SPS, MH and bulb distance

[Aquattro]

I can't find the poll/thread from years ago, so thought I'd revisit this.

for those running MH over SPS tanks, what distance are your bulbs from the water?

[lastlight]

I run SE (no shields) and they are about 7" from the surface.

[lorenz0]

150 de and it's 8-9 inches

[Delphinus]

I'll have to measure to be sure since it's been a while since I hung the lights and I don't remember but my goal was 12" for the lamps (not the bottom of the reflectors but the bulbs themselves). Wanted a little more height for a couple reasons: reaching in with a hand without burning my elbow, heat mitigation, and better coverage/less shadows/less-straight-up-and-down-angles so that corals have some hope of side lighting since before with lamps closer to the surface I always had corals dieing out at the bottom and I really want to avoid that with this tank. I forget but there was a fellow out east with a similar sized tank to my own (was big on reefescape.ca when that board was still around) who went 12" and I sort of modeled my lights after his tank.

[ScubaSteve]

I've got a 250W Coralife about 4" above the water of my 40g, though I would like to raise it up a couple of inches to get better coverage (square tank).

[gobytron]

I have my lights within 5" if the water surface...
I run 2 HQI 250W halides and sometimes I think the light is too intense in the topo half of my 24" deep tank as I often have new corals bleach out even if they came from a comparably lit tank.

I have been contemplating moving them up to around 8" off the water surface.

Looking forward to more hobbyist input here.