Lighting suggestions

[Instinct]

I've decided to convert my tank into reef and am having some trouble deciding which lights I want, so I thought I'd go ahead and post and let you experts chime in.

I'm going to go ahead and go with VHO.. the tank is a 29gallon. I want to to run dual 24" lights, so a total of 150watts. From what I've read URI is the way to go, the question is what color temps would be most beneficial?

I was thinking one actinic, and one aquasun (10000k) but I see there is also an 'actinic white' available as well.

Not planning on keeping anything too crazy, just some colorful 'easy' corals.. though I would love to someday be able to get a BTA for my maroon clown.. is that even possible with 150watts in this tank?

Anyway, what would be advisible choices as far as getting the most useful light spectrum out of this setup?

Thanks in advance...

 

[Anonymous]

First off

:welcome:

If you are looking for mushroon corals and zoanthids (sp???) you lighing should be fine. If you want to have large polyp stonies and leathers I would look to get 3 or 4 VHO bulbs in there. URI is the best VHO bulbs in my opinion. They just changed their name, but I forget to what. I don't think that 150 watts of VHO would be enough for a BTA.

When I ran VHO only I had 2 actinic and 2 actinic/white. I like the look and all my corals grew fine.

What are you going to be using for a ballast? I would suggest the ice cap brand. I had a 660 running 4-48" bulbs. For 24" bulbs you may be able to use the smaller model.

Good luck.

 

[bleedingthought]

I'm running 440 watts of VHO's with a PFO ballast and I'm really satisfied with PFO. ICE CAP is very reputable too though. For retrofit kits, 24", PFO will run you about $250 with bulbs and ICE CAP will be about $299 with bulbs both from www.marinedepot.com .

One thing though, I'm running 46.5" bulbs and they're all actinic whites. I ended up buying 6 of them to have them shipped free and I wish I had gotten some actinic only also. While I'm very happy with the color of my tank under the 50/50's, I wish it was a little more blue. But that's just my preference!

 

[Instinct]

Thanks for the quick replies! As for the ballast, yeah I'd love to go ice cap but.. well, money is an issue. Hope I don't get flamed but I was going to try and use a workhorse 7 electronic ballast. I figure for 35 bucks it's worth a shot. I've already modified the light fixture that came with this thing to accept 2 bulbs so I'm going to stick with that till later down the road.. it's N.O. for now, figure I might need a little fan with VHO.

So the actinic white is a 50/50 bulb? Comparible to the coralife 50/50? When talking looks, I actually really like the look of the coralife 50/50. In my cichlid tank I run 1 actinic and one 6700K and I like that look as well. But I know in a reef tank looks are only part of the equation.

Looks like the choices come down to 2 actinic whites, 1 actinic & 1 10000k, or 1 actinic and 1 actinic white. Aesthetics aside (I think I'd be happy with any of those choices) which one would make the corals happiest?

 

[Anonymous]

I hear the workhorse is OK. It should do the job just fine. Not sure what would be the "best" combo for bulbs. Look at some tanks to see what you like.

Here is a link to my old 110 that had 2 actinic and 2 50/50.

http://www.reefs.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=39171

...and a picture

 

[Instinct]

Thanks for the link Wazzel. It almost seems like it would be too blue.. I like the blue but worried it would drown out the other colors... but then I see that yellow tang just glowing so I guess that's not the case. Are the pics pretty close to how it looks in person? I know cameras sometimes pick up the actinics more than my eyes (at least my camera does). I think you sold me on the actinic white / actinic combo though.

Question that is slightly off topic - the powerheads with spray bars down into the rock... Based on your experience is that something you'd recommend?

At somepoint I'll need to make a thread for some flow advice, but I'll get to that after I finish building my sump/refugium.. I'm taking everything pretty slow hoping to cut down on "lessons learned the hard way"

 

[Anonymous]

From what I remember it was basically what the pictures show. If anything i was just a bit less blue.

As far as the spray bars, I felt they helped. On the tank I down graded to I also had a under the rock spray bar. I'm not totally sure what I am going to do on the tank I am setting up now.

Taking things slow is a good deal. Should save you some money and issues in the long run.

 

[martin808hil]

I reckon 2 x 14k and 2 x actinic.
10k just looks to yellow IMO.