Using aquarium hobby LED strip lighting for orchids
 

I am thinking of building a vivarium to take advantage of the room with the A/C on all night and grow some cooler growing orchids. I am on a budget and not handy at all, so I was considering the use of aquarium LED strip lights. I use LED light on my planted aquariums, but they are not the strip form. They are relatively cheap and they will be inconspicuous, easy to install, waterproof, low energy /heat production.
These are the specs from the seller:
- Power supply included so you just stick to tank and plug it in.
- Strip can be cut at every 3 inches (on cut lines) to fit any aquarium.
- If you need more than 16 Feet you can simply wire 2 strips together.
- Strip is completely WaterProof
- LEDs put off about 5.5 lumens each and there is about 19 LEDs per Foot.

-6500K Lighting LED Strip 100 Lumens/Ft Salt Water Reef

Ok now my issue is I was never one to pay attention to Watts, volts, and Lumens and what not when it comes to lighting, I just research the plant and place it where I think it will get the maximum amount of light suitable for its species. Basically trial and error,, keeping close observation. Would this lighting be sufficient for most orchids. What type of light output would this be considered (low, intermediate, high)? I know LEDs are pretty bright and it would probably be enough for a planted aquarium(however light loses a lot of intensity even in clear water. All my "low light" plants are currently outdoors so they receive dappled sun , then afternoon sun.

You can't quite compare lumen values for plants between different types of sources since lumen put lots of emphasis in useless green light (and different light sources have different emission spectra). But a single 4' T8 bulb is around 2800 lumen/4ft. It depends on the reflector/lens of LED and T8, but you'll need quite a lot of your LED strip to get similar output as T8. With T8, you can grow low-intermediate orchids if you place the bulbs close to the plants.

It sounds like this LED strip is a pretty old technology (which isn't as efficient as the newer "3/5W" diodes. How much energy does it consume?

LED fixture is initially expensive, but in a long run, you could save money (especially with R&B grow light type).

Not sure exactly what you are growing, but that probably isn't enough light output for most orchids... my guess is not even close.

A small, single, 2' T5-HO light bulb will give you much, much more, and are not that expensive - again though, not sure how much you are talking about cost wise for this other set-up. They are not waterproof 'out of the box', however.

Its about $30 for the strip but I guess I'll go T5 since I do have an extra ballast. Thank for the help