[roddey]

I have a 75 gallon tank I am setting up. I used 2 -250 watt Metal Hylide and 2 96 watt blue actinic.Just with the Metal Halyde lights on they light up the whole room.Here is a picture of my stand.

I think I should go and take a light MH out. Do you all think I overdid it?Would I be OK with 1-250 watt MH and 2 96 watt CF Blue Actimnic? Here is another idea I have. What if I have one side come on then both come on for a couple hours then the side that was on first go off with the remaining MH light on till the CF lights come on in the evening for a couple hours till the moon lights come on? What do you all think?Help, new to reef tank but not to saltwater and freshwater tanks.

Edit: I resized your image so it fits better on the page, hope you don't mind.

Zhenya

[roddey]

Help!!! What should I do?

[Ninong]

Two 250w metal halides with two 96w actinic PCs is not too much light for a 75-gal tank. It's considerably less than the intensity of tropical sunlight in the upper few meters of the ocean.

I would suggest that you run the actinic fluorescents 12 hrs/day and the metal halides 10 hrs/day.

Good luck!



P.S. -- If you want to see an example of overkill in the lighting department, check out this 54-gal corner tank with 2,200 watts of metal halides plus 190 watts of VHO actinics! Most people would say that that's too much lighting but to each his own I guess.

[zhenya]

My tank(75g) is lit by two 250w MH and two 110w VHO actinic bulbs. It is not too much at all, in fact I was really contemplating switching to 400watt bulbs and simply raising them few inches higher...
I think the problem may be in that your canopy is too shallow and light spills too much into the room. Is it mogul base bulbs or the double ended type?

[roddey]

Oh what canopy?I thought about it today and went and got some 1x12 to build one. Thanks all. Rod

[roddey]

Oh and while I was about town I bought a used tank from a LFS employee he had running in the back. A 40 gallon whith a coralife 2 96 watt CF strip light for 100 dollars to use as a sump.Thanks all.

[sihaya]

Roddey- Note that, if I'm not mistaken, Ninong and Gene keep tanks with a lot of intense light loving acropora and montipora. What kind of corals do you want to keep?

Yes, with your lighting, you'll probably still have less light than natural sunlight over the reef. However, something to consider is that the corals we get at LFS are usually from waters a lot deeper than our aquariums. Granted, a lot are still from swallow water. But what's "shallow" water on a reef? 10ft down? 5ft down? It's still considerably deeper than your 2-3ft tall aquarium. And you won't even be putting the corals at the bottom of the tank.

Are the MH lights HQIs? or electronic or standard? If they're HQIs I'd start with one 250w MH (plus the actinic). You can always add the second light later if you don't think your corals are getting enough light. If they're mogul base electronic or standard, then the two might not be too much.

Btw, I'd mount a fan near the lights. You're going to get a lot of heat from all that lighting.

Good luck

[Ninong]

Sara,

As you will see if you read this post that I made just a few days ago, you're not disagreeing with me at all.

My response in this thread was to the specific question of whether he had "too much" light for his tank. He doesn't have too much light. Could he get by quite nicely with less light even if he intends to keep SPS? Of course!

[sihaya]

Oh, I didn't mean to disagree with you necessarily... I just wanted to get roddey thinking more about specific coral needs rather than the over all question "is this enough light for a 75g tank?"

In fact, the language of of the post you linked is nearly identical to the langauge of asira's acropora care sheet: www.asira.org - Acropora In fact, the language is so similar, I hope you don't think I stole that from you.

Personally, I'm always baffled by the "is this enough light for a __ gallon tank" question. People should be asking "is this enough light for a __ft deep tank in which I want to keep ___ ?" I'm really not one to talk though. When I first set up my tank I asked the same silly question. Then when I got a mix of vague answers, I just bought the most powerful light I could find and hung it from chains and airline tubing from my ceiling so I could shift and swing around all I wanted. LOL