Lighting 180G (72x24x24)

[intarsiabox]

DE is Double Ended, it has electrical points on each side of the bulb. I believe your fixture is DE. The other type is mogal which is a screw in MH bulb. If you are still using the original bulb you will probably want to upgrade to a higher quality bulb and then you will get the proper coloring of a 14K bulb.

[ALang]

OK. Thanks. It is pretty obvious now that you mentioned Dbl Ended as DE.
And I do agree that I will need to change them very soon. That's why I am seeking advice. But with all the bewildering arrayed brands of bulbs out there, can someone please suggest a few (readily available, pls) that I can try, in order to get that nice blueish color? Do I need to go higher than 10,000K ?? Right now I have the 10,000K ( thought they were 14,000K) Coralife brand bulb that came with the fixture. Don't ever remember the lights as being that blue, though.

[intarsiabox]

Yeah, 10k bulbs give off a yellowish look to the tank. I don't have MH's myself at the moment have have heard lots of good reviews on the Phoenix 14k bulbs and they are less expensive than most other bulbs. 14k will give a nice whitish blue color but not too blue as a 20k bulb would.

[ALang]

Thanks buddy. I'll try to source out for these bulbs. I cannot wait to see if they help the outlook of my tank's inhabitants.

[intarsiabox]

I know JL Aquatics has them at a pretty good price but I have not looked locally for them. Give Blue World or Marine Aquaria a try. There's also SOSlightbulbs in the states. They're cheap but only ship via UPS or FedEx so brokerage may be an issue and the good price may not be so great in the end.

[Myka]

I have those same Coralife 10,000K bulbs too! They sit my closet collecting dust! They are my spare bulbs in case one gets blown, they just came with a fixture I bought. They are horrible. I would also suggest Phoenix 14,000K or for a really blue look XM 20,000K. You will get much more PAR out of the the Phoenix though, and you can always use some heavy actinics like UVL Super Actinic to make the corals pop even more. Most actinic bulbs have low PAR, but the UVLs are out of the ordinary because they have a strangely high PUR output in comparison, so they are really great bulbs as well. Of course if you want even more output you can use a "blue" bulb instead of actinic like 18,000-22,000K. Having the DE halides over your 24" deep tank you should have plenty of PAR to not have to worry too much about that, and just pick bulbs that you think look the nicest. Imo, the Phoenix bulbs look great on their own too.

[ALang]

Thanks everyone! In this hobby, when every little bit of equipment/ livestock is so expensive, this is a great forum for us newbies at the hobby to succeed, without throwing money at things that are sub-par or plainly not work. I have struggled for years and have read all the serious books coming out of professionals, but still have no way of testing stuff that they mentioned due to cash restraint. Or to weed out what is it that I really NEED instead of WANT.
My interest in this hobby have re-surfaced, and I am hoping that this time around, I will have results similar to a lot of the ones that I have admired in these "bragging pages". I will have a lot of questions in the future, and I am gratified that so many of you are caring enough to reply to my simple questions.