Lighting Question

[Tigger]

I am thinking of buying a workhorse 7 ballast, and I was wondering if it is better to use 2 110W compact flour. or 4 NO T8 flour. I would like to grow softies, LPS corals and an anenome. Which produces more light and which has a better colour? Which model (colour spectrum) of bulb do you recommend? Is Albrite the cheapest place to get this stuff?
Thanks
Steve

[StirCrazy]

two 96 watt PC's would have a lot more punch to them than 4 NO T8's. as for colour.. I like 10000K but the 6700K have a higher PAR value but are a little less white. I have found that J&L's is cheeper than Albrite for 96 watt PC tubes also. only 74.00 for a 96 wattt PC at J&L's when I was there friday, as I recalled Albrite wanted 81.00 (and it would take a while to come in.)

Hope that helps
Steve

[CHEAPREEF]

I would agree go with the PC's, they have way more output for the same wattage. By the way where are you getting the workhorse ballast from? I think i'm going to get one to overdrive my NO's.

Clinton

[Tigger]

Thanks for your input

If PC bulbs are $74 each and the workhorse 7 cost $56 then the total price would be $204.

The T8 NO bulbs are around $5. A 4 bulb setup would be $96.

If I buy 2 workhorse 7 ballasts and 8 NO bulbs (only $192), would this be brighter than 2 PC bubls?
Can I use 2 workhorse 7 ballasts to overdrive 4 NO T8 bulbs?

Is the colour of PCs better than NO's?

[StirCrazy]

Tigger, the $5.00 NO T8 bulbs are fairly yellow.. for a good colour that will make your stuff look pretty you are going to pay 20.00 and up / bulb. I use normal daylight bulbs on my fresh water planted tanks but only because there is so much green inside the tank you can't tell the difference between different colour temps. having said that.. that is all personal tast.. if you like the colour then go for it.. but now with NO bulbs you will not get the punch that a PC has, I get 160 PAR from two 96 watt PC's at a depth of 12", on my fresh water tank I am running 4 T8's and I don't even get 1/2 of that.

if you were to go to 8 bulbs you would be putting more light over the tank but not increasing the intensity (does that make sence to you?) another way to put it would be your amount of light would be more evenly spread but you would not have "more" light at one particular spot. it is hard to explain but lets say you had 4 bulbs on a 24 inch wide tank. lets say each bulb puts out 2000 lumen (normal for a real good T8) so all togeather if you add up your bulbs you have 8000lumen, but directly under any bulb you only have 2000. now as you penatrate into the water lets say that you are only running one bulbs and 12" below it you get a reading of 300 lumen, as you move to the side it drops off more as you get farther away from the center of the bulb, now you add more bulbs.. what yyou have done is spread the light not intensafied it.. now at 12" you still have the same 300 lumen but as you move sideways away from the bulb it stays at 300 lumen because you are geting light spread across the tank now instead of just on one side.

now that I have totaly messed you up does that help? it is much easyer to explain this in person that on the computer but I hope you can grasp what my rambling was intending to say :D

from a money point of view.. two workhorse 7's 120.00 and 8 T8 bulbs 30 to 40is.. and you have a yellowish tank with no actinics.. if you buy a mix of actinic and ultra daylight T'8's now you are at 160.00 for bulbs. 2 96 watt PC's and one workhourse ~200.00 I would go with the PC's and the workhorse 7 myself..

Steve

[Tigger]

Thanks Again :D

So let me know what you think of this. If I buy one workhorse 7 ballast and hook up 2 6500K 96W PC's and also run 2 4-foot NO attinics, would this be enough for Softies, LPS and Anenomes? What other things could this lighting support?

My tank is 6ft long, so I could put the 2 PC's in the middle across the tank and put one attinic on the front right and one attinic on the back left. (Are 96W PC's about 3 ft long?)

Would there be enough lights reaching the edges of the tank?

Where can I get the end caps for PC lights? Do you know how much they cost?

Steve

[StirCrazy]

Originally posted by Tigger:
would this be enough for Softies, LPS and Anenomes?

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">I am no expert on Anenomes, but from everything I haave read and from other peoples responces about them. If you are thinking of getting one then you should be looking at MH lighting.

as for the others.. well maby, it depends on a lot of other factors, how wide is your tank, how deep is it.. ect.. I myself (after I order two more PC's) will be running 4, 36" 96 watt PC's on a 3 foot long tank.

There are a fair amount of low light stuff you could keep, but you are severly limiting yourself. it might be better to go with 2 or 3 MH's and NO actinic IMO.

Steve

[reefburnaby]

Hi,

I run normal daylights and actinics. It is true that the water gets rather yellow over time, but I just add some carbon to the water for a couple days to get rid of the yellow.

The usualy mix between actinics and 6500K is about 50/50. For every actinic, you have a 6500K. In most cases, this will work and the colour is rather pleasing.

So, T8s aren't out of the question. They are still cheaper by a fair margin.

BTW WH7 with T8s...is overdriven by default (2x).

- Victor.

[ 28 April 2002, 23:22: Message edited by: reefburnaby ]

[stephane]

Originally posted by reefburnaby:
Hi,

I run normal daylights and actinics. It is true that the water gets rather yellow over time, but I just add some carbon to the water for a couple days to get rid of the yellow.

The usualy mix between actinics and 6500K is about 50/50. For every actinic, you have a 6500K. In most cases, this will work and the colour is rather pleasing.

So, T8s aren't out of the question. They are still cheaper by a fair margin.

BTW WH7 with T8s...is overdriven by default (2x).

- Victor.

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">100% agree mix daylight with philips actinic will by top nuch

[canadawest]

I guess the question is whether or not 4 T8's (overdriven x2) have the same outut (PAR) as 2 96W PC lamps? My guess would be no. IMO the extra money spent on the 2 PC lamps ($132) over the T8 lamps ($??) would be worth the increase in light output, rather than the better coverage of the 4 T8 lamps. (This is entirely based on the assumption that 2 96W 6700K PC lamps have a higher PAR value than 4 6500K T8 lamps overdriven x2)

With that in mind I think your plans to add 2 96W PC 6700K lamps with a pair of 48" 40W NO actinics would certainly give you an increase in intensity, nice coloration, as well as good coverage of your tank for a relatively low cost (less than $200).

Steve (StirCrazy), I don't think the suggestion of going to "2 or 3 MH's" is even a valid one here as it seems obvious to me that Steve (Tigger) is looking for a relatively inexpensive upgrade to his lighting. MH would be at least a $600 option for just two ballasts and two lamps and that would not even be nominal considering he has a 6' tank to light. Seems to me that Steve (Tigger) is looking to stay in the $200 ballpark here (ballast + lamps)

With the aforementioned combo of 2x96W 6700K PC lamps with 2x40W NO Actinics you would be able to keep pretty much any softie, mushroom or polyp, and most LPS corals. You wouldn't be "severely limiting yourself" to anything except most SPS corals and clams. You could easily keep a T. Derasa clam though under that lighting. As for an Anemone again I see no problems under that lighting, providing you are supplementally feeding it and keeping good stable water parameters.

So it seems the thing that needs to be answered here is which provides more light (total PAR) 2x96W 6700K PC lamps or 4x32W 6500K T8 lamps overdriven x2?