coralife HO t-5

[bautiSTUD73]

after the loss of several corals i decided it might be time to change bulbs on the 14 cube, i went to a petco and they had the 30" coralife HO on sell for 37$...less then the PC bubs on the cube. i bought em , i know some of it hangs of the edge of the cube, will this affect the watts it puts out per gallon? Im thinking of getting the hanging kit for it?? any ideas , or should i return it and go with the PC?

[Jai1985]

should be fine IMHO as long as your getting great light in the tank i dont see where a lil bit would matter

[Ninong]

The only thing that matters is the intensity of the light incident on the surface of the corals themselves. Watts per gallon is a meaningless rule of thumb that should never be used.

Therefore, if some of the light is being wasted as "light spill," then it's not hitting your corals. How much light you need depends on your corals and how far the light has to travel from the tube itself to the coral.

It's difficult to light small reef aquariums because it hard to find decent fluorescent fixtures that are adequate for hard corals. That's why some hobbyists resort to metal halides. I have seen some very nice small tanks (e.g., 20 gallons) lit with a single 70w or 150w metal halide lamp.

In the end what matters is what you can support with your equipment. You can either increase your total light intensity or you can change what sort of corals you keep in your tank to those that are capable of thriving under the light that you have. Most corals are very adaptable and capable of thriving in a wide range of light.

Good luck!

[Parrothead]

very good point Ninong, he could pick up a 70 watt viper or something similar and set himself up with a good MH over the bio cube, I personally wouldn't go with anything bigger as I owned a the same size cube when I joined here, 70 watt MH will provide more than enough light for any coral he wants to keep

[twisted]

i have a friend with a 2 nanos and has the 70 viper and the 150. they are pretty decent lights. the only thing was he didnt get the one that has the fan attached to it so he had to add one. i thought he would have more heat issues but they work great for his tanks and the price on them isnt bad at all

[bautiSTUD73]

Yea i wanted to go with the sunpod 24" but i don't have enough cash for it lol. I went to buy some PC bulbs for stock lighting and saw the sale figured it would be better for keeping some LPS. I don't plan on keeping SPS, so far so good ricordeas seem doing well and a rock flower anemone seem to like it as well.I was away for some days and came back to a crashed tank.Sister kept putting SW wen evaporation happened and salinity went thru the roof. I balanced it out and did the acclimating on the species left , btw how can u tell on the PAR value on this fixture? thanks in advanced

[Parrothead]

determining PAR is gonna be based on bulb manufacturer and type of bulb being used. Look in the sticky, click here before you ask, there is a link to some real good info. about par in there.

[Ninong]

...how can u tell on the PAR value on this fixture?

The only PAR value that counts is the one taken at the surface of the coral itself, or taken submerged at the same level as the coral. In other words, you could set up a tank, fill it with saltwater, turn the lights on and then take PAR measurements at the water's surface, 3" below the water, 6" below the water, 12" below the water, etc.

The Apogee PAR meter runs about $300 and that's the one most serious hobbyists use. For those who don't want to spend that much, there's always the trusty luxmeter. They make them with submersible probes that register the light underwater. You would take readings in the same manner. This should be done with the pumps off, not with them on as I did when I didn't know any better many years ago. A nice luxmeter runs about $100.

A luxmeter is not giving you PAR but at least it's giving you a measurement of intensity. Anyone who is halfway serious should get an Apogee PAR meter. Obviously none of this is what you wanted to hear but I always like to throw it in anyway. ;;

What you really wanted to know is whether you can find PAR ratings online somewhere for your particular light. The answer to that is probably not if it's a fluorescent light. There are figures posted online in various articles that give lux readings on normal-output fluorescent tubes, power compacts, T8s and probably even HO T5s somewhere. I know I come across them from time to time. I don't believe I have ever seen PAR ratings on fluorescents online. The reason there are lux ratings is because that's what buyers who use fluorescents to light their office or showroom, or whatever, want to know.

It's an entirely different story with metal halide lamps because Dr. Sanjay Joshi has published numerous tests over the years on the various brands of metal halide lamps in various Kelvin ratings, various wattages and with various different ballasts. So we have a great source of comparative data for metal halides but not fluorescents.

There are articles that compare say HO T5 tubes with or without individual reflectors and from those we know that individual reflectors make a tremendous difference. There are articles comparing VHO with normal-output fluorescents and power compact fluorescents. There are articles comparing the PAR of a daylight power compact fluorescent to the PAR of an actinic power compact fluorescent and from those we know that the actinic puts out only about one-third as much PAR as the daylight, which is not to say that you shouldn't use actinics.

In the end, the only thing that really matters is what you can keep in your particular setup. Start out with some low-light softies and work your way up from there. Obviously you don't want to stick any clams or SPS in there but you should be able to keep a lot of other stuff that is not as demanding when it comes to light intensity. Remember that the intensity under any fluorescent lamp is greatest in the middle of the tube and weaker at the ends. The intensity of light in your tank will be much higher halfway up the rockwork in the middle of your tank than it will be at the edges of the sand bed on the sides of your tank.

P.S. added 8/20/10:

I would probably order the Milwaukee Mw700 Lux Meter. It's only $74 on Amazon.com and some other online sites.

On this site they offer to ship it free. I think I paid $95 + $6.95 shpg back in 2003 for something very similar, so $74 with free shipping is a pretty good deal. It has a submersible probe with a 1 meter cord, so as long as your tank is no more than about 3-ft deep, you're good to go.

Remember to turn off your pumps before taking the readings so that the numbers won't bounce around because of light spikes caused by your metal halides, assuming you have metal halides.

[Parrothead]

Ninong,

didn't the grim reaper over at RC publish one that listed the diff. par reading of various bulbs??????

[Ninong]

Ninong,

didn't the grim reaper over at RC publish one that listed the diff. par reading of various bulbs??????

I don't know. Besides, there is nobody named "grim reaper" on RC. There is a Grim Reefer and a Grim Reeper. I tried searching under those two names but RC's search feature is not working because it produced no results at all for either name.

[bautiSTUD73]

I saw the chart parrot was talking about , so if each bulb puts out diff PAR should i just switch bulbs to ATI bulbs or another brand to maintain a healthier tank?

[bautiSTUD73]

par - tfivetesting .Just in case you still couldn't find it ninong

[Ninong]

par - tfivetesting .Just in case you still couldn't find it ninong

You should always consider either PAR or intensity when choosing fluorescents. It's nice if you have PAR comparisons of different lamps to help you make your decision.