Lighting

[Kalin0121]

How many watts of lighting would you need for a 65 gal tank with fish, liverock, polyps, and mushrooms?

 

[Gti_Leo]

the whole wattage of like per gallon is pretty pointless to me, these days technology in lighting produces more light per watts then it did 10 years ago.

it all depends what you want to do with your aquarium, what kind of anemones you want and what kind of corals

 

[Kalin0121]

Soft corals only no stoney. As far as anemones long tentacle and bubble tip

 

[Gti_Leo]

i think the bubble tips are high light anemones. at the end of the day you can go wrong with metal haildes but you may need a chiller for the water since MH get really hot. T5HOs are my choice in lighting and you could prob get away with 4-4'ers

 

[Zer0]

Well, just getting lighting for softies, and then wanting to put anemones in there is a contradiction, considering the anemones you are looking at need higher light then some stony coral. So you can either buy lights for just softies, and be done with it, but then you won't be able to keep any anemones happy. Or you could just go with higher lighting and be able to keep anything you wanted, including anemones.

I would also suggest Metal Halides. You normally don't need a chiller unless your house temp gets really high up there. A simple fan could be used to bring the temperature of the tank down a few degrees. I had a 150w MH pendant over my 25G cube and my temp never rose above 80 degrees, and i didn't even have a fan to boot.

 

[Gti_Leo]

how close was the MH to the water, if its hanging fixture with a glass cover you won't feel the heat to much unless youre within 6 inches.


i'm an electrician, and i do alot of grocery stores in some of the high end stores MH highbays are used, and if the need to be moved and we leave them on i start to sweat cuz of the heat coming off the 400watt bulbs.

now a days all the highbays are being retro fit with 6 lamp T5HOs, the florecents keep 95% of their lumen output over their life time, while MH drop to 50%, reason why i say my lighting choice is T5s

 

[Kalin0121]

Ok thanks! So if I stick with soft corals only and use T5HO how many watts would I need for a 65 gal? I currently use T5's ob my 29 gal and I am happy with them.

 

[Gti_Leo]

i would say 3 but i don't think you can get a 3 lamp so stick with 4 and you'll be alright 6 lamps for 5 watts per gallon, more then enough for most corals

 

[Kalin0121]

Ok thanks so much for your help!

 

[Gti_Leo]

no problem

 

[Zer0]

You just said watts/gallon is out of date and you used it as reference lol.

What are the dimensions of your 65G tank?

 

[Gti_Leo]

lol i know i did but its still a general rule and at that thats 30 000 lumens of light total, more like then two 150watt MH lights.

 

[Kalin0121]

36in long , 18in. wide and 21in tall

 

[Zer0]

21" tall is pretty tall. You can go T5's but you will need more than a 4 bulb fixture if you want to keep those nems. At the very least you'll need a 6 bulb, but if you wanted to keep anything you should go with an 8bulb.

If you went with halide, you could do something like 2x250w halides and be done with it and be able to keep mostly anything you wanted.

 

[Kalin0121]

Ok thank you!