Upgrading lights please add 2cents

[sduerk]

I am upgrading from almost 2 watts in my 55 gal to almost 5 watts per gallon here in the next week or so. Any advice you all could offer would be helpful, such as do I need more snails to account for any possible algae bloom? (7 or8), should I start out with the lights on for six hours a day and add an hour a day for the first week so I don't burn my corals that I already have? (green star polyps, umbrella leather) I am adding reef plus and reef trace by seachem, when should I start adding calcium and other elements in anticipation of more corals and an anemone for my clown fish.
The system is over three years old, rock is covered in corraline algae, I have five fish, hermits, snails, shrimp and all levels are good except nitrates which are at 20ppm.
Thanks for the advice.
Scott

 

[javajoe]

I went from 2 110 watt VHOs and 2 40 watt NOs to a total of 4 x 110 watt vhos. this was after the tank was running for a year. I only decreased my lighting about 2 hrs at first, then after 3 weeks was able to increase it to running from 1:30pm - 11pm. as far as algae, i did have a small bloom, which was easy to control. as for the coraline, you will find that different kinds of coraline require different lighting. i did experience some bleaching of my coraline, but this was soon covered over by other kinds of coraline. my tank was well estqablished as well, and i was surprised at how little change was taken place. i was expecting a lot more coraline to die, and figured it would take longer to recover. I keep all my levels good, so imagine that has a lot to do with my success. what type of lighting do you have now, and what are you going to? that may help people give you some more pointers.
I cant tell exactly what will happen for you, just what i experienced.
good luck--
joe

 

[zack schwartz]

I argee with java vho are good but mh i feel are just as good

 

[azonic]

I went from 0.88 watts per gallon a week ago (2 x 40 watt normal outputs)....to 9.7 watts per gallon this week (dual 400 watt halides with the flourescents used as actinic.) I noticed a small algae bloom on the sand but it's far from unsitely..i kinda like it actually, sorta got a yellow/green color to it and it's only a very very sparse amount of it. My glass gets a lot more algae grow on it..I could usually go 4-5 days without cleaning my glass with my magnet...now if i dont do it everyday i cant see in the tank. I only have 10 or so snails...they are so damned expensive at $3 a pop, i bought an algae magnet for $20 which was cheaper then buying the amount of snails I would of needed to keep the algae under control. PLUS I have hermit crabs who love to eat a snail when it falls off the glass....they even chase them up the glass from time to time until i knock them off...other then that I never noticed any negative effects....all my corals are opening wider then ever before, my one inch mushroom opens to 4 inches under my new lights! right now im at 880 watts....by christmas I will be removing the two normal output actinics, and replacing them with 4 x 110 watt vho actinics which will give me 13.7 watts per gallon.
But don't base your decision on watts per gallon, that's just a very loose-ended way of looking at lighting IMO.
I'd wait until you get the lights going and judge it based on them running for a week or so. Don't buy extra snails yet, they will die if you don't have enough algae to feed them