halide lighting?

[Blue Tang]

Hi all, Was just wondering about the strength of halide lighting i would need to light up a 6ftLx2ftwx28inch high tank? i think ill need halide as i have some small corals etc but with the fluro tubes i have now they dont seem to be doing well, is it because the tubes dont penetrate deep enough into the water? Some help on the strength of halide would be great , tnx ,Blue tang :mrgreen:

 

[trido]

I have 250s over my 24" deep tank and love them. If I had a 28" deep tank I would go 400s or nothing. With 400s you can keep anything you want without light being a limiting factor.

 

[Blue Tang]

Thanks trido, ill go for the 400,s i was just going to keep butterflies at first but have found out that they can be rather hard to keep so im going for a community reef tank, tnx for your help! Blue tang. :mrgreen:

 

[sihaya]

Eek!! Not so fast! Things you should think about: 1) DEs put out more light than SE 2) the temperature(K) of the bulb 3) how hot that light is going to make your water! A 250watt DE, 10k light will be enough for anything (and probably too much for most things... I know, I have one). A 150watt DE, 10k bulb would be perfect (in my opinion) for just about anything I can think of. If you trust A. Calfo at all, he would agree with me. I think reefers tend to over-due the lighting a little.

 

[Slayer]

I Have two 175w 10k, singal ends over my 55gal. I have floresence for atinic.
HEAT yes it does heat the water up. You will need lights that come with fans. 400w metal halide is alot. Think it over.
It's like 4-7 watts a gallon. Are your lighting requierments. What do you have a 125gal?

 

[trido]

A 150watt DE, 10k bulb would be perfect (in my opinion) for just about anything I can think of. .

So, You think a 150 DE 10k bulb would be perfect for a 30" tall SPS dominated tank. I think that Most SPS keepers would highly disagree with you. Do you realized that you can raise the lights higher from the water if you want to reduce the par a little bit. Dont you think it would be better to by a little more than you need and be ready for any thing, than to buy "not quite enough" and then wish you had more? If you look at Tank specs for people with large tanks . You will see that most with 180 Gallons and larger have a minimum of 250s on their tanks. Usually 250s for LPS and 400s for SPS. We are talking about a 210 Gallon tank here not 30. I surely dont know everthing about reefing but I have read alot about other experiences and opinions.

 

[ChrisRD]

Good points on both sides here IMO.

As mentioned, lighting selection really depends on what you want to keep. IMO wattage alone doesn't tell the whole story as not all lamp+ballast+reflector combinations are created equal.

In very general terms, for halides on a tank that size, if I was predominantly interested in soft corals I'd probably be looking at lower wattage halides (150/175). For a mixed tank I'd probably want 250s. For an SPS/clam tank I'd probably be looking at the best 250 systems or 400s.

Again, those are very general guidelines when you consider that there are some 175 systems out there that can outperform the poorer 250s - same goes for good 250s vs. the not-so-good 400 setups.

JMO of course...

 

[mgranato]

Halides really don't follow the watts per gallon rule. Tank depth is the determining factor as opposed to tank volume. 250's would be plenty strong enough to penetrate 28", even at 10" above the surface (SPS or otherwise). 400's are best used for the deep tanks (36"+). Like what was previously stated, what you plan to keep should guide you decision. If you only plan on a few SPS, you can place them in the upper 1/2 and use 175's. If you think you may go full blown SPS, get 250's. If you plan on mostly LPS and get 400's, buy them sunglasses

 

[Blue Tang]

Thanks one and all for your thoughts on lighting my tank! All i really want is to grow a few small corals etc as well try to cover the rocks with the red and pink kind of algae that you see cover the rocks , not sure what it's called? it looks like a kind of coloured crust algae rather than just having bare rock.there is some purple parts on the rock, thats the stuff i mean. I'll take all the info into mind and let you all know what i get , Thanks again for all your help!

Blue tang :mrgreen: ps, i think the tank works out at 600ltrs.

 

[mgranato]

The algea you like requires VERY little light, but lots of ca and alk.