200 watt/gal with Power Compacts?

gliderpt

gliderpt

Member
I'm a bit new to Saltwater and am a bit confused about lighting. I have 4 * 24 watt PC bulbs for a 40 gal tank. In the future, I'd like to be able to have corals, clams, etc... I've been doing a lot of web research and have found a page that states "One 9-watter is equivalent to a standard 75 watt incandescent" (http://saltaquarium.about.com/librar.../aa041100e.htm )
If this is true then (conversion) 75*24/9=200 watts out of evey PC bulb. (200 watts * 4 bulbs) / 40 gallons = an amazing 20 watts per gallon!?
Is this true???
If not, any ideas on good suppliers of premade PC or VHO fixtures?
Any help and/or insights are greatly appreciated.
 
glinton

glinton

Member
I have had the exact same question. From what I can gather, there are some that love PC's and there are some that don't. The ones that don't say that they have tried PC's and they didn't work well for their corals and when they put on VHO's their corals perked right up. But, there is really no proof as to why VHO's are better than PC's. It seems to be a mystery. Personally, I am going to try the PC's. I just bought a used 2X55 strip.
Hope this helps. Do a search for "power compacts" or "PC", there are quite a few posts on this subject.
 
jonthefb

jonthefb

Active Member
ok, gilderpt, your equation is correct, however you cannot take the incandescent wattage rating of your pc bulbs and use that to figure the total watts per gallon. pc's run on a ballast (transformer) that drops the current from your regular ole wall outlet to a sufficient amount that is then used to power your flourescent tubes, however, just because they run on less electricity and are smaller wattage than incandescent, they still need to be considered in their own right. incandescent lights are horrible for reef tanks, for many reasons. sure they are cheap, but they burn a lot of electricity, are a horrible yellow color temperature, and do not have the long life that a pc, vho or metal halide do. now flourescents, and pc's and vhos's and ho's and no's ar eall types of flourescents, all have the ability to be coated inside with phosphors, which allow for truly actinic bulbs, and can be created with many differnet color temperatures (degrees of kelvin) in mind. the ones we want to capitalize on for our reef tanks are the daylight bulbs at 10,000K and teh super actinic ones. if you go to home depot or any hardware store, they will sell dalight deluk fourescent bulbs that are NO, however, their color temp rating is only 6500K, and although it does look a little blue when fired up, it still isnt the true crisp white/blue daylight bulb that is used to mimic midday sun on a coral reef., so basically your conversion chart is correct, in that pc's are much brighter than incandescents, while using a third of the energy, however when talking about illuminating a reef tank you are really comparing apples to oranges!
hope this helps, if you have any other questions i cand try to clarify, ask away!
good luck
jon
 
db

db

Member
With your 4 24watt pc's you would be able to keep a variety of soft corals. You definetly don't have enough wattage for clams, but you can start building a reef now with what you have.
 
eddie g

eddie g

Member

Originally posted by glinton
I have had the exact same question. From what I can gather, there are some that love PC's and there are some that don't. The ones that don't say that they have tried PC's and they didn't work well for their corals and when they put on VHO's their corals perked right up. But, there is really no proof as to why VHO's are better than PC's. It seems to be a mystery. Personally, I am going to try the PC's. I just bought a used 2X55 strip.
Hope this helps. Do a search for "power compacts" or "PC", there are quite a few posts on this subject.

I think pc bulbs have been improving. Maybe these people that found VHO better the pc's, did this when the pc bulbs weren't as good. The bulbs sold as actinic in the past were more blue light and had less actinic. And now they have 10,000k etc for the sunlight bulbs. When I started with pc's in 98 they didn't have all these true actinic, super actinic and 10,000k daylight bulbs.
Eddie G
 
glinton

glinton

Member
Eddie! You're a genius. Well, you at least said what I was wanting to hear. I just bought a PC unit and was hoping that it was a good choice.
Thanks for the info.
I am getting an All-Glass 2X55 unit with straight pin bulbs. Any suggestions on which bulbs (brand) to get?
E-mail me at glinton@plainviewbible.org so we don't steal gliderpt's post.
Thanks!
 
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