What lighting do I need for this tank?

I'm building a tank right now and I'm trying to determine what lighting I need.

The tank is going to be a shallow reef and the dimensions are 48" wide, 24" deep (front to back), and 12" high.

I'd prefer to hang the lights above the tank but I may build a canopy that is mounted higher up above the canopy. I don't want something resting on top of the tank though as I want the tank to be able to be viewed from above.

I plan to keep softies and LPS in this tank as I've never been successful with SPS. I may some day try SPS again but for now I'm going to stick with what I know I can do.

Right now I have a 29 gallon biocube with a 150 Watt Sunpod metal halide fixture. Since this tank will be shallower I was thinking that I could go with dual 150W or dual 175W metal halides and some T-5 Actinics. I was considering dual 250W metal halides but don't want to create any heat issues.

 

depends a lot on what you want to keep in there IMO

Edit - as Jonjonwells read the dimensions properly in the correct order its 12 deep so 175W would be ideal
as would T5s

but having said that if heat is a problem and you dont want SPS on very low levels of your tank, you could probably achieve your aims using a decent T5 fixture with 6 or even 8 54 watt lamps in there - great for SPS at higher levels and still enough light at the bottom for your softies . shrooms etc IMO based on what I have seen others achieve with T5s


Steve

 

+1 on the t5's. I have a fellow reefer here that has an sps dominated 150 and he uses only t5's and he has an absolutely beautiful set up.

 

With only being 12" tall, I would think a dual 150/175 setup would be more than enough for anything. Usually don't need 250 Watters until 24-28 inches.