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Anyone using these without trouble?

Wisey, thanks for the link. that was one of the threads I'd seen which made me reach the conclusion that increasing intensity is the way forward.

My photoperiod is relatively short, 6.5 hrs including a 60 min ramp up and down. So only 4.5 hrs at peak. My thinking is that even if I raise the intensity quite high the photo period isn't excessive.
 
Yeah, I'm 6 hours at 80% and only ramp for 15 minutes. I have heard of people running them at 100% when suspended higher, so I'm working towards that. If that works I'll add half an hour to the duration each week, but probably won't go beyond 7 hours.
 
Wisey. Can I ask how much you increase them by each time? I'm considering upping them by 10% this weekend.
 
When I was being careful last year I increased by 10% per week. As I'm rescaping in a few weeks I started at 60% when I got my CO2 running again, jumped to 80% last weekend and was planning on going to 90% tomorrow, but I might just jump in at 100% and see how it goes.
 
I take it that you've not seen any adverse effects then over the last week with the 20% increase?
 
Just good growth, but remember my tank is different to yours and what works for me could cause algae for you. My light is 30cm from water surface and a 45cm high tank.
 
Yeah. I appreciate that but given that the last 5 months ive seen plants stay dormant and die I'm prepared to try more light. Realised a typo in earlier post as my lights were actually 45% this week. I am going to try a 15% increase today and see how I get on at 60% for the next week. Nothing ventured nothing gained..........
 
I have switched to the iQuatics 4 x T5 unit for my Rio 125 and the growth has been massively improved.

I think I perhaps have too much light at the moment so I need to balance the 2 sets of tubes timer settings.

The plants are going red near the top and the fish look much better colours.

Will get a pic later.
 
Just as an update I ended up increasing intensity to 100% and noted slightly improved growth although still not what I'd expect with the amount of co2 injected and ei. In the end I decided that contrary to what I had been reading on many threads about keeping light intensity low to reduce co2 demand that I would try an alternative strategy.......I bought a 2x39 watt t5 to add to my grobeam. I understand that this is a risky strategy but given that nothing had been growing and in fact had been dying I decided that I couldn't keep doing the same thing and expect different results. I'm glad to say that it paid off within the first week i started seeing growth on my remaining plants that were on deaths door. Within the following weeks hairgrass that I forgotten had been planted reappeared in the sand. I added some new plants and my tank is now thriving with lush green growth that I have been able to trim and replant so it is filling out nicely. I added the t5 over a month ago and I'm so glad I did. Im a little annoyed with myself that I wasted so much time and money in dead plants with my lights on such a low setting (15% at one point). Clearly in my case twin ultima 600s were insufficient for a 200 litre tank. My only issue now is dealing with the bba that took hold before I introduced the t5.
 
Thought I'd upload a photo of my tank as it stands. It won't win any competitions but I'm quite pleased with it.

You will note an absence of fish. I am ashamed to say I had a one time timer malfunction. Which meant my co2 for one day was on from midnight till 7pm instead of noon till 7. I am only left with some dwarf please, corydoras and a couple of otos. I'm planning on getting a large shoal of chili rasboras.

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