Question about weekend lighting on a Nano....

[saltycube]

I'm setting up a 24g Nano in my office waiting room. The lighting that came with the Nano is easy enough to switch off/on BUT, I'm only open from Monday to Friday so I won't be here to turn on the lights during the weekend. Will indirect light from door/windows be enough for corals or do I need to put the lights on a timer?
Reason I don't really want to do the timer is the moonlight LED's will not work that way...

 

[rotarymagic]

you're joking right??? you had hundreds of dollars to set it up yet you can't spare 10bucks for a digital timer?

 

[gatorwpb]

Indirect light through a window will not be enough for any coral IMO.
Just buy a timer with multiple plugs (2-stage maybe?) and it will turn the moonlights on when the main lights turn off. I have 3 sets of lights on one timer power strip: halides, actinics, and moonlights. Costs somewhere around $30.

 

[small triggers]

there is a 3 stage timer out there i think its made by corallife, it has 8 pluggs, 2 daytimes, 2 for actinics and 2 for moons. works great

 

[gmann1139]

What's the cord setup like? I know mine only has one plug for both the main lights as well as the moonlight, so I ended up having to rewire it to put in a timer.
If you're handy and have a soldering iron, its not too bad to complete.
But I realized afterwards I don't like the moonlight, so now I leave that off all the time.

 

[spiderwoman]

Just get a simple timer. It's not going to break the bank and it's easy enought to setup. We got our timer strip from local pet store. This was used in our 55g tank and it worked just fine.

 

[coral keeper]

Just get a timer from Wall-Mart for like $7. Don't leave the moonlights on every night. I did that and in about a year and a half the moon lights were crap. Now, I upgraded to a bigger nano and I only turn on the moonlights when I'm looking at the tank, when I'm done looking at the tank I turn the moon lights off.