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$eaba$$
10-24-2008, 8:12 PM
Hi guys,

So I have a DIY hood that i have made, and I am swapping out my lights in it. Currently, I have a 15 watt t5 bulb, and 2 coralife 20 watt 50/50 bulbs in it; 55 watts of lighting in it. I just purchased some PC lights, and am going to swap them out for the current lights either tonight, or tomorrow. I got one customsealife retrofit kit, and one sunpaq retrofit kit, each with 65 watt (50/50:10,000K/Actinic) power compact bulbs, and each light has an individual reflector. This puts me at a total of 130 watts of lighting over my 20 gallon high tank. Would you guys classify this as low, medium, or high lighting for my tank, just so I know about what kind of corals I could get. Also, would you expect a lot more algae to appear in my tank, and is there a way I could stop that? One more quick one; do you think I could keep some type of anemone in my tank with this lighting?

Thanks all, and I will post pictures as soon as it's done!!
Amphiprion
10-24-2008, 9:07 PM
That is on the lower end of medium lighting. It will allow you to keep most, if not all "soft" corals, polyps, and a good number of 'lps' corals. You should only see an increase in algae if other conditions are conducive to their growth.
$eaba$$
10-25-2008, 12:29 AM
well I am thinking of changing one of yhe bulbs to a 10000k. That would put me at around 100 watts of 10000k and 30 watts of actinic; where do you think that would put me, and would you recommnd I do that? Would I lose a lot of color from the corals due to the 10000k instead of the actinic?

Thanks!!
Amphiprion
10-25-2008, 9:16 AM
That would give you more of an edge on intensity, but not terribly much further. The next step up would be T5HO or metal halide lighting. A good T5 or MH setup will allow you to keep whatever you want.
$eaba$$
10-27-2008, 6:38 PM
If I did change to 1 10,000K and 1 50/50, or both 10,000Ks, will I notice a big difference in the color of my corals? Will it put me from low medium light to higher light, or will it be the same roughly?

Thanks
Amphiprion
10-27-2008, 6:54 PM
Slightly more light, but in the same general tier of intensity. Yes, you'll lose some fluorescence with the exclusion of actinic spectra.