46g Bow front lighting help

[reeffreak]

The Constellation won't fit your tank.They do make the TX5 and Solarflares for your tank.

Here are prices and info.........Aquactinics T5: Premium Aquatics

Here is there main site.........Aquactinics LLC | Marine Aquarium Lighting Specialists

[RyanG]

Heres the link matt
Aquactinics LLC | Marine Aquarium Lighting Specialists

Reef beat me to it

[Altohombre]

so this premiumaquatics.com website is where you would buy lights from or are you just using as a reference?

[RyanG]

Matt that lighting link I put up y-day has a ton of options and price ranges depending on types of corals wanted I dont member which thread its in think maybe it was 6 ft one but Im not sure.

[Altohombre]

yeah, I looked at it pretty closely. I wish they had 46g listed instead of just 50 and 55's. But it helped me think that the Nova Extreme line was pretty good. The others they recommended were PC lights or MH which most people are saying to avoid the compact lighting and that MH aren't needed and run hot.

[RyanG]

Id prolly go with enough to get you into some softies and maybe some lps especially with the budget.

[fatman]

There are different aspects of keeping corals. There is maintenance of corals , grow out of corals and propagation of corals. There are lots of people who maintain coral, even some SPS on NO (normal output) fluorescents. There are many more people maintaining corals and getting good, fair growth rates with soft corals and large polyp corals using T5's and VHO fluorescents. There are very few people getting good, consistent, fast growth of SPS with T-5's, and even less success is had using T-5's with SPS frag grow out. There are exceptions, such as lights within 10 inches to a foot of SPS corals and SPS frags or closer in very shallow tanks made for frag grow outs. However, with what most would consider acceptable growth and propagation success T-5's can not come close to comparing with halides. However, lots of people are for some strange reason content with just keeping and possibly propagating soft corals, and not a large percentage of reefers continually keep SPS corals, yet alone try propagating them. But, if your one of those who always want more, more, more, then SPS propagation with halides is that more in reefing! If you are concerned about heat stop to think, Light = heat out put, therefore the more efficient the light the less waste heat produced. Halides are more efficient and put out less waste heat than, T-5's, VHO, Power Compacts to NO flourescents. A halides waste heat is just more concentrated (meaning contained in a smaller area, IE a HQI bulb is only about 2 inches long), than long tubes which spread there increased amount of heat out over a larger area and therefore appear to be cooler. The same amount of coral usable light produced by T-5's, VHO's, NO's or power compacts will producw more excess heat PERIOD. There is no free unch with lights either. The only other light that is more efficient and produces light usable for corals is the new generation LED, but you wiil have to easily pay in excess of $1000 for light output equivalent to a 250 watt halides output. When your lucky in the aquarium trade you get what you paid for. Unfortunately lots of people pay for to little and get to little and are stuck with doing less than they want to, or they have to go back out and buy what they should have in the beginning. Hell, even Biffer uses halides, and she is very stubborn. Of course you can stick with fish and use a few incadescent light bulbs, they do not care.

[Bifferwine]

Originally Posted by fatman

Hell, even Biffer uses halides, and she is very stubborn. Of course you can stick with fish and use a few incadescent light bulbs, they do not care.

I use halides on my current tank, because it's 7 feet long and 3 feet deep. Just too big for T5s.

On my previous tank (55 gallon), I used T5s and saw MUCH faster SPS growth than I have with my current tank. If it was realistic for my tank, I would have gone with T5s this time around also. I just like them better than MH.

[fatman]

What bulbs are you using that you do not like your halides (K value). I can not believe any other light including T-5's can produce better results with hard corals, especially SPS than hadide 6500K. Are you using around 6500K bulbs and complimenting with blue spectrum or just using high K bulbs. High K might look good, but they do not produce anywhere as good a results as 6500k bulbs. You are just comlpimenting with acitinic for better viewing color, I hope. Other wise the comparisom is moot. What is your water depth above sand? How many bulbs, what are their wattages? I do not believe nearly every marine and reef expert is wrong about halides and that we should use cheaper less efficient T5's instead.

[yote]

Actually,theres a full 100 and something long thread on reefcentral by grimreefer where he compared T-5s to halides.Says with some of the T-5 bulbs,you can actually get quiet a bit more par rating than with halides.