Metal Hallide Help

Im in the power delivery field and have a question about metal hallides. A guy I work with had a 240 reef with everything a few years back. He used the hallides that we use for outdoor street lighting, just added plugs to them, used our bulbs and put them in a GFI and hung them from the ceiling. Is this something that anyone hear has done? Is it ridiculous or feisable, because he's telling me that when he did it he actually got things to grow that he couldn't in the past. We have 70 watts and 250's. I was thinking of doing this with 2 70's for my 90 gallon for softy and lower light corals. Any suggestions?

 

You can do that I guess... I wouldn't recommend it, when I first started my tank my dad is a contractor so I was going to do the same exact thing, wattage is important but what is equally important is the kelvins the bulbs produce, and I believe if i remember correctly most industrial bulbs kelvins are not adequate for keeping a reef tank. But its worth a try!

 

I have seen several tank that people have just used street or parking lit fixtures, But the bulbs are a different story, i am thinking that they are all somewhere around 3 to 5k and i think all you would grow with that is a good crop of algae. I may be wrong though.

 

Agreed. It will work, just acquire some reasonable bulbs.