Really need help with lighting, im kinda lost.

Ok so im really confused about lighting and what lighting i need to use so i can grow what i want.at first i was going to go with T5's to save money, but then i wanted halides so that i wasn't limited, but i have read alot about light and i fill like the more i read the more lost i get. i have been using this forum and another for most of my leaning material and a few saltwater store sites to put the knowledge with the items, but im still lost. one of the sites i have been using is Aquarium Fish: Tropical Freshwater Fish and Saltwater Fish for Home Aquariums to me it tells alot about the corals as far as lighting and ect... one of the things i dont under stand is the lighting chart i guess you could call it. on that site it goes from: moderate to moderate-high, and then High. know to me high would need the strongest lighting, such as Metal halides and the moderate would be your t5? is this correct or am i way off.

what has me lost maybe, is im pretty sure im ready people using T5' and their growing stuff that i thought could only grow using halide. know some people are using T5's with actinic bulbs. WHAT ARE ACTINIC BULDS? is that how people are growing higher light required stuff?

i swear i fill like im loosing my mind. i dont want to buy or spend the money metal halide if i dont need to.

truly thanks for any good help in advance.

 

okay okay calm down.

don't stress on the type of lighting... there are a lot of factors.

what kind of corals do you want to grow? how much money do you want to spend? what color temperature do you like (do you like a warmer yellow/red/white look, a mixed white/blue, or a deep blue tint?)

how big is your tank?

T5's or MH will grow every coral under the sun... either is an excellent choice... wattage does matter here however, a 150w MH fixture over a 28" deep tank will not be suitable for an SPS reef tank... a 4 bulb T5 fixture will work for most corals, and a few SPS can be placed at the top.


a 10k bulb is considerably brighter, whiter, and capable of growing more corals than a 20k bulb...

lighting is something where there are too many variables.

I'm guessing you are starting out... to me the most important thing is how the light looks to you... go check out some tanks lit by metal halides (in person) and t5's and see which ones grab your attention, do you like the bluer look with extra radioactive fluorescent corals but maybe some washed out reds/yellows? do you like a blend of blue/white? do you like a sunny bright red/yellow look that shows off fish colors?

these are what you should really be considering IMO.


what is your current lighting set-up, what if any corals do you have & what do you plan to add first... more light is always better as even low light corals will color up better under brighter light and also grow faster and be more hardy and resistant to stress...

you can overdo the light, but it's difficult.


don't stress on MH vs. T5 etc... there are no rules to lighting, just give some info about your set-up and what you want out of your tank and people can advise you better.


a simple 4 bulb T5 set up is a middle of the road good starter option for almost anyone... can grow just about any coral except very high light clams, sps, and anenomes, well it can even grow these if they are close to the light.

a 6 bulb t5 set up will let you do just about whatever you want as far as corals unless you have a very deep tank over 24"

Metal Halides will also allow you to grow just about whatever you want but they cost a little more sometimes, they ahve a unique quality to the light and make things glint and give a shimmering effect from the ripples in the surface of the water which many adore, but they do not light the tank as evenly and you can't mix and match bulbs like with the T5's.


you can't really go wrong with any T5 or MH fixture as long as you have a decent amount of wattage (5 Watts per gallon minimum).... it's really about color choice i think.


read the sticky on color temperature and Kelvins, Actinic bulbs are blue colored bulbs which bring out the fluorescent phosphors in corals which make them glow... most people will combine actinic bulbs with white bulbs, all white bulbs and your corals will not have that cool neon fluorescence to them, without the white bulbs, the corals don't get enough photosynthetic activity to grow properly and it just looks weird having a dark blue radioactive tank.

so it's all about balancing the blues and whites so you get whatever looks just right to you... there are also pink/purple bulbs to bring out the reds etc...

bulbs come in just about every shade of white and blue you can imagine, it can be a bit overwhelming so my suggestion is find some tanks on here where you like the coloration and figure out what bulbs they are using and try to emulate that in your tank!

 

Im newer to the lighting side as well but i will do my best to explain what i have learned.

Ok so for the differences mainly between the Halides and the T-5's, is that the halides give you more bang for the buck if you will to the aspect that you can get extremely high wattages from a single bulb. Where as the T-5s you might need several bulbs to get the same output. However you can still use T-5's in place of halides if are on a budget. Keep in mind the longer the bulb the more the wattage, i know the 24" bulbs have and output of 24 watts each, where as the 30" bulbs have 36watts. So depending on tank size will give you the final outcome of the total wattage of each bulb.

Now for some in depth info on each system Halides are expensive, they require a larger separate ballast to power the bulb. While the halides will give you nice wattage, with this higher power comes lots of heat. So on certain tanks you may end up needing a chiller to compensate for the extra heat. Halides offer more choices in bulb spectrums, but unlike the t-5 where you can have one actnic and one say 10,000kelvin bulb, you will only be limited to one spectrum with the halide. Halides from what i have read are generally only good for a 2'x2' surface area so tanks larger than this will need more than one halide bulb. THe halide also gets a better depth penetration than the t-5's, but t-5's can get to good depth with the right spectrum and reflector. Halides also give a cool shimmer effect not seen with the t-5's.

Now for the t-5's, more efficient and puts off less heat. The ballast for the bulbs are mounted into the fixture rather than separately. t-5's offer a wide variety of color spectrum, but nothing like the halides. Cheaper than halides but more bulbs will be required to get the right amount of light. Now there are people supplementing halides with t-5s to get the actnic spectrum with a powerful day time spectrum.

Actnic is a spectrum of light that simulates sun light that would be under the water, comes in 2 flavors 420nm and 460nm one is more of a purple and the other is more of a blue. They give the corals a nice glow especially green, yellow and red corals.

You can keep just about any coral but you would need to choose placement of certain higher light requiring corals up higher than ones that don't need as much light.

 

LOL 10001110101 you beat me to it.

 

WOW THANKS to both of you. that truly helped a lot. both 10001110101 and blazinlow89 thanks for the very informative yet simplistic explanation. It helped me see the light lol. for someone that is VERY new to this hobby that truly helps.

like i just said im new to the hobby, this being my very first tank ever but when i first planned on getting into saltwater (2 months ago)(lots of reading)i had lighting in mind from the very start. i kinda new that the deeper the tank the more lighting i would louse toads the bottom. So for my tank i have a 40g breeder 36Lx18Wx17D. i thought that this would look sweet. it kinda shallow be only 17D. i figured this would be very helpful with lighting, but at the same time figured i would be able to get a really cool effect because of the wight of the tank.

that being said all i have is my tank, stand(DIY), 20g sump/refuge(DIY). i have preformed a leak test on both and thats about it. Oh yah i just ordered my skimmer (Octopus NWB-150 Bubble Plate Protein Skimmer 2009), return pump (Supreme Mag Drive 3 Pump 350 GPH) and my overflow box (Pro Clear Overflow Prefilter 60/75/125). i kinda have a really good idea of all of the other stuff i want/need. most saved to a shopping cart

What i like. humm that's really hard to say, its all so cool. im for sure wanting the reef and as for the fish. i would say a few of coarse. i would have to say probably am favorite fish would be the red and green Mandarin, Clown fish (i know), and i love the Fuzzy dwarf lionfish (probably not possible with a reef, to bad). So i guess i like the odd, crazy, and cool looking fish, but i dont want to over load my tank at the same time. So just a few really cool ones. oh coarse i want lots of cleaners ect...

on to the coral. i dont really want to be limited, simply because i like most of them. like for instance i like everything on the first page of this link: Saltwater Reef Aquariums: Live Coral for Saltwater Coral Reef Aquariums . So another words, i like a little something from each type/class. As for the color that kinda hard to say. simply because their are not to many tank around this area that have halide lighting. So most of what i see is on the web. their are saltwater tanks around this area though. i do know what the shimmer effect is though. nice but seams like a lot to pay just for that.
one thing i will say i kinda like the florescent/glow looking effect of the corals, and i also like the moon lights.

Oh yah one thing i do want to try my best to avoid, is having to run a cooling system. it just not something i want to get into and it cost a lot.

so if i understand most of this correctly. i can grow the anything with T5's as long as i have enough wattage and proper Kelvin. So for what i want/like something like a 6 light setup (not counting moon lights) would be best or would i need more like 8 lights? what would you recommend?

 

Oh yah i almost forgot anemones are cool.

 

Just get metal halides and call it a day i promise u wont regret it (this is where you t5ho advocates tell me how t5s are better or the same lol)

 

i run the nova extreme 4x54 watt t5 fixture on my 90 and have no problem growing soft coral.