New tank lighting conundrum

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LordHappy

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Happy day,

Thank you in advance for the time you spent reading this post. I'm going to be setting up a tank on my desk in the office. I'd like to do a neocardia shrimp tank and have a bit of vertical space for something else later on. I currently have a UNS 5N, and its great for its footprint, but I wanted to go a bit bigger. The 5N has a dirt core, gravel cap, no ferts/filter/pump/C02 or anything else. This new tank I seem to have settled on the Landen 45P (9.7gl) and with Eco Complete black, and I will add some root tabs to help things get started. Outside of the root tabs, it will also be a no-no tank once it gets going in a few months. I was going to use a glass top as well to minimize evaporation and dust.

I'm struggling with lighting. First, I'd like a programmable, dimmable LED that can be set to dawn, midday, dusk and moonlight. As the tank will be on my desk, if I do go rimless, I'm concerned that the lighting will spill out and be a distraction. So I was thinking that the fixture would need to have some sort of cowl to direct the light. Which in turn brought me back to ye olde classique plastic hood. And I really don't want that look on my desk. I poked around the web and came across the Chihiros X Series, which is way too big for my plans, but I liked how the light was recessed inside the cowl.

Might anyone have a recommendation for such a light?

And yes, an alternative is to take ye olde classique plastic hood with LED inside and paint it a tendy brushed nickle color, although I don't think they come in a size suitable for the Landen glass.

I welcome any thoughts you have on the matter and am grateful for the attention given.
 
With regards to the dimmable/programmable aspect, Fluval have it all covered with their 'Plant 3.0' range. I have the strip version on a tank.
It isnt the most stylish looking contraption...

The version I have doesn't spill light, and if anything I have to raise it above the rim of the tank to achieve good coverage.

The programmable side is its main attribute. You are to connect to the light via Bluetooth, and with the use of an app on your phone, you can customise it to the nth degree
 
Happy day,

Thank you for taking the time to reply. I saw this in my search, and I admit to being hesitant about it, but I'm not quite sure why. I have a Fluval Flex15, and while the tape line across the top inch of the tank is annoying, it functions quite fine. Do you know if the light strips are able to be replaced or do you think one just disposes the whole unit?
 
There is a new Chihiros A Series 2 coming out soon (its available in some places) and that has a tiltable unit on acrylic legs, just wondering if you could angle the light away from your eye line and still achieve what you want to with that? Generally speaking most of the lights that fit onto rimless tanks dont have covers, its usually the big heavy duty ones like Chihiros Vivid 2 and ADA Solar RGB that are designed to be hung over a tank rather than sat on it.

Wills
 
Happy day Wills,

So I spent a few hours in the middle of the night watching assorted and sordid videos regarding nano-lights and dirt tanks. I learned so many things I hope to soon forget, like PAR values at one inch below the surface vs bottom of the tank, the role of the pink light, the disputed effect of blue vs. green light and, best of all, that I think my choices are narrowed down to the OnF Flat Nano, (which I have now and allegedly comes with some sort of control app) and the Fluval 3.0. I saw a very informative video regarding the settings that one aquarist tested in multiple tanks and that will probably be my choice because wherever I can leverage someone else's experiences, the better.
 

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