do i have the proper amount of light?

[jmac]

hello all, i have compact fluorescent twin tube double liner 36 inch 96 watt 10,000 watt and a 96 watt true actinic o3 blue, is that sufficient for a 58 gallon with a bubble tip,scolymia brain, if not what should i replace or change. one more thing that scolymia brain i just got last week is not opening up, please help. thank you

 

[Krish]

Is that a 58gal Oceanic? If so, with it's dimensions (depth wise) IMO, I think you may need a bit more lighting, but could be wrong...You are running approximately 3 watts per gal, but you don't get the penetration with pc's as you would with say with MH's which may be the reason the brain isn't opening up. Either that or your water's parameters may not be at the correct levels (calcium, alk etc). Just a thought...Like I said, I may be wrong

 

[jmac]

so should i replace the 10,000k with a 6,700k? and yes it is an oceanic

 

[Krish]

IMO 6700K won't make much of a difference and besides, you'd probably hate the color. I'd wait for the others to chime in before you go ahead with anything, but I tend to prefer halides where I know my corals will be getting good useable light seeing MH's will penetrate through the water nicely. People tend to use pc's these days for supplemental lighting or corals that don't require much lighting at all, but that's not to say your pc's aren't fine for your setup. I just know that the brain corals we have here in the wild found in shallow waters require tons of light which was why I said you may not have enough lighting, but I couldn't say for sure as I don't know much about the species of brain coral you have

 

[aquaman3680]

I would say that you need to go with halides. That tank is 24" deep and the pc's light wont reach the bottom of the tank. How is your bubbletip doing? they really need halides too.

 

[Reefdaddy1]

If you want to keep it with what available add retro T5 setup . An addition 3 bulbs will really make that tank glow. Better then moving up to MH at this point. Then when you do add MH you can use the T5 as suipplemnt lighting .

 

[jmac]

i got my bubble tip and the brain at the same time, the bubble tip is on a rock in the middle of the tank and is spread open. also i have my old hood that came with the tank which is(36 inch) t-8 twin tube i believe, will that work? if so what bulbs will work? (please say what kind of bulb watt,ete) thank you all for taking the time for answaring my questions.

 

[jtyce]

I have 390 watts of PC lighting on a top fin 55 gallon which is 18 inches deep. I have definately killed some corals with what I think is too much light. Being winter, I have to keep the windows open in the fish room or my tank will heat up to 83+ degrees with the heat running in the house. I am starting to get rid of my LPS corals and am moving to SPS. I plan to go with a 75 gallon that is still 18" tall but gives me an additional 5" of floor width (front to back). Do you think I have enough light with my 390w PC setup or do i need to go MH. The two acropora that I have now seem to be doing fine. Please advise.

 

[returnofsid]

I would also recommend going to at least T5 lighting, OR you could purchase a PC fixture that has 4 bulbs instead of 2. That'd give you twice the wattage. However, you're still looking at quite a bit of depth to penetrate.

 

[Sherman]

I'm on the "There's no such thing as too much light" side. I used to run 384w of PC on my 20" deep 38gallon. It wasn't sufficient for SPS. They survived, and even grew, but never had anywhere near the color they have now, under 2x150w MH.

Were it my choice (and I recognize I have expensive tastes, but that's what this hobby is all about), I'd be going with 2x150w MH, and use the PCs for Actinic supplementation. You could also go with just a single 250w MH, but I don't think you'd see full light coverage at the edges. You're talking another $400, if you put a retro kit in your hood/canopy, but, to me, that's what it's going to take. Your T8s won't do anything for you at all, so I wouldn't bother chasing that path.

As far as cost: You could throw a couple hundred dollars at T5, with the intention to upgrade later, sure. I've always thought that intermediate steps are only a waste of money. That's a couple hundred dollars you could just throw at MH now, instead of "wasting" it on equipment you're not going to keep.