Help With Metal Halide

[Chris]

This is excellent info thanks guys.


Chris did you edit my last post instead of quoting it ?

:o


Opps!

If you plan on keeping a lot of SPS than 400's are really the way to go. Considering the size of that 150G they would be great for it with some Spiderlight reflectors or the Diamond Lumenarc III reflectors.

6500K bulbs definately give you the most growth. The higher up the Kelvin rating you go... the more pleasing it can be to the eye. With the Iwasaki's you'll probably need VHO actinics to make the tank look nice... you probably won't need any actinic support with the 20K Radiums.

A lot of it is preference in color, but your bulb will also help determine the colors that come out in your corals.

[Tim Marvin]

I stand corrected! The pendant is a reef opix from sunlight supply, but it is running on an icecap electronic ballast and works great! I have gone from $500 a month electric bill to $200. I changed all the ballast, took off a couple pumps, and a window air conditioner. I am just guessing that the lights were half of that bill. Maybe a little less. The air conditioner only ran every couple days. when it got really hot.

[Tim Marvin]

I think this is the exact set-up I got from Vinh, only with the AB bulb. Very nice, and I only gave him $150 cash for it brand new not even wired yet. Oh yeh, I did have to give him my 150watt geissmann. I like the 250 better though in my application it just works better.

[ziggyrocket]

I was thinking about tim's comment on power consumption on metal halides saving 300 bucks a year...thats alot of light you are using tim. I did some research as i have been wanting to upgrade to some MH's soon, and was crunchin all the numbers. The typical coil and cap ballast's are pretty efficient, and if you figure a 250 watt bulb is consuming 250 watts then it uses .25kw per hour, and i know here in texas the average price for elecricity is .065 cents per kilo watt hr so a 250 watt bulb uses once cent of electricity per hour, 24 cents a day..which is about 7 bucks a month. And that is an efficient estimate. If i used metal halides on my tank, i would double the power consumption in my apartment per month...thats a crazy thought...so im trying to think of a more efficient way to do it...maybe ill crack cold fusion
By the way...thanks for the corals tim...they look great, and I would gladly recomend you to anyone...great stuff.