30 gallon reef lighting
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Just butting in, and a little late at doing it, but why would you have t5s plus MH? There is nothing wrong with it, but just seems to add expense to the fixture.
150 MH would be great for your size tank. If you want you could do a unit that uses power compact blubs for the actinic lighting and then a 10k bulb in the MH fixture. Or you can just do a 150watt 14-15k to get the same look, or a 20k bulb if you want a very artificial and deep blue look.
Just some generalizations on MH bulbs:
10k
ptimal for coral growth. Little to no blue hue, maybe a even a little yellowish looking. Most people dont like to run 10k MH bulbs unless they have actinic supplementation
14K: not as optimal for coral growth, but will have a bluish color to it and allow corals to show off their flourescents.
20k: great for showing off the colors of your coral, but you will notice decreased growth rates.
Some things to note about metal halides is that 1) the color any given spectrum bulb will vary from manufacturer to manufacturer, and 2) the color of the bulb can be different from stock photos because of the type of balast you use. Ballast will impact color output as well. 3) dont buy cheap ebay bulbs. you may thing you are saving some cash up front, but they have a tendency to blow up (im serious when I say blow up) after about 3 months. 4) dont turn the metal halide on and off repeatedly. Metal halides are a two phase ignition like HID lights. They use a metal like mercury (for example) to initially ignite under high voltage, and then the gas will ignite after the warm up phase and go to a steady state. Turning it off and on repeatedly causes the metal vapors to crystalize and it severly shortens the life of the bulb... and the ballast too since steady state operation require less current draw.
150 MH would be great for your size tank. If you want you could do a unit that uses power compact blubs for the actinic lighting and then a 10k bulb in the MH fixture. Or you can just do a 150watt 14-15k to get the same look, or a 20k bulb if you want a very artificial and deep blue look.
Just some generalizations on MH bulbs:
10k
ptimal for coral growth. Little to no blue hue, maybe a even a little yellowish looking. Most people dont like to run 10k MH bulbs unless they have actinic supplementation14K: not as optimal for coral growth, but will have a bluish color to it and allow corals to show off their flourescents.
20k: great for showing off the colors of your coral, but you will notice decreased growth rates.
Some things to note about metal halides is that 1) the color any given spectrum bulb will vary from manufacturer to manufacturer, and 2) the color of the bulb can be different from stock photos because of the type of balast you use. Ballast will impact color output as well. 3) dont buy cheap ebay bulbs. you may thing you are saving some cash up front, but they have a tendency to blow up (im serious when I say blow up) after about 3 months. 4) dont turn the metal halide on and off repeatedly. Metal halides are a two phase ignition like HID lights. They use a metal like mercury (for example) to initially ignite under high voltage, and then the gas will ignite after the warm up phase and go to a steady state. Turning it off and on repeatedly causes the metal vapors to crystalize and it severly shortens the life of the bulb... and the ballast too since steady state operation require less current draw.
the t5's come in the mh fixture, its the mh and then two t5 actinic bulbs. And thanks for all the info, especially about the coral growth.Heathd;4434551; said:Just butting in, and a little late at doing it, but why would you have t5s plus MH? There is nothing wrong with it, but just seems to add expense to the fixture.
150 MH would be great for your size tank. If you want you could do a unit that uses power compact blubs for the actinic lighting and then a 10k bulb in the MH fixture. Or you can just do a 150watt 14-15k to get the same look, or a 20k bulb if you want a very artificial and deep blue look.
Just some generalizations on MH bulbs:
10k
14K: not as optimal for coral growth, but will have a bluish color to it and allow corals to show off their flourescents.
20k: great for showing off the colors of your coral, but you will notice decreased growth rates.
Some things to note about metal halides is that 1) the color any given spectrum bulb will vary from manufacturer to manufacturer, and 2) the color of the bulb can be different from stock photos because of the type of balast you use. Ballast will impact color output as well. 3) dont buy cheap ebay bulbs. you may thing you are saving some cash up front, but they have a tendency to blow up (im serious when I say blow up) after about 3 months. 4) dont turn the metal halide on and off repeatedly. Metal halides are a two phase ignition like HID lights. They use a metal like mercury (for example) to initially ignite under high voltage, and then the gas will ignite after the warm up phase and go to a steady state. Turning it off and on repeatedly causes the metal vapors to crystalize and it severly shortens the life of the bulb... and the ballast too since steady state operation require less current draw.
No problem, I thought you were saying you were going to add a t5 fixture as well. What light fixture are you going with? Most MH fixtures I have seen come with PCs for the actinics.808;4434772; said:
First, heath, good points. Second...yes aquatraders has both PC and T5 for supplementation. I find that the bigger setups use t5, and the smaller ones usually use PC. That being said I have seen very small ones with very small t5's in them.
Not a bad idea, then you try to switch to hard corals and enter a world of alleopathic chemical warfare. Not fun. Try getting shrooms off of LR to do hard corals. Doesnt work. Sofites versus SPS...softies win that battle. They win that battle 9 out of 10.TheCanuck;4434147; said:
Thanks to you as well. I agree with this. But sometimes you have to fall down to learn. I know that when I started as a twelve year old I wish that someone would have told me that switching to SPS later would be a pain because of my aptasia like softies.israelm;4433530; said:
Great. I think you will be happy with that aquatraders fixture. I have seen it run on a 40g tall with sps corals halfway down with no problems growth wise.808;4434125; said:
sorry, for the late update. I got the light today and got it all setup. For now i just got it resting on a couple of pieces of wood until i get some s-hooks and chains to hang it over the tank. its looking pretty good so far, obviously brighter than the 18watt fluorescent bulb i had on it before. I also added three little green chromis to the tank for now. ill try to get some pictures up in a bit.
