I've read about Kessil Lighting. What do you think? I don't really want a DIY rig. Thanks for responding. "edit" - Here is the lighting brand I was talking about, "Optnova" http://opnova.optiled.com/Order.aspx


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