Lighting Q

[Grace's Dad]

Input needed on my lighting options. The 280 has an 8" cross brace. I was going to try 3 400w mh but that puts one bulb dead center over the brace. Didn't even think about the heat issue on the acrylic until a little bird- actually he's pretty darn big- brought it to my attention at Lonnie's.
So if I went with 4 250w Would this be overkill in each area that they light. I have 2 36" reflectors that would keep the middle bulbs from being directly over the center brace. Would I have a darker area dead center since the two end bulbs would face in and the two center bulbs would face the ends.
Tank is 72x30x30.

Two large lumenarcs on the ends and two minis in the center would also keep the bulbs from being directly over the brace. Would the 5" spread distance between the minis and large look odd?

Any suggestions?

 

[DrBDC]

What do you plan on keeping? 2 may be enough unless you are going all sps.

 

[Grace's Dad]

I was thinking mainly sps.

 

[frenchie]

got same problem, until i get my new aquamedic light with 4 250 watt metal halides. I'll post a pic what it looks like you can see small shaded spot in middle.

 

[frenchie]

i need one of these than light would work better(180gallon)glasscages.com

 

[sirreal63]

Perfecto tank...bad idea of theirs to have one center brace. a pair of lumenarc 3' pendants would solve that with 250 watt bulbs.

 

[frenchie]

gonna add this light this summer with a little overtime, the light with 4 250 watt halides

 

[sirreal63]

You should have bought Clark's....nice light.

All Glass at least had sense enough to put 2 braces on it so a 3 light fixture would work. I need to give Kim at perfecto a hard time about that one.

 

[StupidsReef]

I would think the more light the better, as long as your pocket book will be able to handle the power bill. As for the cross brace, I would try to retro fit your lighting to be on the sides on the cross member. Or simple logic, place the light farther up off of the water. The higher you raise the lights the shadow will become smaller. If your going to use 400 watt MH this should be fine beings they are made to punch deeper. Graces Dad, did you get a view of Lonnie's light set up?? His lights are up off of the water quite far, 2 of them are 400 watt MH's and the center one ( which is off center due to the cross member) is a 250 watt MH.

 

[frenchie]

not worried about power bill current light is 834 total watts combined power bill didn't jump up much at all, gonna wait til july to i buy new light the way reflectors are everything does good on light i put my big toadstool in middle and its happy there with less light almost was getting to much on it.

 

[DrBDC]

Another option is to replace the center brace with 2 acrylic strips spaced at 1/3's.

 

[frenchie]

can you do that with water still in tank and if so what would you use acrylic cement or another type of glue/cement, and is it safe.

 

[DrBDC]

Hit the DIY forum on that one. I've never done it but I've seen/read about it. I believe you use some small stainless screws through the existing lip on the trim as well as a glue. Not sure if superglue, acrylic cement, or what though. I would think if you added the 2 new ones before removing the center it would work with the tank full.

 

[DrBDC]

But a partial draining might help since the crossbrace is under stress with it full (if it's doing anything at all it would be). Then if you added new ones they wouldn't be under stress at that point. Then when you removed the center, they would need a little more bowing pressure until they were under stress.

 

[Grace's Dad]

Back to my problem, would 250w over the center be too much heat? I could go with three of the large lumenarcs and put 400s on each end w/ a 250 in the center.