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Anonymous

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Yes, I am aware of the contradiction built into my thread title. :P

Seriously though, what I'm trying to get at is that I want as high-end an option as possible, but as cheaply as possible. To give a parallel, I was really excited to discover the excellent value Vertex Gen2 pinwheel skimmers recently and I'm hoping that there are lighting equivalents out there.

I'm looking at options for a roughly (I'll be working in cm) 40"x28"x21" tank (100x65x50cm). My preferred option at the moment is a Envision Acrylics tank with external overflow, but if I want to stick to this size, I will have to go for a tank with perimeter flange and center brace (to go rimless would cost huge amounts at that size, and even eurobraced would be a pretty penny). If I decide that a rimless (braceless) tank matters to me that much, I will have to downsize, but for now that's what I'm looking at.

Anyway, the center brace means that it'd be ideal to go for two metal halides, with supplementary T5/PC. But at the moment, the only reasonably priced options seem to be one metal halide, plus T5/PC, or going for completely T5, but lose the glitter lines. I'd be worried about doing either because of the center brace. I assume it would cast a shadow if I weren't careful.

Any thoughts/opinions on how to best tackle this? Should I go for the T5 option or will that doom me to a tank with a noticeable shadow down the middle?

Otherwise, I might end up going for a smaller (31"x25"x20"?) tank, rimless or eurobraced, lit with a 24" ATI fixture.
 
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Oh, and the other option I was looking at were two LumenMax 2 pendants, but then I lose the ability to add actinic, and I'm going to be keeping zoas, shrooms and LPS, so don't want to lose that option if I can avoid it...
 
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Anonymous

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I guess I'm asking for the moon...:?

Any thoughts on how bad it would be to have a center brace? Hardly noticeable or a real irritation every time I look at the tank?
 

Len

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Hi Tom :P

You are asking for the moon, but you deserve it :) But what does "cheap" mean to you? :D

Lumenmax Elite reflectors would give you the best light, but as you said, you can't add fluorescent actinics. You can consider LED blue supplementation mounted inside the reflector (Ecoxotic sells blue and UV-A LED strip lights).

T5s will be fine for a 21" deep tank. You won't have any shadows, though you won't have any glimmer lines either. T5 tanks tend to give corals a brighter, more translucent pigmentation then halides. Decide if this is what you want.

Can you get glass tanks? You could avoid the center brace. The center brace won't cast a dark shadow, but the lighting below it may look a bit less bright. The bigger concern is if you go MH, heat and acrylic are not friends. But I guess if you have the halides left and right of the brace, you'll have no problem (with heat damage or shadows since good reflectors will distribute the light evenly).
 

fungia

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i have a center brace over my 100 gallon glass, no problems with shadows. i use two 250w halides with reef optix reflectors.
 
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Len":1yzebijy said:
Hi Tom :P

You are asking for the moon, but you deserve it :) But what does "cheap" mean to you? :D

I guess about $600 all in would be cheap in my book. I could get two LumenMax pendants plus ballasts and bulbs for that. Or one 24" 4 bulb ATI fixture plus spare bulbs (though that's only an option if I end up going for a smaller tank - if it's larger one then I wouldn't be able to get the 36" ATI fixture and would have to get the Sunlight Tek Elite fixture*). Just apparently not a combo MH/T5 fixture (even for a little bit more). :x

Lumenmax Elite reflectors would give you the best light, but as you said, you can't add fluorescent actinics. You can consider LED blue supplementation mounted inside the reflector (Ecoxotic sells blue and UV-A LED strip lights).

I was wondering about that as an option but was wondering if the heat would be an issue or it would end up looking a bit homemade (I won't have a canopy, so don't want it to look too messy - or more accurately, it looking sleek is one of the wife's conditions for me having a new tank :lol:).

T5s will be fine for a 21" deep tank. You won't have any shadows, though you won't have any glimmer lines either. T5 tanks tend to give corals a brighter, more translucent pigmentation then halides. Decide if this is what you want.

I'm really in two minds about this one. On one level, I tell myself the lack of glimmer lines won't be a problem, but I don't remember seeing a tank lit by fluorescents only and that worries me. I don't want to end up with a lighting option that I regret for ages (I have a budget and would need a compelling case to buy a replacement - I don't think the wife would swallow the "But there are no glimmer lines!" excuse for spending more money).

Can you get glass tanks? You could avoid the center brace. The center brace won't cast a dark shadow, but the lighting below it may look a bit less bright. The bigger concern is if you go MH, heat and acrylic are not friends. But I guess if you have the halides left and right of the brace, you'll have no problem (with heat damage or shadows since good reflectors will distribute the light evenly).

I could go for a glass tank I suppose. The problem is that I've been told also to get a tank I can take with me when we move back from Japan/move to my next posting. I have a feeling a glass tank will be too heavy to ship. Good point about the heat issue - I'd ensure the MHs were not above the brace.

Thanks for all the advice!
 
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fungia":19gbqmrr said:
i have a center brace over my 100 gallon glass, no problems with shadows. i use two 250w halides with reef optix reflectors.

Thanks fungia! To be honest, I'm more worried about shadows if I went for the T5 option, but from what Len says, that also won't be an issue.
 
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*Actually, I might be able to run to the 36" 4 bulb ATI fixture. It's not that huge an amount more...
 
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Alright Tom your last comment threw a bit of confusion into the mix.

You want inexpensive, you NEED to go DIY/retro kits. You can get just as good, if not better parts for less money.

You want a pretty fixture hanging over the tank, that's gonna cost you. Canopies are great for side stepping the fixtures too ;)

If you can't go that route and do need "pretty" above the tank, I'd stick to T5s, Easier to get an all in one unit then having to do some lumen*** reflectors then have T5s that are also in pretty pendents, and IMO they tend to not look as good when they're mixed that way. Now the unfortunate thing is you're limited for how cheap you can get with the pretty fixtures, sure there are REALLY expensive options, but not really any cheap ones.
 

Len

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This is the Ecoxotic LED strips: http://www.premiumaquatics.com/Merchant ... e=ecoxotic
I think they can be installed pretty cleanly if you go the dual pendant route.

If you go with the T5 route, you can also install LEDs (either white/blue or all blue or all white) to add the glimmer line effect. LEDs do a good job of it. Fluorescent tanks will look rather "matte" compared to MH or LED.
 
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sfsuphysics":kbn8gi4h said:
Alright Tom your last comment threw a bit of confusion into the mix.

You want inexpensive, you NEED to go DIY/retro kits. You can get just as good, if not better parts for less money.

You want a pretty fixture hanging over the tank, that's gonna cost you. Canopies are great for side stepping the fixtures too ;)

This is why I needed a thread. If it were simple I could work it out myself. :P

The difficulty is that I can't go for DIY/retro (doesn't look good and therefore doesn't get the green light from my wife/I have no technical skills/a canopy won't practically work where we'll be/I don't like them), but I don't have a huge amount of money to spend, so I'm looking for the best priced option that looks sleek and doesn't cost the earth (c.f. my reference to the Vertex skimmers - $200 for a high quality skimmer was a bit of a discovery for me!).

If you can't go that route and do need "pretty" above the tank, I'd stick to T5s, Easier to get an all in one unit then having to do some lumen*** reflectors then have T5s that are also in pretty pendents, and IMO they tend to not look as good when they're mixed that way. Now the unfortunate thing is you're limited for how cheap you can get with the pretty fixtures, sure there are REALLY expensive options, but not really any cheap ones.

I see all the advantages of T5s here, but there are two things that make me hesitate. One is the glimmer lines thing and the other, believe it or not, is that I'm not sure I likely the hyper-bright colored tanks that I've seen under really good T5s. The even, bright colors look artificial to me. Plus my preference (LPS, zoas, 'shrooms) would be better off without the super-bright fixtures I mentioned above (the ATIs of this world) whereas the less high-end T5 fixtures look nowhere near as sleek. The glimmer lines and shadows of the MH, combined with the fluorescence you can get with actinics is my ideal, probably with 150w MHs (enough for clams, but not so much in a shallowish tank that corals less greedy for light fade away).

You know, I think I may have to go for the two LumenMax pendant thing, combined with the LED strips Len mentioned.

Thanks for the input though - it's extremely helpful to bounce these ideas off people. :)

One last thought - am I laboring under a false assumption with the thought that some corals would be bleached out under a fixture like the ATI? As I'm considering only a 4 bulb fixture, with a moderately deep tank (front to back), then I could probably get away with using the front and back for less light hungry coral. Which would leave me with only the glimmer problem (which an LED fixture might address). Hmmm....
 
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Len":2mvmwsuh said:
This is the Ecoxotic LED strips: http://www.premiumaquatics.com/Merchant ... e=ecoxotic
I think they can be installed pretty cleanly if you go the dual pendant route.

If you go with the T5 route, you can also install LEDs (either white/blue or all blue or all white) to add the glimmer line effect. LEDs do a good job of it. Fluorescent tanks will look rather "matte" compared to MH or LED.

Thanks Len. Intriguing suggestion. How do you think this would work best? Bearing in mind that a T5 fixture would likely be hung from a rack above the tank. Attached to the rack, or would that be too high? Attached to the fixture (if I'm splashing out on something that looks sleek, I wouldn't want to unbalance/uglify the fixture)?
 

Len

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The Escaped Ape":9ruwzsyx said:
Len":9ruwzsyx said:
This is the Ecoxotic LED strips: http://www.premiumaquatics.com/Merchant ... e=ecoxotic
I think they can be installed pretty cleanly if you go the dual pendant route.

If you go with the T5 route, you can also install LEDs (either white/blue or all blue or all white) to add the glimmer line effect. LEDs do a good job of it. Fluorescent tanks will look rather "matte" compared to MH or LED.

Thanks Len. Intriguing suggestion. How do you think this would work best? Bearing in mind that a T5 fixture would likely be hung from a rack above the tank. Attached to the rack, or would that be too high? Attached to the fixture (if I'm splashing out on something that looks sleek, I wouldn't want to unbalance/uglify the fixture)?

The LED strips are pretty small, so it won't look to intrusive. Depending on your fixture you might even be able to mount it inside for a clean fit. It'll still add the shimmer effect if you hang it from height.
 
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It'd likely be one of the sleek fixtures where I'd want to avoid messing up the lines/reflective ability. But maybe something like this in a clip-on fixture to the light stand might work? Commonly sold in Japan.

c67a0ab080d842ad8a3d36bc0d31638c.jpg
 
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Anonymous

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Both Japanese and American makes of bulbs like that say not to use any reflector over them as that kills how they dissipate heat. Just remember to remove the reflector part prior to use.

FWIW I have the nano-tuners one and a friend has both the one you show and a nano-tuners one. He loves both and I love my nano-tuners one. I love my new Reef Brite 48" LED actinic strip light just as much (in case it reads this :lol: )
 
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GreshamH":2uub8lmp said:
Both Japanese and American makes of bulbs like that say not to use any reflector over them as that kills how they dissipate heat. Just remember to remove the reflector part prior to use.

FWIW I have the nano-tuners one and a friend has both the one you show and a nano-tuners one. He loves both and I love my nano-tuners one. I love my new Reef Brite 48" LED actinic strip light just as much (in case it reads this :lol: )

Sorry if I'm being a bit thick here Gresh, but when you talk about the reflector, is this sort of reflector you mean it is best to avoid?

fe1f2d327cde06ede25a0742dd4152c1.jpg


That would make sense, as this is the clip that's sold next to the bulb.

68d29b86e5f18037322def99f525a4fd.jpg


Good to hear that you like it. Does it work like actinics in making the coral fluoresce, or just in bringing out the blue better? :)
 
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yah, the 2nd picture :) The reflector on #1 will hold the heat in and not allow the heat sink to work properly.

The ones I have seen make for a "true" actinic look. There are different blues used and the ones I like the best, and seem to make for the best 'actinic" are the "royal blues"/
 
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Excellent. This is really good news. They sell all sorts of color variations. Time to do some research on what's out there! Thanks Gresh. :)
 
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Can you hire someone to make a canopy shell for you? Something to screw the lumen***'s into? Something like this one?
4169619597_360bccdcf7_o.jpg


Here it is over a 75g.
3095672081_ce2b77eb3d.jpg


right now it has 2 mogul sockets and a reflector. You could easily add single actinic to it.

I know where you can get one like it, cheap.

B
 

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