lighting on 96x36x30

[smellfishy]

I have 3-400w mh I am going to use and was thinking of adding 4-54w t5s for suplimental lighting. Do you think that they will be able to do the job or would I be better off ussing vho lighting. I am planing on 1400k or 2000k for the metal halides and the tank is a mixed reef with mainly sps.

 

[sabodish]

3 MHs on a 8 foot tank wont be enough. when i was lighting my 8 footer, i ran 4 400Watters with 4 4' vhos and loved it.

i dont think a 54w T5 can penetrate 30"

 

[three-spot]

It's either not enough or just fine... From what I've read, a MH only lights an area about 2 ft. in diameter... so, with three your gonna have areas where you won't be able to put certain corals...

 

[KEEPERZ]

3-400w mh in lumenarc III's will work fine-I ran them on my 96" x 30" x 36" and I like VHO's for actinics-see JBNY's old tank, one of my favorites.

 

[JCTewks]

I agree with Keeperz. just use luminarc reflectors and you'll get a nice big even spread of light. 3 should be just fine. I would think that overdriven superactinic t-5's would work well for color balance. you may want to use 8-54 watt instead of 4.

 

[smellfishy]

I have 4 400w and all in lumenarc III's, but my tank was built with three openings. I was just looking to get a good fluoresence.

 

[JCTewks]

I'm working on a much smaller tank setup(48x24x24) and my plan is to us the XM10k MH to get the higher par and growth of the 10k bulb, and just add t-5's to get it to the color that I want and to keep the corals color going. I have heard that t-5's will defnitely punch through a 30" water column, so you shouldn't have problems there. it's just a question of will 4 t-5's be enough. I would def look into using 10K's in the luminarc's though. You can't beat the par with a 15-20K bulb.

Check this out to compare bulbs and see the difference in PAR.
http://www.reeflightinginfo.arvixe.com/select2lamp.php