# Philips bulbs for plants and aquariums



## ninoboy (Jan 26, 2004)

Many of plant bulbs don't mention the K rating. But they do have peaks on red and blue region. I think it's because they don't want to mislead people with the K rating. GE plant/aquarium bulb is red and has a K rating of 3200. Many soft white bulb that rated at 3200K emit yellow or orange color. Another GE SPX bulb emit soft pink color and has K rating close 5000. Most 5000K bulbs are yellow. The bright pink one we usually see the the GE aquaray 9325. So the Kelvin doesn't always tell you what the real color is.

But when GE and Philips mention "plant", they always have U shape spectrum graph (high on red and blue)


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## GulfCoastAquarian (Jul 30, 2002)

What nino was trying to say is that the Philips P&A bulbs you saw at Home Depot will work very nicely in your planted tank.


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## fishyboy (Nov 16, 2003)

I just bought 2 of them and i hate them. The light is too yellow. I like the 9325 K much much better


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## ninoboy (Jan 26, 2004)

Agree. No bulbs those say for "plant and aquarium" look nice.


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## Overfloater (Jan 12, 2004)

> No bulbs those say for "plant and aquarium" look nice.


That's why you mix them with a more eye-pleasing bulb. They grow plants great.


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## jcgd (Feb 18, 2004)

Okay. I have the 20 watt plant and aquarium bulb, a 20 watt daylight bulb (6500K) and a 15 watt aquaglo over my 20 High. Is this any good?
I also have co2


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## Capt. (Mar 11, 2004)

Those are very good bulb choices.


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## GulfCoastAquarian (Jul 30, 2002)

I've used both OSRAM/Sylvania Plant & Aquarium Gro-Lux bulbs and General Electric's Plant & Aquarium bulbs and not only do they grow plants well, they have a slight pinkish tone that I believe makes the fish look fantastic (especially Rasbora heteromorpha!).
If the bulbs you purchased are really yellow, then they're probably not fit for planted aquarium use. Let us know how it goes.


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## rain- (Mar 29, 2004)

Here is a good site with pictures of different tubes used in the same tank, there's Philips, Arcadia, Sylvania etc. Some metal halides too and the spectrum charts. 

Samu Saurama - Light Comparison


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## GDominy (Jul 30, 2002)

rain, that page is simply amazing. That is the kind of information that I have been looking for, for quite a while now. I love the fact they have a photo and a sprectral analysis of the light.

Great post!


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## rain- (Mar 29, 2004)

It's made by a friend of mine =) It really is quite usefull. I have been using Philips 840 tubes, but those pictures made me want to change to 965, it looks so much better. 

And then I bought metal halides with those Philips Mastercolour (942) bulbs. But well, I still have smaller tanks that need fluorescent lighting, maybe they will be less yellow (with peat extract it doesn't really matter though, everything looks yellow then) =)


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## GDominy (Jul 30, 2002)

Can you ask your friend if I can use the Spectral graphs on my site? I will give him full credit.


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## rain- (Mar 29, 2004)

I'll ask =)


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## glass-gardens.com (Apr 14, 2004)

Kelvin (color temp) is a measure of the combined wavelengths of a bulb, CRI would give you a more accurate measure of how smooth the output is, the higher the number, the less spikes and dips amongst specific wavelengths of the visible spectrum, the higher the CRI, the smoother the output and the greater the color accuracy.

The problem with "gro bulbs" is that they emphasize the red wavelengths that algae can use more efficiently than plants. From my experience and a little research, the higher temps are readily used by plants while depriving algae of it's ideal wavelengths.

Here's another good analysis of bulbs:

http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Hills/2637/spectra.html


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