80W NO T12 reef?...I must be crazy.

[Stab_Master_Arson]

That's right. I am going for the easy and cheap way out on my second reef and I am going the way of the good old T12 coralife bulbs. Powering these lights will be a 18 dollar balast and set-up from Canadian Tire simply labeled "work light". Now why do you think that this ridiculous idea will work? Well simple, because one of my close friends pulled it off a while back...but he put the cheapness to shame when he upgraded to hard corals and scraped his budget masterpiece. No ice caps for this tank. No 150 dollar VHO ballasts. No 40 million dollar metal halide contraptions that put the temperature of the Sun to shame. I plan on putting the debate to rest, once and for all.

If you guys want to comment on my obvious insanity then please do.
If you want to place wagers that my soft corals will die a horrible horrible death then be my guess. I doubt they will though.

I plan on recording their growth and colour. I am conviced that certain polyps, mushrooms and fingers will thrive under these lighting conditions.

I am well aware that the suggested lighting is between 1W and 1000000000W and then back again.

The NO bulb needs to be returned to the glory it once had. The T12 desearves greater respect.

BTW, This is my first post and I am glad to find a Canadian reef community.... Much more local then Aquaria central.

[Invigor]

I won't knock t12s, but if you want NO t8 is where it's at then overdrive them with a wh7 ballast.

[DanG]

Wow, ghetto reef.

[fakename]

All I can say is that WE NEED PICS!! Haha! Look forward to seeing how the experiment goes!
Cheers,
Aaron

[Stab_Master_Arson]

Fakename, WIll do.

After talking to a few people I am going to take their suggestions and put in a sump and buy a better protein skimmer first. I know, I know...I am taking away from the budget..ness of the reef tank but the point is to test the lighting and not the other equipment.

I don't know if putting the corals high in the tank is cheating but that is what I plan.

I will probably have the whole set up created in the next couple months since I am now going to blow about 400 bucks...Hell, there is no such thing as "blown Money" when in comes to an aquarium...except on lighting IMHO....and on over priced live stock..(can I through in my props to J&L aquatics, the best Aquarium store I have ever been to with the most reasonable prices.)

I already had a psuedo-reef before but since then have been only really Fish, LR and inverts. I want to get the corals going again. Softy corals that is.

Thanks

[Stab_Master_Arson]

DanG.

Indeed, a ghetto tank. the perculas will have "dice games" every thursday and saturday.

[Stab_Master_Arson]

Invigor, T8's?

I heard of this over driving through ice caps etc but can these items you speak of be purchased from Canadian tire or from another budget store not meant for aquarists?

[Invigor]

hmm workhorse ballasts shouldn't be hard to find, but they're about $50 manufactured by "fulham". I've had best luck with philips daylight deluxe bulbs from home depot, they're about $5/bulb and 6500k they must shift colors when you crank em up cuz they get whiter. (I do however now run t5s and halides, but done on a ghetto budget and all DIY)

[AndyL]

Overdriving - pretty easy on T8/T12s... Take a 2x40 ballast, hook up so that both leads are powering one bulb. Its just that easy. (yes people do take a 4x40 ballast and drive one bulb with it...)

Do your reading on ODNO before you do it though. If you don't do it right, you could easily burn your house down.

Andy

[Saltysteve]

Ahhh, you're just mimicking the commercial pet stores