Lighting for a 36" cube

[tommyp]

Hey all,

I am planning a new larger tank. I posted on the DIY forum.

What I really want is to have a semicube LxW, 24" high

I was thinking to start a 24" cube but that is too small,

Then I was thinking a 36" cube. I saw this great one on RC. It was lit by a single 400 and I contacted the owner and he said that it would be better to have two lamps and he would switch back to 2.

I really want to save on electricity. and not waste any lighting. What should I light this tank with? It is going to be a SPS/ LPS tank.

I was liking the original Idea of a single 250/400 halide over the tank. I have a single iwasaki over my 65 and I find that it works pretty well to cover most of the length of the tank. It falls off in the top corners but thats about it.

I would consider de's but I don't have a clue on how they match up against SE's on a electronic ballast. They do have more par if run on an M80 mag ballast but that ballast also takes 340 watts. They also don't have as much spread.

It would be great if I could over drive a se with and m80 and pull it up off the water 12+" to give it just a bit more spread. I don't care about keeping acros all over the tank and could live with high ligh corals in the middle and lower light corals on the outsides. Since that is what I do currently.

What do you think? I really want a tank with 36" of depth

Thanks

Tom

[Maxx]

Tommy,
I'd honestly go w/ a dual 250 HQI/DE set up. Two lamps above the tank will prevent corals from shading themselves...since there is more than one origin of light.
Also if you run them side by side, you could run one 10k XM (REAL close to PAR of Iwasaki , I mean REAL close...but better coloration IMO) and also run a 20K bulb of your choice....XM 20k is a good one, but the par isnt as good as the 10K...this would give you a real pleasing combination of color IMO.
If you're really concerned about the electricity usage, you can go the E ballast route. But your savings arent going to be all that much on your energy bill vs a Tar and Coil ballast. I have two BlueLineE ballasts which are really Icecaps in a pretty blue box....and they were purchased solely to prevent circuit breakers from tripping on my during light power up.
I have to run, will post more later,
Nick

[tankgirl]

Hi Tom,
I don't think you need actinics or any other bulbs than MHs. I'd definitely go with at least two MHs.

My understanding about actinics, vhos, etc. is that you really don't need them with the high intensity mhs. It's not that the corals won't use the light from them, just that they get plenty from the MHs.

[tommyp]

Thanks maxx,

Are your icecap ballasts mag?

That sounds like a plan doing two hqi's I have to save my pennies. My electricity up here is in the range of .13 a KWH.

I don't want to run 1000 watts in lights more around 5-600.

I was thinking two 14k's side by side and no actinics.

Thanks

Tom

[addict]

Check out the first page in my thread I got going... ('my journey...') I have the same tank being built (36x36x24), and I have a diagram of how I'm going to light it.

HTH.

[tommyp]

RA no way!

I'll check your thread had no clue I must have seen your thread but not realized. I started thinking i would do a diy 24" cube

Thanks

tom

[addict]

24x24x24 is about 60 gallons... smaller than your current tank.
36x36x24 is between 120-130 gallons (depending on the thickness of your material).

[Maxx]

Tommy,
No my Icecaps are electric. If I had to do it over again....esp since the 250 w comparison by JBNY is finished, I would have probably gone w/ the M80 ballast by PFO since it will run everything I want to optimal specs. E ballsts have some advantages over Mag ballasts....E ballasts will run any bulb, (probe, pulse start, or HQI/DE) w/o overdriving or stuttering the bulb, and they use less electricity. This last one was the most important to me since I live in an older house w/ questionable capacity...(meaning I hope I dont blow cicuit breakers everytime my lights are on and the AC kicks in.) The E-ballasts are MUCH lighter....so shipping is really alot less than on a magnetic ballast. And since they run cooler than the mag ballasts it allows you more flexibility when placing your ballasts near your tank. I may wind up putting them in/on my canopy. Still need to get the logistics of that worked out.
I bought my lighting, (two Sunlight Supply Bluelwave IV E ballasts, 250 w, and two Sunlight Supply Reef Optix III plus HQI/DE pendants for a grand total of $632.90 , (shipped) from Ocean Encounter who is now one of our sponsors here.
Might want to take a look.
HTH,
Nick

[tommyp]

Thanks all,

That cube is damn nice RA!

Maxx thanks for all the info.

more planning for me, might abandon the cube idea, not sure..

Thanks

Tom

[addict]

I hope you're not abandoning the cube idea on my account...

Thanks for the kind words... I'm building the tank now that we wanted when we started... I'm actually glad we waited since I'm doing it right this time.

Keep us posted on what you decide.

[Brucey]

Hey Tom ......... re Cube idea. IMHO the cube idea comes down to one thing, where the tank is going to be located. A cube is just brilliant if you are going to view it from ALL sides, then it just looks awsome. If you only going to view from 3 sides then I think a rectangle is the best approach .... but hey, that's just me. Dave, where is yours being situtated ?

[joe@inreef]

I have a 36x36x40 cube, and love it..... I light it with 3x250 MH... one a 250 10k, one a 250 20k and one is a 250 6.5k. You can place them all above the tank about 4" apart, and not notice that you have three different color light sources. The 6.5k only runs for about 4 hours, every third day. My cube has the overflow all the way up against one side, as this makes aquascaping much easier. Originally, it was center of the tank, but it made coral placement difficult.

[tommyp]

RA, Nawh I am just trying to figure out what I want. I am trying to keep electrical cost down and If I am going to run two halides I might as well go 4x2 . I don't really think I can pull off a big tank until I move as I don't know if the floor can handle the weight where I am.

Joe I love the idea of the bright day halide!

Thanks for all the ideas!

Tom

[arcab4]

like you - i wanted to save on electricity and wanted to use only one 400watt bulb.

i ended finding a reflector made by PL Lighting that would be sufficient for my cube tank (36x30x24). i saw the specs and the actual lighting chart and with that reflector, it would easily cover a 4x4 with minimal deadspots.

what's sweet about it is that i turned it on in a dark room and the reflector actualy almost formed a perfect cube of light. normally a regular reflector would distibute the light everywhere.

i've yet to actually set it up but i'll let you know. haha.

oh yeah..it's a pretty expensive reflector. costing almost $150 for it. but if it'll save me from setting up another halide, that's totally worth it.

[addict]

Sorry for the late comeback Brucey... I didn't realize a question had been posted to me in here...
My tank's gonna be about 6-12" away from the wall, so that I have room to work behind it if I need to.
I like the cube design because no matter which way you look into the tank, you're looking through the same depth of field... plus it gives you more floorspace to make some interesting reef heads.

I did the cost breakdown on my tank (with RC's power consumption calc) and it should only cost about $50-60/mo to run it... my current 55g tank costs about $25/mo to run (at california rates of 13¢/kwh).