• Folks, if you've recently upgraded or renewed your annual club membership but it's still not active, please reach out to the BOD or a moderator. The PayPal system has a slight bug which it doesn't allow it to activate the account on it's own.

20L Frag Tank Questions

S

saltwater4life

That would be nice i was wanting that light but don't have 30"...
and what i was thinking of is a AC filter with LR in it but idk

BEST OF LUCK,
Nick
 
T

TripsieD

A 150W 20k metal halide about 8 or 9 inches off the surface would be a way to go. Check with Ed over at ILC to see how much it would cost, I think it would only be about $30 more than the fixture your looking at.

Tom
 
K

kharn101

not only do you need MH lighting for sps, make sure you have strong flow. SPS are hard, your water perm must be amazing, do you have a skimmer? Also 150 MH might not be enought light for some sps. I am no sps expert,mabey one of the sps people could hop on. Anyway, good luck and post pics of the tank.
 
A

albie611

i run a 20h frag tank of softies with 130 W p/c lights, hob shimmer and a few power heads for flow. it was doing great until the crash a few weeks ago ( power outage for 36 hrs) :'(
you could get away with p/c's if you stick to easy to keep sps and you put them high in the tank but if its going to be all sps and harder to keep species i would go with either vho T5's or the 10-14K halides......( better growth with 10k, better color with 14k) just remember the heat from the halides will give you more evap. and you will have to top off every day to keep water stable.

good luck........al

ps:.....i'm thinking of going to a bigger tank and will be selling my 20H frag set up in a few months
 
R

RevClyburn

Why is everyone under the opinion that nothing but MH's work for SPS? I think
that you can have SPS, SOME, with T5'S also. T5's produce great par, cost less and are more energy efficient. And I don't think Zoas require such a intense light as MH's produce. T5's may not have the shimmer, but the have the par for softies and SOME SPS. I really think the main issue with SPS corals in water quality and flow. Without those two factors they will not thrive. Just my opinion.

RevClyburn
 
C

concept3

Guest
Rev is right. You don't necessarily need MH to keep SPS. One thing I may add, however is the flexibility of what you can keep with the MH. It is a versatile bulb for corals, only drawback is the heat it produces. T5's produce great PAR, PC's are somewhat OK. The only thing I was able to keep in my 20 gallon (when it was running) in terms of SPS were a few digitatas, and they turned brownish. They survived, but they lacked the color they should have had. I had 2X65 W PC's on that tank.

One twist on how you may want to look at lighting though, is the life of the bulbs. Make your calculations on cost there. I know VHO's lose intensity after 8-10 months, and I know people who change them regularly every 6-7. Halides generally last a little longer, I've ran the same MH bulb in the past for over 14 months with no ill effects (coral colors changed a bit though). I don't know what the life expectancy on T5's are, but I do know that a few people on RC (like Iwan's tank for example) replaces a bulb every month or so to keep them up to date.

Rev, as far as efficiency, an electrician told me that watts is watts, so a "150 watt MH vs a 150 watt T5" should use up the same amount of electricity.

-OR- Did you mean efficiency of wattage in relation to PAR?
 
A

albie611

i believe you should be fine with vho T-5's over a 20L due to the shallow depth of the water , just keep the SPS frags on a shelf high in the tank and if you have softies , zoa's or shrooms put them on the bottom.


ps: all my soft corals were doing great under 130W p/c's , and the frags of montipora i had were starting to encrust and grow( although i agree that the colors would have been better under t-5's or 14k MH
GL............al
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top