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fishkid1000
Guest
Will 4 T5s on a 50 gallon be enough lighting for sps coral?
spsfreak100
Active Member
Now, you meantioned in another thread that you finally got your tank setup. You should first wait 7 (seven) months before adding any small polyped scleractinian.
You meantioned that your tank consists of:
I bought a prizim skimmer, an overflow, a biowheel thingy, a maxijet 900 and 40 pounds of reef sand. I am so happy it is finally set up and cycling. woot wooot
You will be needing much more current for your tank. You may also want to get rid of the Bio-wheel. You may also want to think about a better quality skimmer, such as a Euro-Reef. Prizms seem to work best on smaller sized aquariums.
Remember that lighting is not the only factor that keeps an SPS thriving. You should have a strong amount of current going throughout the tank. You should also have excellent water quality (which includes a steady calcium and alkalinity level and no phosphate present [phosphate disables calcification]). Knowledge is also extremely important. You will find that lighting only plays a very small role in keeping SPS. What do I do during the seven months of waiting? Reaserch, reaserch, reaserch.
Keep in mind that I wouldn't put SPS or clams under anything but halides. I am not saying that it cannot be done, I am just stating that I wouldn't do it. If you really wanted to get serious with keeping SPS, I would get halides. Period. Nothing else gets the job done
Take care,
Graham
You meantioned that your tank consists of:
I bought a prizim skimmer, an overflow, a biowheel thingy, a maxijet 900 and 40 pounds of reef sand. I am so happy it is finally set up and cycling. woot wooot
You will be needing much more current for your tank. You may also want to get rid of the Bio-wheel. You may also want to think about a better quality skimmer, such as a Euro-Reef. Prizms seem to work best on smaller sized aquariums.
Remember that lighting is not the only factor that keeps an SPS thriving. You should have a strong amount of current going throughout the tank. You should also have excellent water quality (which includes a steady calcium and alkalinity level and no phosphate present [phosphate disables calcification]). Knowledge is also extremely important. You will find that lighting only plays a very small role in keeping SPS. What do I do during the seven months of waiting? Reaserch, reaserch, reaserch.
Keep in mind that I wouldn't put SPS or clams under anything but halides. I am not saying that it cannot be done, I am just stating that I wouldn't do it. If you really wanted to get serious with keeping SPS, I would get halides. Period. Nothing else gets the job done
Take care,
Graham
aileena
Member
I agree that you should wait at least 4 or 5 months until your tank is developed to add just about any coral, including sps. But I respectfully dissent with my collegues as to whether or not I would put sps under VHO. I believe that if you have enough VHO then you can experiment with low loght sps with some success: birdsnest, and some types of montipora are examples. I have no idea about T5 lighting however, so as to that I can express no opinions...
reefnut
Active Member
There is no doubt that the T5's has a place in the reef world but I still don't understand why they get compared to MHs. The intensity per-watt may be higher but to get the wattage it takes more bulbs. How many T5's would it take to equal 800w of MH? Using the assumption that 4- 54watt 48" T5 equal 1- 250w MH then it would take 13 T5's to equal 800w of MH.
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ohioballer
Guest
i like my T5's alot so far they are very intense but had a major diatom bloom also so we will have to see how it goes but so far so good. i would have to agree totally with the 18 in depth rule my leathers do great with the light about 5 inches from the bottom in my 55 gallon
sammystingray
Active Member
I've read it takes 5 54 watt t5s to equal one 250 watt halide....so you would need ten over a tank, and it still isn't as intense. I don't have first hand experience, but I have done some reading.....seems to me, they are NOT an equal replacement for halides at all, but seem to be a possible step up from regular VHO only due to size.....you can fit more in. Most available research I find is biased someway, and since they are new...no long term research has been done. I read one report that the spectrum was shifting badly after only six months...tubes can never really equal a source point light....the glimmer source points put out due to water distortion is the light actually being magnified in short blasts, and may hit the corals in short burst at 2 or 3 times the strength of what the light is even putting out. Tubes stretched the tanks length can never do that. We have hobbiests using them, so we will get to see long term results as time goes by.....they are so new, it's hard to really have much to say about them IMO.