46g Bow front lighting help

[RyanG]

In my opinion a ton of "reef experts" are unwilling to change, humans are creatures of habit and when we get comfortable we dont change and arent willing to accept something thats new and different. And there is also the cost factor why spend money on something to replace a unit that is working. I think that its safe to say that niether school of thought is wrong and both systems have their pros and cons.

So IMO pick which one suits you best and call it good, we can have this discussion/argument forever and prove nothing other than we all have tons of opinions.

[reeffreak]

Originally Posted by Altohombre

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

Yes,that is the sight I use for majority of my online purchases including my lights.Well,Premium Aquatics and the 2Doc's site.

Fatman,not to sound insulting but you are very old school.

[Bifferwine]

Fatman, my MH are all 10K. I have T5 actinics. My tank is 3 feet deep with about 4 inches of sand. And the lights are 18 inches from the surface of the water.

My corals (with the exception of mushrooms and zoanthids) seemed to grow much faster under T5s.

[fatman]

Originally Posted by 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.

Never heard of Grimreefer, and I seriously doubt that the T-5's can give the same Lux readings down at 18 to 24 inches of depth that a 250 Watt halide provides. A usable rating at what depths matters a lot when a tank is used for principally hard stoney corals, unless you can afford shallow custom tanks for all your hard corals. If you can afford custom tanks you can afford the better halides. If anyone likes I have access to plentry of electrical engineer docotates and grad students. I am sure they can easily supply all the data that would be needed to dispel myths.
I will however check out the Grimreefer write up and compare it to known experts work. I do believe experimental data must be repeatable and if he is the only one producing this data and his experimental data isn't capable of being produced by anyone else it is not much good. In my opinion, anyway. I have been in school and around too many years to throw a way the principles of scientific method.

[fatman]

Originally Posted by Bifferwine

Fatman, my MH are all 10K. I have T5 actinics. My tank is 3 feet deep with about 4 inches of sand. And the lights are 18 inches from the surface of the water.

My corals (with the exception of mushrooms and zoanthids) seemed to grow much faster under T5s.

Seems like a great combination if the halide lights are 400 watt. Thirty two inches of water penetration would be quite a high expectation of 250 watt halide, especially ones 18 inches above the tank. However, I do not know why you would be disappointed in your lighting. The 10000K bulbs are generally preferred for viewing purposes as the more appropriate 6500K bulbs are a lot more yellow. Of course true K varies by manufacturer as their advertised K ratings tend to be more of a reflection of what a customer fad or present commercial preference is rather than a true reading. I have found with most 10000K bulbs further (Blue) actinic bulbs are needed for most peoples preferred viewing light. In HQI I found that the only real 10000K bulb was the expensive Ushio. I do not believe I would have my lights up so high as 18 inches though. Is that because of thermal problems. As for which of your corals grow best in what light or why, you speak only of soft coral stuff like mushrooms and zoanthids. Therefore I have know idea what you are implying, or really saying. There is also all the many other parameters that must be considered when dealing with growth rates such as water movements, feedings, temperature etc. All are interrelated, but I still believe what I have seen, experienced and read from the experts. When all other parameters are at their ultimate the best results with hard corals, especially SPS comes from intense halide lighting at 6500K. It is generally true that hard corals like supplemental actinic lighting, but they do not probably care the source of the actinic lighting as there primary needs are not supplied by the actinic lighting.

[fatman]

Originally Posted by 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.

A ridiculously long trhread that I finally gave up on. Lots of stuff like, yes the Halidewill have grater PAR directly under the tube but the spresd of the T-5 means it will have better Par two foot away from what would be the center of the tube. And a lot of, you have to have the bulbs no more than 4 to 5 inches above the water. Nowhere did I find anyone saying that the Lux reading was as good at any depth for a T-5 as what is received by a halide. Lumen relates how bright the light appears and how well the eye sees under that light. As an example wee see yellow light real well. The human eye finds a different light spectrum differently from a coral. As well a soft coral sees differently from a hard coral etc. Lux however is a measurement of how many Lumens fall on each square meter of surface. Halide produce much higher Lux readings. Lux readings fall off quickly with incresing depths. Halides are intense enough lights (focused enough) lights to produce good lux at depths not obtainable by T-5's. Lumens do not matter if they do not reach their target. Then there is still the heat issue. The halide light is 35 to 40 percent efficient. The highest efficiency for any of the flourescents is 24 to 26 percent efficient. Intensity is undoubtfully needed for depths, and is weel liked by many hard corals even in shallow water. I would not even bother to attempt serious propagation (grow out and fragging) of SPS coral in the bottom of a tank with over 12" of water without halides. Why waste my time and money, for poorer results than what halides will provide. As long as I vcan afford the best I buy and use it.

[RyanG]

Im not going to quote your whole post Fatman but if lumens are how the human eye view light and lux is a measurement of how those lumens cover a measurable area, then how does that matter? If that light is not in the photosynthetic range of a coral or plant for that matter its not going to grow as well as it could with lighting of the proper PAR. Im no physicist but we need to keep this debate on track lets talk about the difference in Photosynthetic Light not lumens or lux because they just make the light that we see more appealing to our eyes in the wavelenghts that we are discussing. The kelvin scale and Photosynthetic light are what we need to be discussing without turning things into personal attacks.

It is quite possible for all of us to have the exact same lighting and tank and have varied opinions on the coral growth that we are getting. So why isnt it possible to different tanks and different lighting and have extremely different opinions on what we prefer to have. There are no Physicist in this debate that Im aware of so its all speculation as of now. Fatman you prefer Halide, Reef prefers T5s, Biff prefers and has better experience in her eyes with T5s but uses Halides, and Im just refereeing. Lets see some links to scientific study in a controlled environment so that we make a scientific choice or we can just keep arguing until were blue in the face.

[Bifferwine]

My MH consists of 4 x 250 watt MH. I keep it 18 inches from the surface because of the heat. Without clip on Walmart fans, the lights raise the temp of my tank by 20 degrees (I found that out the hard way on the first day that I turned the lights on -- I had 300 gallons of 96 degree water and a tank full of dead corals and inverts). And I do not use ANY heaters. My tank still hits around 82 every day. And that's with the fans running constantly.

As for coral growth, my SPS grew like crazy under my old T5s, and my LPS did so-so, and mushrooms and zoas hardly spread at all. Under MH, my SPS are totally static, LPS are still so-so, and zoanthids and mushrooms have exploded all over the place.

[fatman]

Lumen and Lux standards are the lihting industries widely accepted numerical metod of judging lighting schemes, needs, outputs , what have you. Yes they were originally concerened with the wave lengths most visible to the human eyes vision needs. However, they are now accepted and used in all the trades in regard to lighting. Yes corals have spectrum needs that are not intune with human vision, and Par at different wave lengths are measured for different uses, such as coral needs for optimal growth, plant needs for optimal growth, and human lighting needs for office work versus relaxation and or putting on makeup. I do not doubt that for shallow tanks that T-5's put out more bang for the buck when properly choosen for K values and when each bulb has its own reflector and the spacing between the lights and the water is less than 6 inches or so. I just say again, that for a deep tank a T-5 cannot porovide adequate Lux (intensity) at proper Par. Even medium depth tanks need so many T-% bulbs as to make the cost sayings and heat differences between thema and halide pretty close to non existant. Put 8, 9 or even 10 T-% bulbs under a hood and it is not a cheap installation nor is it a mluch cooler installaion than a halide setup putting out the same par and greater lux. Actually it might be more expensive and hotter. People are even over feeding T-%'s with icecap electronic ballasts. I do not advocate halides smaller than 250 Watts be used on any tank as the cost is to high versus the alternatives such as T-5's and VHO's, or even some of the better NO tubes. However, I advocate in any tank with over eighteen inches of water over the gravel that the person use halides for maximum hard coral growth. And for SPS 250 watt halides for anything much over 12 inches of water over the gravel for maximum health and growth. Unless you do not want hard corals at the bottom of your tanks or SPS anywhere but the top third of your tank.

As far as physics or whatever. I do not doubt facts when they are repeatedly provable. Just about ever thing used in the aquarium trades was originally designed for something else and adapted to aquarium use. Trickle filters, lighting systems, skimmers, refractormeter, pH meters, testing reagents. Even our salt mixes were designed originally for the sciences. There are a lot of people with degrees that have made the aquarium hobby what it is. Very few non professionals have made many great contributions to this field. Even when the non professional comes up with a good idea it is usually the professional who puts it to paper and through the design, testing and manafacturing stages. I am not trying to exclude the non degree professionals. They make great contributions. But I will never abandon science.

When you learn the use of the proper terminology thst is already widely accepted (look at the Lux meters in Aquarium catalogs) we will have something more to talk about Ryan. The terms Lumen and Lux apply what ever the spectrum of light. When you bring up photosynsitivity your just talking lumens as a measure in that lighting range. Lux is lux, no matter what. You can have a different Lumen rating and a different Lux rating for each section (frequency band) of each light (bulb) source. I do not think you even know what point your trying to argue.

[RyanG]

Did I ruffle your feathers fatman? Sorry didnt mean to. ; )