vho vs. compacts ?

[slipknottin]

Thats a low-medium light tank. Coralline grows better in low light.


CF by definition is a bulb that is bent in half. Coralife bulbs are no different.

 

[Pisces]

In the 4 pin design the "2 bulbs" are connected in the middle at the end are they not? Our Custom Sea Life bulbs are the 4-square pin type and the bulbs are connected, hence it's really one bulb, isn't it?

You were asking for opinions on PC lights and I let you know my experience with them, I've only been reefkeeping for 7 years. I don't think they are worth the money and I don't think they put out any better light than NO's or VHO's. If space is an issue, sure they can be useful. If you ARE growing algae everywhere, that should be a sign that something isn't right with your water or the lighting is just perfect for the algae. I personally don't want to grow algae in my tank, and I don't.

As for being adequate lighting for a 125G tank, it depends on what you're keeping in it. We had both hard and soft corals and they just didn't flourish until we switched to the halides. If you're mainly keeping mushrooms, a leather and some polyps I suppose you will do fine with the PC's because they are low light corals. I've never heard of a low light clam before, what species is that? All the clams I've seen for purchase around here require intense metal halide lighting to thrive.
______
I'm going to correct myself. Ok, if you use a combination of 6500K's and 10,000K's or all 10,000K's (or even 20,000K's), you shouldn't NEED to supplement the blue spectrum with actinics because the 10,000K and 20,000K should provide plenty of blue spectrum wavelengths. Does that sound right? Actinics are still useful for simulating dawn and dusk but wouldn't it just be blue spectrum overkill to leave them on all day? Maybe I'm wrong but we did switch our actinics for 6500K bulbs and I think it looks great with the 10,000K MH bulbs.
And of course if you only have 6500K's you should use actinics to supply the blue spectrum.
I'm sure you know already, but keep in mind that PC's come with plain "blue" bulbs, not true actinics. I don't know why that is, they really need to change that.

Sorry about the previous statement. I was mis-remembering (is that even a word?) an article that my husband had read aloud to me. I've done my reading and realize I goofed. It was getting very late and I had the wrong idea in my head. My bad! Sorry for the fuss. I really DO need to get more sleep...

 

[hammerandy]

I have a 125 gallon tank and I used 6-55 watt CP for three years and grew the greatest mushrooms and soft corals. 15 months ago I added two 175 MH 10K and now the tank has exploded with both hard and soft corals. I run the 6-55 watt CP two actinic and four 10k. I thought I grew great soft corals before. Now I cut and scrape star polyps, mushrooms and button polyps, and give them away. My leathers have popped babys all over the tank and my Bubble coral has doubled in size.

Spend the bucks!!! MH

Randy

 

[afkouns]

I stated that I have algae growth all over and not just the top, due to a previous reply stating taht CF's are only good in shalow tanks and that his algae only grew at the top where the lighting was most intense. Also there is no connection or bend at the end that I can determine that connects the to rods. How could the even make 50/50's like this if its sharing the same tube. The phosphours would mix! I have also read that CF's put out more lumens then VHO based on testing equipment and not just visual opinion. Since I have switched to atinics and the 10k's my corals seem to be doing much better then before. I would like to read the article on how atinics don't offer benefit. The reading I have done show how corals benefit from the intense blue spectrum to reproduce the zooanthanol which is there main source of food (its misspelled i'm sure). I do plan on adding MH's someday, but there isn't much budget for it right now and I don't want to cut into my brand new canopy. After doing extensive research on PAR and Lumens I have discovered that 3-5 watts per gallon that is typically stated is not a very good gauge to determine lighting needs. I used the Lumens method and have found from many sights that discuss lighting have shown I have good lighting for the types of corals I'm running and even a few hard corals. If I do want hard corals I can always place them near the top, but I don't at this time. Sorry I don't remember what species of low light clam it was. I have read there are some that you can get away with not running MH's.

 

[BrianH]

The lower light clams you are referring to would be Derasa and Squamosa. There are many opinions out there regarding different lighting methods. Most of them agree that CF is a valid method of lighting for a low to medium light tank. As far as comparisons to NO, there really isn't any. CF & VHO are much more suitable for reef tank than NO. I've also never seen any info stating actinic lighting does not enhance coral growth. Please note that almost all light reaching below 3 to 10 feet of water in the ocean is of the blue spectrum. This would lead you to believe that the actinic lighting should be benificial to coral growth. Since most of the lighting options out there are so new, most of this information is theoretical. That being said, I would just research the options out there and make the decision that best suits my situation.
JMHO
Brian