Time to upgrade....?

My opinion, for such a small tank I wouldn't want to go halide. 2 T5's I think would work great. I think the retros are the way to go with a canopy but that's my personal preference, I like being able to sit in front of my tank and not have to dodge the bulbs blinding me like I do with a fixture.

Icecap retros are probably more expensive because they use an icecap ballast which overdrives the T5 bulb to put out more power. The thing is with overdriving you need to actively cool the bulbs with fans in order to get the benefit of the extra power, T5 bulbs have an ideal operating temperature range I think 90-100 degrees or something like that, above and below and your PAR drops, quite significantly. All that being said on a small tank overdriving shouldn't be necessary I don't think.

Also icecap reflectors are very nice, very efficient reflectors, but there are other good ones out there that are cheaper, for shallow tanks the Sunlight Supply Tek2 reflectors are nice I hear. They are also a bit wider, but they don't have as good of penetration which is nice for shallower tanks because you generally don't need the depth but you need more horizontal coverage.

This is all based on my research setting up my new 75 gallon with 33 long frag tank, not personaly experience. I've talked to quite a few people and have read a bit about it though and I feel pretty confident in my selection.

Why I'm going with T5's are for several reasons:
1) Their coverage. T5's light up the entire length of the tank, with MH you get a single point source of light and you can end up with lots of shadows on portions of SPS colonies. With T5's light hits more portions of an acro colony (for example) which hopefully leads to more even growth patterns. I've also read reports of unusual growth patterns because acros seek out the light so they grow towards it, not necessarily with the flow or how they might grow in nature. This is all highly dependent on placement and the exact setup but with T5's and such broad coverage I am hoping to avoid having to worry about that.
2) The range of colors you can get to suit your own personal taste. With 2 bulbs you're a bit more limited but even so you can find 2 bulbs with great PAR output with several different color combinations. Also getting a good brand of bulb is key, current USA bulbs, the slimpaq bulbs are pretty much bottom of the line. Get ATI/Giesemann/UVL or another high quality bulb, you will get a significant more amount of PAR out of them, combined with better reflectors that come with the Nova fixtures you will have plenty to work with.
3) Total wattage. A lot of people with MH also supplement with T5 or VHO for color control and that a lot of times ends up overshooting the total wattage of a complete T5 system, this also tends to add a lot more heat of course, a watt of light is a watt of light and produces the same amount of heat. I believe T5 lights may be easier to dissipate that heat because it's spread out along the length of the bulb but the heat produced from 200 watts of halides should be quite close to the same amount produced by 200 watts of T5, from my understanding. It might be a matter of what is more easily transferred into the tank water, I'm not sure.
4) I've also heard that with some MH systems there are a lot more "sweet spots" and a lot more "dead zones" as far as ideal growth areas and areas where some corals just tend to brown out because they are towards the periphery of the reflectors coverage or they are in the transition zone between multiple MH's.
5) There are lots of great tanks out there running 100% T5 for years and are completely SPS dominated. It's proven to work.
6) There are other ways to get shimmer lines! (small numbers of LEDS give some for example)

Some of these are pretty much generalisations but they are some of the things I've been tossing around in my head when deciding on my lighting scheme.

I'm going with a 2 bulb retro for my frag tank which is 48" x 13" x 13" with a non-overdriven ballast (universal and vossloh schwabe(sp?) are good brands I hear, I've heard bad things about workhorse ballasts), Tek2 reflectors (which are 3" wide, icecap and other good ones are generally 2-2.5" wide) and 2 ATI blue plus bulbs (I might swap one out for a UVL 12kk bulb). On the display I'm using a 6 bulb retro with the same ballasts but with reflectors which I'm told are pretty similar in performance to the icecap reflectors except cheaper. I'm getting my retros for both tanks from reefgeek.com.

Sorry for the book, and not trying to knock metal halides, I just feel, especially for smaller, shallower tanks, that T5's are a better choice for me. That's my thoughts anyways, hope that helps!

(sometimes I like just typing out my ideas anyway, helps me think)

 

Screwtape.... WOW thanks for the lengthy info!! Really though, MH's have a lot of advantages, and T5's as well, best of both worlds as they say . I am seriously considering the 70w MH with 2 TEK retros on either side, who knows though, my mind changes daily!

Anyone know if you can run a 70w MH bulb in the 150w fixtures/ballasts without problmes? Don't know if you can switch them around like that.

 

No, you can not. A higher powered ballast will immediately blow the bulb.

Lemme see what I can dig up for you...

 

I have heard you could do that, even on like marinedepot's website they have pendants that can do 70w or 150w.......? No way they would put that on their if it would blow the bulbs.....

 

Possibly a selection switch.

1 150 or 2 70s

 

how would you split the two 70's?

 

I would love to hear the MH side of my post, if anyone cares to share (maybe it's too off-topic for this thread though ). I understand that MH does reach higher peak PAR levels and there are some coral that can utilize that energy before hitting their saturation point. I know some people "just like" MH better, they like the way the light looks etc but that's purely subjective (and I definitely don't discount that as a valid reason). As far as objective criteria other than straight growth for high light coral I don't know of anything else that really puts MH above what I've learned about T5. There seems to be a lot more debate about T5 trying to "outdo" MH which seems to be the old standard high end lighting system, but I haven't seen much objective info to back up MH's claim to fame over current T5 technology.
Keep in mind I'm still learning and researching so I'm not trying to knock MH, just trying to learn.

 

Dude, have you seen my posts?? I NEVER stay on topic ;D

I have done pc, t5 and MH before, will never do pc's again and love the overall look of T5's, don't get me wrong. But T5's alone will not be able to handle what I achieve to do both cosmetically and physically(for the corals). Heck if this turns into a debate I don't care, I would love to hear either side from anyone really, pictures never hurt either ;D. Thanks again for chiming in Screwtape, have you ever had any experience with the 70 watters?

 

I have zero experience with MH lights, all my opinions are based purely on research/reading and that is possibly influenced by the fact that MH has been the defacto standard for high end lighting for a while.

I'm really curious how the supposedly (just because I have no experience) superior growth rates you get from MH are compared to natural growth rates of coral in the wild.

If it gets more extreme than in the wild I would be worried about more brittle skeleton structure, less longevity due to constantly being close to the light saturation point, growth problems since the sun doesn't sit in a single location in the sky like a MH light etc. Captive systems are so different from the wild that I know MH doesn't match the output of the sun but it's much more consistent than the sun. I don't equate growth rates necessarily with health I guess is the point.

It reminds me of a bunch of Italian tanks I saw pictures of that were claiming double digit inches (15+) of acro growth in a year because they were dosing some sort of human growth hormone. That sort of unnatural growth makes me skeptical of longevity etc.

Gotta get some sleep now...yikes...

 

lol, anyone know if this requires wiring? marinedepot kind of lacks to say anything about it really, unless I am missing it???

IceCap 70 Watt Electronic Metal Halide Ballast