Going from halides to T5 (pic)

[reeferman75]

After doing alot of reading and talking to fellow reefers I decided to get rid of the halides and go to T5. I was running 4 250w 10k MH and 4 72" vho actinic 03. I am going to run 16 T5 8 over drivin and 8 regular.
Here is a pic of my old canopy

Let the construction begin
Here is my 13 ply plywood (FREEBIE) got to love it.

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Let the cutting begin

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[reeferman75]

pic

pic

Here is the first of 7 coats of gloss white paint

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[reeferman75]

pics

pics

here is a ruff layout of all the lights

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here is a test run to make sure all the lights fire up

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[reeferman75]

pics

pics

Here is a pic of the inside of the canopy on the tank

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Here is a full tank shot , for some reason these pics dont do the light justice

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[Bebo77]

before and after pic of the tank with the new lights?

 

[reef 'n ale]

Wow! That's quite a nicely done project!

But why the change, exactly? I'm curious because I've been toying with the idea myself.

Rob

 

[reeferman75]

Bebo that was a pic of the tank with T5. I will post a before pic in a few

 

[sjm817]

Nice job! What bulbs are you using? I dont see much for corals that would require strong MH or T5 lighting. I assume you will be adding some? How long were you running the MH?

 

[Ti]

looks good

 

[reeferman75]

reef n al,
I decide to change to try something different, I wasnt happy with the look of halides, or the cost to run them , and the heat they make. In the summer time my 3/4 chiller was running almost no stop durring the day. So I talked to alot of people on here, did alot of reading on the T5 and decided to give them a shot. Plus I also had gotten AEFW for someone and it wiped out my whole tank, I figured while I was waiting for all the eggs to hatch and die off I might as well to the swap.

 

[reeferman75]

Sjm
I had over 100 different SPS but after I got AEFW through out all my corals I took them out and I am waiting for theeggs to hatch and Die off, They cant Live with no food. I was running Halides for over 5 years

 

[reef 'n ale]

Wow, sorry about the AEFW's! That just sucks.

It's nice to see you're still into it after that. That probably would have sent me over the edge!

Anyway, thanks for the info. Those are some of the reasons I've been thinking about switching, although I still like the look of the halides.

Rob

 

[reeferman75]

With T5 you have a wide range of color choices over halides that was a nother reason I wanted to try them. If your realy thinking about it do a search on T5 and do some reading , and look up some post from THEGRIMREEFER.

 

[reeferman75]

pic

pic

BEBO
Here is an Old pic of the tank , THis pic was over a year ago but this is with 4 250w 10ks and 4 72" vho actinic o3

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And here is a after pic with all T5's

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[sjm817]

Sorry to hear you lost the tank to AEFW (I had to look up the acronym). It looks like you are off to a good start rebuilding.

 

[reeferman75]

I am working on it . The guys is my local reef club all have frags waiting for me so when I decided the time is right I will start restocking.

 

[Henry Bowman]

Reeferman75

Looks like a nice project. I am interested in the types of bulbs you are running.???

 

[Bebo77]

Re: pic

Re: pic

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=8625445#post8625445 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by reeferman75
BEBO
Here is an Old pic of the tank , THis pic was over a year ago but this is with 4 250w 10ks and 4 72" vho actinic o3

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And here is a after pic with all T5's

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wow that looks alot brighter...

 

[reeferman75]

Bebo
It is alot brighter the picture just doesnt do it justice at all.

 

[reeferman75]

SJM
here are the bulbs I am running 2 GE 3000K daylights, 2 UVL Aquasuns, 4 UVL Super Actinics, 2 ATI Aquablues and 6 ATI Blue Plus.