Supplemental lighting

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Ericwm

Aquarium Advice FINatic
Joined
Sep 3, 2012
Messages
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I have a 30 gallon reef in the making, I have 2 t5 ( one 10000k and one actinic). I want to supplement my lighting to help my corals out and found these two options.

An led spotlight
http://www.aquastyleonline.com/products/Aquarium-18-watts-Sportlight--LED.html

And an led strip
http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod_display.cfm?c=3578+3733+10704+24397&pcatid=24397

Any advice on this would be wonderful. I'm thinking of adding them in ~2 months. Has anyone purchased either of these or have any suggestions.

I hope the links work.
 
Im guessing you have a 24" long tank. The specialized T5 tubes will do great in the daytime. The strip is better for lumens to spread and bounce off the water particles in the whole aquarium. Just because its not lit, doesnt mean theres no trace of retnal intensity. Go with the LED strip for night time. Make sure its 400-500nm. This spectrum will help coral in post-photosynthesis preparation for next daytime effect(next time you turn the T5 on).

In time, your corals will get used to te routine and optimize themselves accordingly.

If you wanna spend alot of money on lighting, there are these awesome multi fixtures! Its a fixture that has two T5 tube flourescents on each side of a metal hallide bulb. Very stylish as well, and im sure some high end fixtures have both T5+MH AND LED! The metal hallide is used in the vegetation(growing) part of a plants life.
 
I plan on adding some moon lighting as well, are 2 32 inch t5s enough for most corals in my 30 gallon
 
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