help with my lighting

[jhale]

hi all,
this is what I have to work with.
2 x 175 MH now with 10k bulbs, they are very yellow.

a coralife retrofit PC kit it has 4x65 watt bulbs 2 6500 and 2 actinics

2 icecap 430's, enough endcaps for 8 T-12 bulbs,
but not enough room. I have 2 NO 6500 bulbs and 2 VHO
URI actinic bulbs. The prez of Icecap told me to try the NO bulbs.

If I use all 6 T-12 bulbs I won't have room for the coralife kit.
I can probably fit 4 of the T-12's and the coralife and the 2 175's.

I'm going to be keeping mostly SPS, that's what I want to light the tank for. The tank is 20" deep.

So what would you recommend for the halide bulbs?
And which would you use the mix of PC and T-12's or all T-12's

Thanks,
Jonathan

 

[ShaunW]

I don't like PC, the bulbs break too regularly and are very gentle to the touch. Over the long run they were costing me more money than VHO or T5s

I would go with the T-12. But, do you have room for another metal halide inside your hood? since I am a big fan of metal halide lighting. 2-175watt MH are at the minimal lighting spectrum (intensity) for a tank of your size and length/depth to keep all types of SPS (high light loving ones also).

 

[jhale]

there is room for another MH, however I was trying to set up the lighting with an eye towards keeping the electric bill as low as possible. Otherwise I would be running 250's or 400's
I would consider adding another MH in the middle, so the inside of the hood would look like this:

-------------110VHO----------------
-------------110VHO----------------
-------------110VHO----------------
---175-- --175-- --175--
---MH--- --MH--- --MH---
-------------110VHO-----------------
-------------110VHO-----------------
-------------110VHO-----------------

I think that's as many lights I can fit in the hood.
Would I be okay with just four VHO's?
I thought the PC bulbs would be cheaper in the long run.
I can always move the PC's to my sump, something
would be happy growing down there with them.

 

[marrone]

I would add T-5 there very bright and you can get alot of difference colors. Also they run vry cool and very low in electric usage. I've seen a # of people, running sps tank, that added T-5 to their MH or have actually swith over to T-5. Also T-5 are very thin so you can put a bunch in your canop without any problems. I was running 2-pc and in the same space I was able to put in 6 T-5 bulbs that were so much more brighter.

 

[jhale]

I looked up the T-5 bulbs, the 48"are 54 watts to the 48" VHO 110 watts. if I was to replace the VHO t-12's with the HO T-5's
would I realize any significant gains? It looks like I would have to have 2 T-5's for every T-12 I wanted to replace. Is this right?
Or are the T-5's bright enough to go one on one with the VHO T-12's?

 

[marrone]

The T-5 are over driven so you'll get more than 54 watts out of the bulb. From what I've seen in person, on my tank and other tanks, the T-5 are very bright, brighter than some MH that I've seen, and are very intense.

Do you a search on RC for T-5 you'll see people that have tested them and switch over.

 

[jhale]

thanks, I'll look at the T-5's
so the best I can do is to add a MH, I'm debating now what size.
and to switch some of the t-12's to t-5's. or all of them.
I just bought some VHO bulbs, I'll see if i can return them.

 

[ShaunW]

Watt for watt, I don't think that MH will increase your electric bill by much as compared to other lighting systems. You get the most bang for your watt (

) with MH. If the bill is too high just decrease the photocycle, I only do between 6-8 (6-summer, 8-winter) hours/day with the MH, and 8-10 (8-summer, 10-winter) hours with the actinic VHO's.

I like T-5s alot, and would suggest them to anybody setting up a new tank, instead of VHO or PC (between all my tanks I have PC, T5, 110watt VHO and MH, so I've had experience with them all)

 

[jhale]

according to icecap their 430 ballast can run two T-5 bulbs at once. I'll drop the VHO's in favor of the T-5's
icecap also said 58watt T-5 bulbs would be overdriven to 100 watt's. I have not seen T-5's in action so I'll take your word that they are brighter. It seems funny that a 58 watt HO bulb will outperform a 110watt VHO.

so I'll run four T-5's, I have the space so I'm going to use the 60" 80 watt bulbs. add to that the 2 175 MH that I have plus one more MH for the center of the tank. the 400 watt might send my con-ed bill over the top, so I might go with the 250, and
adjust the photo period as Shaun suggested.
now what color T-5's? and should I mix the MH colors? stay with the 2 175 10K's and get the new one in a 20K?

 

[ShaunW]

Your tank is long so you are going to have to be careful that you don't over-light one area so that it stands out more than another section.

I'm a big fan of the blueline ballast/HQI DE pendant with the AB bulbs 10K/20K. The 20K burns crisp white with tint of blue. But it is going to overpower your other MH's (maybe?).

One possible setup:
-------------T5 actinic----------------
-------------T5 actinic----------------
---175 10K-- --250 20K-- --175 10K--
-----MH ----------MH---- ----MH-----
-------------T5 actinic----------------
-------------T5 actinic----------------

But since you bought the VHO's already maybe do this also:
-------------VHO actinic----------------
-------------VHO actinic----------------
-------------VHO actinic----------------
---175 10K-- --250 20K-- --175 10K--
-----MH ----------MH--- -----MH-----
-------------VHO actinic----------------
-------------VHO actinic----------------
-------------VHO actinic----------------

[ March 26, 2005, 09:31 PM: Message edited by: solbby ]

 

[jhale]

thanks Shaun: I'll probably go with your first set up. the vho's are still in the box so I can return them, I hope.
I was thinking with a 250 in the center, that would be a great spot for some future clams
I like the 20K, the 10K's I have are too yellow for my tastes,
but the 20K would even them out and make me and the coral happy.

hqi huh, it's a good thing I don't have to answer to anybody about the money I'm spending on the tank I was thinking about the icecap 250 balast, it can run the de bulbs as well.

check out this one new tank on RC it's really different but I like it, it's about as far from a BB as you can get
http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=4613753

 

[ShaunW]

Check out this:

http://www.premiumaquatics.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=SL-OPTIX3&Category_Code=Sales
http://www.premiumaquatics.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=SB-BW3-250&Category_Code=sunlightballast

These are links to a pendant and ballast. It is a HQI ballast that is not electronic. It is supposed to run DE bulbs at higher eficiency (according to Sanjay test on Advance Aquarist) compared to a cheap ballast or even an electronic ballast. Only one that come close was giesseman-electronic.

[ March 26, 2005, 10:27 PM: Message edited by: solbby ]

 

[marrone]

For T-5 bulbs you want to get Blue & Blue+. The Blue+ will give you really good growth. The actinic on T-5 aren't the best as they're not true actinic so it's better to go with the other bulbs.

 

[jhale]

thanks, Michael. that was going to be my next question.

 

[spykes]

uhm solbby, it's the pendant that does it, blue wave is just a box with fancy fans. they use domestic homesepot ballast including icecaps and M80 ballasts, i gotta say advance and the M80 might be the best tar for HQI. and optiplex is focus, the best pendant even at sanjay's website you should see a reflector called lumnaric relector which is a huge diamon reflector. this makes a 250 feels like a 400 =D

 

[spykes]

btw t-5 might be ok for atinic suppliments, but it's not the most proven thing yet. the T-12 VHOs are still stronger, remember 850MA ballast to run 1 compared to a PC which is 250 MA each drive that's overclocked too on 65 PC. that's why VHO is to hot. cause it burns at way higher amount.

T5 is thinner which is a more optimized light output. but it cannot go one on one with a T12 still. there are major growth diffrences,

 

[marrone]

spykes I'm not sure that's the case on T-5, not being a proven thing. Just look on RC and you see alot of tanks that run with, some alone, with MH. The growth that people have had under T-5 has been very good, as good as MH in some cases, and corals have keep the colors as they were under MH. Since T-5 are so thin you can get many more bulbs in the same space and use different bulbs to produce a better spectrum of light. Also with the alumium reflectors, under the T-5 the performance is great increased.

Remember T-5 are still new and the bulbs are getting better and better so there will take sometime to compare to other lighting methods. Remember the same thing was probably said about PC, VHO and MH at one time until better bulbs came out or differnt combination were used.

 

[spykes]

like you said it's been around herm 2-3 year? i still count that as new. the only reason why you have so much is because you can put so many! BTW they arent cheap. everything is aluminum reflectors. the SLR reflectors is the only thing helping the bulb. if there was room you can make a SLE reflector at the ratio for a VHO and the VHO will be many times stronger then the T-5, keeping color doesnt mean growth factor. remember T-5 white are around 12K to 11K they dont have a true 10K no matter what they label on it. compared to MH T-5s are nothing, they are close to what the VHOs output but that's about it. Alot of people using it doesnt mean proven, i seen sh*&^y tanks with T-5s i had T-5s and they are not the same performance as VHO. as a suppliment T-5s dont give out much blue. some tanks like mine which has widths around 18 inches are really limited. T-5 are not a good suppliment on mine since i use the hellolight MH reflectors with the 17 inch width. you cannot mount another reflector there. but VHos you can go 1 peice of 72 inch VHO and it will be great as 2 T5s

[ March 27, 2005, 12:48 AM: Message edited by: solbby ]

 

[marrone]

I suggest you take a look at RC tank of the month, all T-5's. I have also seem some sh*^%y tank with MH and VHO.

The whole point with T-5's is that you can fit alot of bulbs in the same space and create a better spectrum of lights. As for price the bulbs run about $17-$25 depending on the size, a little more for large bulbs, but you can get them by the case and cut down on the cost. Also they give off so much less heat so you don't need to worry about the temp in the tank, and they also last so much long than the VHO and MH bulbs. And the amount of electric that you use is alot less. As for the reflectors well because the bulbs are so narrow you can easily fit the flectors in and greatly increase the effectiveness of the bulbs. As for the colors I think you need to check them out the bulbs as they have great colors and the Blue and Blue+ have shown great growth and they do give off a great blue color. When I had my setup, with 6 bulbs, the colors where great and when all the bulbs were on left the tank with a very bright white clear look. When I just have the 2 bulbs on the tank had a nice blue color to it. I'm also sure with you setup if could easily be modified to fix whatever bulbs you wanted to use, be it PC,VHO or T-5.

T-5's have produced great results right now and over time they'll just be another of the great improvement in lighting for reef tanks. But if what your using works for you that fine but there are other lighting systems they could be better and the person needs to weight all the option before deciding on what right for them.

[ March 27, 2005, 12:49 AM: Message edited by: solbby ]

 

[ShaunW]

Originally posted by spykes:
uhm solbby, it's the pendant that does it, blue wave is just a box with fancy fans. they use domestic homesepot ballast including icecaps and M80 ballasts, i gotta say advance and the M80 might be the best tar for HQI. and optiplex is focus, the best pendant even at sanjay's website you should see a reflector called lumnaric relector which is a huge diamon reflector. this makes a 250 feels like a 400 =D

Do you have the link to the reflector?

So what's your lighting recomendation for Jonathan's tank? I'm always interested in cheaper (but most par for your buck) lighting options.