Lighting for a 55 gal reef?

[lonbrat]

Today my dual HO t5 light screwed up. Now only one light runs at a time. Should I run the actinic or daylight ? I can also hook up a flood light over the tank for now >^>;

And does anyone have any ideas on a new fixture I could get? I prefer something that can show off corals colors like an actinic, or something with dual lights- I'm not looking to spend much over 150-200$ I still have my bulbs and they both work great- just not the fixture..

I have a BTA, some zoas, a gorgonian, mushrooms, A ric. Or two and two brain corals.

Sucks that this had to happen at the worst time possible.

 

[Canadian Reefer]

Run your daylights, that is what provides the PAR

 

[Ron Reefman]

I'm going to contradict Canadian Reefer here and suggest you run the blue if you can only run one bulb.

The white bulb may provide a bit more 'total' PAR, but your corals really don't use much PAR from light that is other than light in the blue spectrum. It does use some PAR from other colors of light, but not much. The white bulb puts out light from a wide variety of spectrum, 400nm violet to 700nm deep red, that's why it looks white to us. But that means only a small part of the bulbs energy is in the blue spectrum (probably less than 25%). Your actinic bulb is all in the blue spectrum, so all of it's energy is useful to your coral.

The Zooxanthellae (algae) that the coral holds inside the polyp needs blue (400nm to about 480nm) in order to do photosynthesis and that is what feeds the coral. It's the chlorophyll A & B that work doing photosynthesis. You can see in the chart what spectrum of light work with them and draw your own conclusions.



As for new fixtures, there are some decent Chinese leds on Ebay and several suppliers here on RC. I've seen the MarsAqua fixture for about $80 and one should work given your corals. Although you'd have better end to end coverage in a 3' wide tank with 2 fixtures and then you'd have enough light to grow anything. Personally I have OceanRevive, ReefRadiance and ReefBreeders leds over my 4 tanks and 2 refugiums. Two of them have sponsor forums here at RC.

 

[lonbrat]

I'm going to contradict Canadian Reefer here and suggest you run the blue if you can only run one bulb.

The white bulb may provide a bit more 'total' PAR, but your corals really don't use much PAR from light that is other than light in the blue spectrum. It does use some PAR from other colors of light, but not much. The white bulb puts out light from a wide variety of spectrum, 400nm violet to 700nm deep red, that's why it looks white to us. But that means only a small part of the bulbs energy is in the blue spectrum (probably less than 25%). Your actinic bulb is all in the blue spectrum, so all of it's energy is useful to your coral.

The Zooxanthellae (algae) that the coral holds inside the polyp needs blue (400nm to about 480nm) in order to do photosynthesis and that is what feeds the coral. It's the chlorophyll A & B that work doing photosynthesis. You can see in the chart what spectrum of light work with them and draw your own conclusions.



As for new fixtures, there are some decent Chinese leds on Ebay and several suppliers here on RC. I've seen the MarsAqua fixture for about $80 and one should work given your corals. Although you'd have better end to end coverage in a 3' wide tank with 2 fixtures and then you'd have enough light to grow anything. Personally I have OceanRevive, ReefRadiance and ReefBreeders leds over my 4 tanks and 2 refugiums. Two of them have sponsor forums here at RC.

I'll run actinics and a few white LEDs over it for now.
Would this be enough for the corals and nem?

http://m.ebay.com/itm/48-60-Fixture...Fish-Coral-Reef-Tank-/360911611241?nav=SEARCH

Or would 2 of these be better?

http://m.ebay.com/itm/T5-Quad-24-Aq...3D301165398092&_trksid=p2056116.c100408.m2460

Thanks!

 

[Ron Reefman]

First fixture is 177 leds and 10 watts of power, so the leds are running at 0.05 watts. Not half a watt (0.5) but 1/10th of half a watt!. If those were 3.0 watt leds like the ones used in better fixtures, it would only drive 4 instead of 177. Do you think a 4 led fixture is enough? This fixture might work for soft corals on a 4" tall rock in a 10" deep tank!

The t5 fixture is much better in terms of making enough light (PAR). Notice it is 96 watts? Just remember that in a year those bulbs will still be lighting up, but they will have started a spectrum shift and could/might/possibly start an algae issue. When I was running MH and t5 together, I replaced my t5 bulbs once a year and MH bulbs every 2 years. So at 1 year, and every year after that, you'll be spending about $30 to $40 on new bulbs.

So absolutely NO to the cheap led fixture and IT'S GOOD ENOUGH to the t5 fixture. And that endorsement is from an all led supporter.

 

[CStrickland]

I run the marsaqua you mentioned, and they grow everything great for crazy-low startup cost so they are fantastic for beginners. But, colors don't pop like they do with other lights. Especially yellows get washed out, the same fish under mh for example is like night and day. So if you really like the way the t5's lit you tank, the Chinese LEDs might feel like a downgrade. It's the only downside to them IMO. Maybe you could visit someone who runs them and see them in action?

Sorry about the bad timing Murpheys law

 

[KingTriton1]

FYI BRS is having a 10% off sale on the Ecotech LEDs

 

[lonbrat]

I'll definitely keep looking then ^^
I don't know what LEDs are good or bad lol and actinic bulbs cave all the color Pop I need- so I might end up with the same fixture I had. But the 90~wat one sounded the best. It would have more watts per gallon than my current did (before it broke)
I'm also okay with new bulbs often- it's more of being in a tight spot right now. I've used my "allowance" for the month on the tank. So I'll be digging into other funds for the fixture, and later I'll know i have to spend on lights ^^

 

[Ron Reefman]

I run the marsaqua you mentioned, and they grow everything great for crazy-low startup cost so they are fantastic for beginners. But, colors don't pop like they do with other lights. Especially yellows get washed out, the same fish under mh for example is like night and day. So if you really like the way the t5's lit you tank, the Chinese LEDs might feel like a downgrade. It's the only downside to them IMO. Maybe you could visit someone who runs them and see them in action?

Sorry about the bad timing Murpheys law

I looked around a bit and couldn't find a list of the led colors in a MarsAqua fixture. And MarsAqua didn't have a website, just Ebay sellers (not a good sign). But looking at the photo of the MarsAqua fixture on Ebay, it appears to have a lot of warm white leds which may have been part of the bad coloring you were seeing.

And I'll agree with you that MH have a better look than most leds at full daylight. But you can't adjust colors other than buying more expensive bulbs. You can't get the blue light pop with MH that you get with leds. You really can't adjust how bright they are very easily. They do run WAY, WAY hotter than t5's and crazy hotter than a good led fixture (mine run 4-7 degrees above room temp). So I'm willing to give up the MH look for the many other advantages of leds. BTW, my leds paid for themselves in just 2 years through reduced electricity (fixture itself, less chiller run time and less house A/C run time) and not buying any bulbs (I spent about $300/year in t5 and MH bulbs).

To the OP, t5's work just fine. I used them for many years. The smart thing to do is start looking at other people's aquariums and when you see one you like the lighting on, find out what they use.