A lot of people seam to think that you will get a benifit of reflected light, the actual usable light that is reflected is not a significant amount. take into concideration on a smooth reflective surface the light is reflected at the incident angle of what it is recived, so 90% of refleced light will hit the bottom a few inches from the glass and closer. also glass is not a 100% reflective surface by any means its transmittance can be between 85 to 95% for common glass so that means 85 to 95% of the light passes right through the glass to start with, the remaining 5 to 15% is reflected. plus the light that is reflected travels a greator distance through the water so its intensity is dropped also.
so don't clean your glass just because you think you are going to get more light.
now if you made the back of the tank out of a highly reflective material with a very low transmittance it might be a differant story, but I don't know anyone making tank backs out of spectral aluminum
Steve
__________________
*everything said above is just my opinion, and may or may not reflect the views of this BBS, its Operators, and its Members. If cornered on any “opinion” I post I will totally deny having ever said this in a Court of Law…Unless I am the right one*
Some strive to be perfect.... I just strive.