Adequate lighting?

jock

New member
Right now i have 1x High Lite 45watt 15000 Kelvin white light & 1x High Lite 45watt 20000 Kelvin blue actinic light. Was going to be fowlr but fancying some corals now. I have two questions I would love some advice on. Tank is around 50g, ~39"x16"x17" (lxbxw)
Is there much I can keep with this current lighting? I think there is probably the odd thing but not much.
If i doubled this & had 2 each of what I currently have (ie 4 bulbs) would that be enough to keep almost anything out there?
Right now I dont even have reflectors. Just want a feel on how much I would need to change before I go ahead and do all the research & get attached to idea, only to find I can't afford it at min *embarrassed smiley :)

Thanks in advance

John
 
45w is not enough at 16-18". u might get away with zoa or mushrooms but if that. if u like to keep a good reef u will need more powerful lights. 39x16x17 50 gal tank i recommend at least 150w-250w MH bulb 14k with few actinics t5's. thats if u like to keep sps and lps. for fish only this light is enough.
 
Don't know anything about the lights quality. Interesting is they say they are T5 but they aren't standard T5 lengths so you're stuck with their custom tubes and can't get any of the known high quality tubes. You're also stuck with only two bulb choices. When I ran a 6 bulb unit I had for different kinds of bulbs to get the best growth and color.

Another issue: There is not an actinic 20k color. 20k is a blue white light there are 20k Metal Halide bulbs. 20k can and should have some of the actinic wavelengths in it, 420 to 460nm. But when we say actinic we expect very deep blue light that creates the florescent effect. So this sounds like a combo white / blue bulb.

For a high quality fixtures, with active cooling and reflectors, using 39watt T5 bulbs,
4 bulbs would be good for soft coral and some lower light hard corals higher in the tank.
6 bulbs and you'd be in the grow most anything range with light hungry towards the top,
8 bulbs grow anything you want just about anywhere.

If you want T5 I would suggest you save up and replace the fixture and get better bulbs.
 
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