Marineland 72" Pro Lights

[phastroh]

Yeah so i was just checking out the lights I have along with the tank.

Even though these lights have 3x150MH 8x39T5 and the useless LEDS it only equals 3.46Watts per gallon.

So I still cannot have any other corals beside the LPS and Softies. Great, good thing I didn't pay a lot for them.

The only thing to me is that the tank is only 30" deep which is 6" more than my 80Gal so it wold seem with so more much wattage it wouldn't be suck a big deal.

I wish placing any Hard Corals near the top or halfway up would be plenty of wattage. Like having them near where the MH fixtures are.

Not saying I want them but I was kind of wanting a nice blue Clam or 2.

I just don't get how keeping them halfway or higher doesn't allow for enough light. it has to doesn't it. I mean the mushrooms suck near the top but do good down low.

 

[Sir Alex]

So I still cannot have any other corals beside the LPS and Softies.

NOOO!!! :shock::shock::shock:


The best way to do lighting for a big tank is metal halide pendants and ballasts. You can get decent ones for a good price.

 

[phastroh]

I cannot have any hanging lights and I already have these now.

I will just stay with no Hard Corals and I will see if I can have any clams either.

I figured if I keep anything it would only be something similar to a cup coral and I would not have that near the bottom.

What can I do at this point...nothing I guess.

I will try and talk to this big coral place over hear and talk to the guy who takes care of them and see what he says about my lights and my depth and maybe he can give me any tips on the location of stuff that could work.

I mean if I have a Hard Coral 10 inches from the top it will be getting plenty of light.

I will talk with them,

 

[Sir Alex]

I cannot have any hanging lights and I already have these now.

Why not? You can always sell does lights.

 

[phastroh]

No hanging lights period. I have this with a matching flip up canopy and it looks so nice.

Plus my wife won't want them either. I do not hate them but not in this house.

 

[Sir Alex]

It's up to you, but I don't think tall tanks need a canopy. I only have a hood on my 75 because it looks short without it.

 

[fastrd400]

You can mount the pendants inside the canopy. If you look at the Catalina MH lights, they are small enough to be screwed into the inside of the canopy.

 

[Northstar24]

I had these lights, and was able to keep clams and I had a few SPS corals in the top half of the tank....

The SPS corals proceeded to melt when I upgraded to the AI LED's and I ramped up the intensity too quickly

 

[fastrd400]

Catalina Aquarium

 

[phastroh]

Ok just say I stay with these I just read the manual and it says basically to replace all of the bulbs after one year. I mean 1 year was the limit on the MH and 9 months on the T5's.

I have no clue how much they were used but this was purchssed on 6-20-10 so basically one year is up.

So I was looking at bulbs and it comes down to the Temp. It says use 14,000K but what is best.

Honeslty at this point I may have to just use them as is no matter how long they were run.

Right now my tank that is running has 6x54 so even after a year I would think theses are putting out far more than the 324 at the original power of 762.

Its that or me having to mount the 2 48" lights I have. The Nova Pro and the Aquaticlife.

I mean even wore out 3x150MH has to outshine the Nova Pro right.

I still have maybe 2 months anyway by the time I set up and cycle that I don't need bulbs. I can use them for a little while till I can buy new bulbs. Or just get a cheap ass skimmer and the bulbs which I do not want to do.

 

[Northstar24]

Its not that they put out 'less power' as they age, its the spectrum of light that is emitted. As they age, the bulbs shift to put out more light in the red end of the specturm, which is beneficial to nusiance algae growth such as cyanobacteria.

I had cyano real bad, and changing from my Marineland fixture to LED's solved it almost overnight. Had i decided to stay with the MH / T5 fixture, changing the bulbs would of had the same effect

As far as bulb color, its really a matter of preference. I was not a fan of the 14k bulbs that came with the Marineland, and had I replaced the MH bulbs, I would have likely gone with 20k bulbs. It would have slowed coral growth, but IMO it would have looked better. With 8 T5 bulbs you could also run several purple bulbs or Blue Plus bulbs

 

[phastroh]

Hmm ok.

Well I have some time to get $300 for all new bulbs then.

Frigin sucks because I got it for $400 and was happy now $700 doesn't seem so great.

I have no idea how often it was used but he did say he only ran the MH 3 hours a day but who knows for sure.

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF

Maybe I can sell it for $900 and go buy a new one for another $300 haha.

 

[phastroh]

YAYAYAYAYYAYAYAYAYAYAYAYA Great news for me.

I called back Marineland with my serial number which is on a sticker by the way that gets ruined by water and so the call was ending with her telling me the department dealing with that will call me back Tuesday or Wednesday.

So I said ok but so how long am I supposed to wait to change these bulbs because I am worried I will start growing algae using these old bulbs.

She says can I hold on she wants to see if the supervisor will send me the bulbs and puts me on hold. So she comes back and says yeah we are going to just send you out new bulbs for your system.

So I asked what I should expect and she says the T5 bulbs. So I asked what kind of MH bulbs should I be getting for it when I get them because the unit is about a year old so she says I am going to send those to you as well.

I about fell over with joy because I was looking at a $300 bulb bill in the face and now I am getting all new bulbs.

I have to say that I am at this point very impressed and satisfied with how Marineland took care of this.

Yes I could have just said ok thanks and waited for the call but I kept asking and it worked out for me so never just hang up I guess.

I just want to thank the person on the phone and her supervisor for helping me out.