Lighting for 36x22x36 tank

[jasbullard]

hey guys, i am having a hard time getting help on lighting for this tank. its deep, i have been told i need at least 1 400 watt halide and 2 vho at the least. where do i find a fixture for those? and do i need less or more lighting, or is that right? It will have hard & soft corals along with fish.

 

[Entropy]

36 wide, 22 front to back, and 36 tall? That is a really tall tank! I would go with a single 400w halide and a lumenarc reflector right smack in the middle. Man I hope you have long arms, because a 36" reach to the bottom is no fun.

 

[jasbullard]

will 1 400w halide and the lumenarc reflector be enough lighting?

 

[kysard1]

A 400W could work if you build a false bottom and put a deep sand bed over it. Then plan on only low light corals toward the bottom.

A first reef tank should never be 36"'s tall. It is a maintenance and lighting nightmare. If you are new to this, I recommend 5" of a false bottom. Buy a piece of starboard the dimensions of your tank bottom. cut several pieces of 2" PVC five inches long. Fill this with canned foam insulation then place the starboad on top. You will need to build your stand in such a way to conceal the false bottom.

 

[Entropy]

IMO 400w will be plenty. You might not being growing SPS on the bottom, but there are plent of options. I would build a tower of rock right in the middle held together by an acrylic rod or something and then put light loving stuff on the top, and softies and mushrooms on the rest, and then make sure there are lots of holes and caves for your fish to dart in and out of. It would be awesome. You might want to go bare bottom to make it easy to keep the tank clean of detrius because the reach is really going to be an issue.

 

[miwoodar]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=10508664#post10508664 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Entropy
IMO 400w will be plenty. You might not being growing SPS on the bottom, but there are plent of options. I would build a tower of rock right in the middle held together by an acrylic rod or something and then put light loving stuff on the top, and softies and mushrooms on the rest, and then make sure there are lots of holes and caves for your fish to dart in and out of. It would be awesome. You might want to go bare bottom to make it easy to keep the tank clean of detrius because the reach is really going to be an issue.

I agree, it could be a super cool setup. Hopefully you have some go-go-gadget-arms though.

 

[jasbullard]

would power compacts, or vho's work? i 'm thinking going 32" high after everbody saying thats really deep. this is going to be a in-wall mount viewable from 2 sides. Heat from the halides kinda concerns me!

 

[kysard1]

maybe for mushrooms.

 

[miwoodar]

What do you want to keep? "hard and soft corals" isn't very descriptive.

BTW - Welcome to RC!

 

[jasbullard]

soft & hard coral along with fish

 

[spleen93]

"Hard" coral covers a lot of ground with huge lighting differences. Without knowing more specifically what kind of "hard" coral you were intending to keep, it's hard to make recommendations. For instance, a sun coral (a hard coral) would require no lighting at all while an Acropora sp. (also a hard coral) would require very intense lighting.

Spleen

 

[kodyboy]

if you do not want metal halide I would go with T5s. A great fixture for your tank would be an aquactinics solar flare (diyreef.com) six 36 inch overdriven T5s with icecap ballasts, reflectors and fans. Not cheap, but worth it.

 

[luke33]

I would avoid pc or vho unless your using them as supplements for color. I'd have to go with a 400w mh like said previously. If you go with the t5's overdriven, i don't think they would penetrate as well, not 36" imo. Also with a 6" fan and the MH'd you should avoid heating issues

 

[miwoodar]

jasbullard - Looking through a book and putting together a list of your favorite corals would be very helpful. A good book will pay rewards for years to come. It will cover some of the information you might not be so apt to pick up on a forum. My favorite right now is Eric Borneman's book: Aquarium Corals.

You don't want to do what I did. I decided that I would be satisfied keeping medium light corals under a VHO system then within a year I got bitten by the SPS bug and upgraded to a metal halide system anyways. I could have saved time, money and head ache had I done it right the first time. I also ended up with a bunch of corals that I had to get rid of.

 

[kodyboy]

I second a good book or twenty Being an informed reefkeeper will massively mitigate future mistakes/costs