Hi all,
My new 29g is coming along well (in the hair algae / clean up crew stage -- its been about a month now, no other livestock yet) Anyway, I've been measuring my daily temperature variation, and how my lights impact it. Here's what I've found:
If I run my MH light (175W 10k), my tank gets up to just about 83F. I've tried setting the heater to different temperaturs, either 79 or 76, and that has no effect on the peak daytime temperature, only the minimum nighttime temperature. The CF Actinics have no impact on temperature at all.
So, my question is this: What is an acceptable daily variation? Should I set my heater to 80 or 81 so that there is less variation? Is swinging from 78 to 83 too much on a daily basis? I already have a fan blowing on the water when the MH lights are on, so I can't increase evap.
Since the MH generates all the heat, I've considered putting in some "breaks" in the MH lighting in middle of the day. Instead of running the MH for a constant 8h, I would choose a cycle of "4h on, 1h off" twice a day, or "2h on, 30m off" 4 times a day, all of which result in 8h of total MH light.
Any thoughts? Has anyone run a light cycle like that? Is cycling the MH on/off twice or four times as much per day going to reduce its life?
Steve
My new 29g is coming along well (in the hair algae / clean up crew stage -- its been about a month now, no other livestock yet) Anyway, I've been measuring my daily temperature variation, and how my lights impact it. Here's what I've found:
If I run my MH light (175W 10k), my tank gets up to just about 83F. I've tried setting the heater to different temperaturs, either 79 or 76, and that has no effect on the peak daytime temperature, only the minimum nighttime temperature. The CF Actinics have no impact on temperature at all.
So, my question is this: What is an acceptable daily variation? Should I set my heater to 80 or 81 so that there is less variation? Is swinging from 78 to 83 too much on a daily basis? I already have a fan blowing on the water when the MH lights are on, so I can't increase evap.
Since the MH generates all the heat, I've considered putting in some "breaks" in the MH lighting in middle of the day. Instead of running the MH for a constant 8h, I would choose a cycle of "4h on, 1h off" twice a day, or "2h on, 30m off" 4 times a day, all of which result in 8h of total MH light.
Any thoughts? Has anyone run a light cycle like that? Is cycling the MH on/off twice or four times as much per day going to reduce its life?
Steve
