Lighting Question

[aquatix]

I bought a Orbit 24-Hour Lighting System that has two lunar lights, floursent and actinic bulbs. My aquarium is a 70 gallon pentagon and will contain fish, anemones and minor corals, not a hard core reef tank but a few corals.
My question is how long do u suggest I keep on each light? I have timers for the flouresent and actinic. Here is what one web site suggests:
Use the Compact Fluorescent Dual Daylight and Dual Actinic bulbs for lighting for twelve hours during the day and use the Lunar Light(s) to illuminate the tank with a dim blue moon-lite glow for the twelve hours a day your Compact Fluorescent bulbs are turned off.
Does 12 hours seem long? Will that cause a lot of algae build up? Leaving the lunar lights on 24 hours a day is cool?
When I first opened the box I thought the actinic lights where the night time ones
What do you guys suggest?

 

[bigb]

use the actinics to simulate dawn and dusk, you can run them 12hrs, have them come on an hour or two before flourescents come on and go off. When both the a's and f's go off have your moonlights come on.

 

[aquatix]

When both the a's and f's go off have your moonlights come on.
geeze, so I need 3 timers?

 

[coopersx]

Consider yourself lucky that you have 3 seperate power cords...some units only have 2.
Question: Do you count the one hr. before the full spectrum lights come on as part of the 12hr lighting period?
Example: Blue light on for one hr--- Daylight and blue light both on for 10 Hrs.--- blue light on for one hr. before moonlights come on. = 12 hrs of lighting...or do I need 12 hrs. of the Fullspectrum daylight/blue actinic lights.
Also the pentagon tanks are usually pretty deep...you may be a bit underpowered in lighting if things are not right up top under the lights.
Thanks, Wayne

 

[bigb]

12hr total for both actinics and flos. So actinics would be on full twelve, and flos for ten.
If you had to double your lighting.. youd need six timmers. lol or consider something more powerful than pcs.
If you set your timers so they go off around the time you go to bed you could manually turn on the moon lights. then turn em off when you get up, by then natural daylight would make their appearance fade anyway. The problem with this, other than being a pain in the A**, is that on weekend nights when you stay up later, your tank goes to bed before you want it to.

 

[aquatix]

Is there a problem with just leaving the lunars on 24 hours a day? I turned them on and off when the other 2 were on and you can't notice a thing? Can it hurt if the lunars are always on?

 

[bigb]

only thing would be that they'd burn out faster, they are LED's so they should last quite a long time. If you remember to turn them off while the others are on they'll last longer.
They don't add any extra wattage. They only promote a more natural nocturnal setting the life in your tank, some of which are more reproductive at night.
They also let you see what everything does when the lightd go off.

 

[coopersx]

<SNIP> "only thing would be that they'd burn out faster, they are LED's so they should last quite a long time. If you remember to turn them off while the others are on they'll last longer."
LOL...and that is why at Current USA website they state "and you can leave the lunar lights on all the time" like they are trying to "subtly" endorse it. The Orbit does have a convienent seperate power supply for the moonlight. No biggy if you forget to unplug it and it is not on a timer though.
Take care, Wayne

 

[bigb]

Originally Posted by coopersx
LOL...and that is why at Current USA website they state "and you can leave the lunar lights on all the time" like they are trying to "subtly" endorse it.
If you think about it, most alarm clocks and digital watches are LED. Have you ever known one of them to burn out?

 

[coopersx]

I do not disagree with that. That is not stated on their web site but should be common knowledege. But what makes me laugh is that Current states that they can be left on 24/7...as if that is some sort of special feature.
Take care, Wayne