can i have corals with these

lights

lights

I suppose these lights would work. Many aquarists calculate watts per gallon. I have a 72 gallon with two 175 watt metal halides... for 4.8 watts per gallon. With a little actinic supplementation, I'm hitting nearly 5.5 watts per gallon. Some say 4 to 6 watts per gallon is the target. Kelvin rating or color is also important. Something between 12000 and 20000 Kelvin has enough blue in its spectrum to penetrate deeper tanks and help corals survive and propogate. I've seen corals under 50/50 actinic and the same corals a week later under metal halide. MH looked much better with corals open wide and more colorful. Heat and electric use might be of concern. I mounted stylish little fan onto a shelf above my topless tank and put it on a timer to coincide with the MH lights. My temp stays between 77 and 79 throughout the light cycle. I bought two 175 pendands with dual ballast and two bulbs for 175 bucks. The pendants I bought on E-bay. The 14,000K 175 watt bulbs were from A&T lighting for 30 bucks a pop. Tank is very bright with that "shimmering effect" that reflects onto the floor and ceiling. I was looking into t-5, PC, and others. If I had to do it all over again... I'd buy exactly what I did again.
 
watts per gallon means nothing. i would rather have 1watt per gallon of metal halide lighting rather than 1000watts per gallon of normal output lighting.
 
Hey Jim,

Might want to look at this as well:

http://www.saltycritter.com/lighting/current/current-nova-extreme-t5.htm

Only a few $ more and I trust the name much more than an ebay seller.

I'm not a lighting expert, but power compacts are slightly older technology. They are more watts but because they are bent in half (the bulbs are U shaped) they don't handle reflectors as well as T5s. They generate a little more heat and need to be replaced more often. When I set my tank up a few months back nobody suggested a PC hood to me. It was always a question between T5s and MHs. But I will say that going to a fixture like Tek that has individual reflectors will give you even more light, but costs $100 more with legs and no moonlights.

Here's a zoa link about lighting

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=909443&highlight=current+nova
 
lights

lights

I'd have to refute Jiggy's 1000 watt comment. You can have too many watts per gallon given many fishes and corals are light sensative and will not do well under really high wattage.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7998247#post7998247 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Kreeger1
Jiggy, your 100 percent wrong

I,ve grown many sps corals under Normal output bulbs.
Click to expand...
Me too
 
Jiggy is right actually, not sure the post was read correct, and think the wrong thing was taken from it. I think the point the poster was trying to make was the fact that the watts per gallon rule for instance does not work when conparing different types of light... not the fact it could or could not be done. Some types of light give off more lumens/par per watt than others while others give off less is what the poster ment. Such as the T5 properly setup vs. say VHO, T5 is less watts but is brighter.
 
Watts per rule correct, 1 watt Mh doesn't equal another watt of different light sourece, bulb choice, brand type ect. growing corals under Normal output bulbs incorrect! 1 watt mh is not greater by any means than 1000 watts Normal output. Just plain wrong. I've seen mh bulbs that put out less wattage then vho, pc, t5 ect. So comparing apples to oranges just doesn't work
 
FYI, wattage is a measure of energy used, not light output. PAR is the measure of output that you're concerned about as it's the measure of energy useable by photsynthetic organizisms (corals). To compare two light sources saying one is better than another because it uses more watts is incorrect. For example, on the T5 bulbs I use, PAR ranges from 310 to 200 depending on the spectrum of the bulb. All the bulbs use 54w of energy to produce this.

Here are the PAR measurements on common 54 watt bulbs:

ATI Brand

Aquablue 322
Blue Plus 311
Actinic 142
Sun 340

UVL

Actinic White 294
Super Actinic 212

Aquaz

Ocean Pro 329
Blue Pro 249
Sun Pro 306

D&D Guisemann

Aquablue 302
Actinic Plus 248

Helios

Daylight 10K 325
Super Blue 245

Current Sun Paq

10K daylight 301
Blue actinic 252

GE Daylight 319
 
well thats alot of usless info in a thread that all i asked was if i could keep a few corals and with 11 replys and not 1 answer to my question all i have to say is thanks lol.. maybe we could get back on track and let me know if i can keep corals with those lights?!
 
To give you the short answer .... Yes you can keep corals with that light... not all corals but many softies and LPS
 
Actually I linked you a thread that was exactly answering your question concerning zoos and suggested a different fixture that, I feel, is a better bang for your buck.
 
Re: lights

Re: lights

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7995911#post7995911 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by stevestank
The 14,000K 175 watt bulbs were from A&T lighting for 30 bucks a pop.
Click to expand...
Sorry slight off topic question. (looking left and right to make sure topic police are not watching me...again)

Stevetank...Was wondering a couple things about these $30 14k bulbs you mentioned.
Do you know what brand they are?
and where or who is A&T lighting. My search in google brought up results from anything from North Carolina U to sprinkler systems.

If you could point me in the right direction to further my query, I'd greatly appreciate it Stevestank.


Ok Ok, Back on topic...sorta.
(is this an "in my opinion" rerun?) anyway.

PC bulbs are like souping up Mom's minivan for the Indy, sure it will get you there but your results won't be what you had hoped for. They just don't have the horsepower and by no means have the dancing shimmer that a killer tank with MH's has. PAR, intensity and willy nilly things like that. Think of the MH's as the powerplant of Indy Car as compared to Mom's minivan. It's like actual results as compared to placebo. The Indy Car average is around 670hp and looks sexy as heck and Mom's minivan is not sexy in the least and only has 240-250hp and that's if it's a newer one. The logic may appear pretzel but it's probably sound.
 
Bulbs are actually 24.99 a pop. I'll upload some pictures sometime soon to show fellow reefers how these bulbs are working...

http://stores.ebay.com/A-to-T-Lamps-Light-Bulb-Store

"A to T" lamps is the correct store name on ebay. This fella buys these bulbs directly from China. I found the distributor who actually sells these bulbs to A To T for 9 dollars!! Perhaps C-CEA could pose as a retailer and group buy?

I also researched the spectral analysis of various bulbs. I found these Plus brand bulbs to score very well. My corals are open wide and happy. Less than half the price of many other comparable bulbs...

Spectral analysis page: http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2005/12/review
 
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