Is this light adequate?

Add Homonym wrote:
If you can afford it, the PFO solaris lights look VERY nice.
Also very expensive.

Ouch! $2345 for a 48" hood. It would be a 5 year payback. Maybe less
if I count AC costs.

What brand do you recommend for MH lights?

--Kurt

KurtG wrote:
Add Homonym wrote:

If you can afford it, the PFO solaris lights look VERY nice.
Also very expensive.


Ouch! $2345 for a 48" hood. It would be a 5 year payback. Maybe less
if I count AC costs.

What brand do you recommend for MH lights?

--Kurt

For lighting, it's not really the fixture manufacturer that is critical,
but the bulb manufacturer (and to some extent, the ballast manufacturer)

Lotta more experienced reefers (ie: not me!) don't even buy a full setup
as one item - they get it all piecemeal - Buy the fixture, ballast,
bulbs all seperate. Or maybe even one step further - buy a hood,
reflector, light socket, ballast, and bulb all seperate.

Been digging around trying to find some site that lists data on spectral
output of different brands/models of bulbs, but to no avail.
What one wants is stuff that puts out at the ends of the visible
spectrum (ie: red/orange and blue/violet, and even slighly up into the
UVA band, IIRC, and less so yellow - and of course green is largely
reflected away) - these are the wavelengths that photsynthesies uses.
(more or less - different organisms have different types of clorophyll
that utilze different parts of the spectrum differently) Sorta flies in
the face of common sense - we have a "yellow" sun, so one would assume
plant life would like yellow best. But that ain't the case.

One thing I am aware of, is that one can not go by the kelvin ratings
alone to know what the actual spectral output of a bulb would be. These
are "rough fit" type ratings. The "kelvin" ratings, if I am not
mistaken, describe the spectral output of stars at certain temperatures.
Man made light bulbs are most often NOT going to match these 100%.
Light may look the same, but put it through a prism, and see waht the
output is in different bands, and you are going to see differences.

So, is that 20,000K blue white light mostly blue with some yellow and a
touch of red? Or is it even more blue, with less yellow and a bit more
of green and a bit more of of red? Overall color may look exactly the
same, but there would be a big difference between the two for xooanthellae.

I'm hardly an expert in this area - I have only owned 1 metal halide
myself, and have only had that for 4 months! FWIW, it's a coralife
double ended HQI 14K "hang on tank" I have no idea of the actual
spectral output.

So, in a nutshell, I can't give you an simple brand recommendation and
keep a clear concience.

Add Homonym wrote:
So, in a nutshell, I can't give you an simple brand recommendation and
keep a clear concience.

Fair enough. I don't think I'm ready to assemble such a unit.

I'll probably end up with a CoralLife myself.

--Kurt

KurtG wrote:
Add Homonym wrote:

So, in a nutshell, I can't give you an simple brand recommendation and
keep a clear concience.


Fair enough. I don't think I'm ready to assemble such a unit.

I'll probably end up with a CoralLife myself.

--Kurt

I'm happy enough with mine. Decent stuff.

You can always contact the manufacture to get the
spectrograph of the bulb. It's often on the manufactures
web sites.

Wayne Sallee
Wayne's Pets



Add Homonym wrote on 12/22/2006 12:25 PM:
KurtG wrote:
Add Homonym wrote:

If you can afford it, the PFO solaris lights look VERY nice.
Also very expensive.


Ouch! $2345 for a 48" hood. It would be a 5 year payback. Maybe
less if I count AC costs.

What brand do you recommend for MH lights?

--Kurt

For lighting, it's not really the fixture manufacturer that is critical,
but the bulb manufacturer (and to some extent, the ballast manufacturer)

Lotta more experienced reefers (ie: not me!) don't even buy a full setup
as one item - they get it all piecemeal - Buy the fixture, ballast,
bulbs all seperate. Or maybe even one step further - buy a hood,
reflector, light socket, ballast, and bulb all seperate.

Been digging around trying to find some site that lists data on spectral
output of different brands/models of bulbs, but to no avail.
What one wants is stuff that puts out at the ends of the visible
spectrum (ie: red/orange and blue/violet, and even slighly up into the
UVA band, IIRC, and less so yellow - and of course green is largely
reflected away) - these are the wavelengths that photsynthesies uses.
(more or less - different organisms have different types of clorophyll
that utilze different parts of the spectrum differently) Sorta flies in
the face of common sense - we have a "yellow" sun, so one would assume
plant life would like yellow best. But that ain't the case.

One thing I am aware of, is that one can not go by the kelvin ratings
alone to know what the actual spectral output of a bulb would be. These
are "rough fit" type ratings. The "kelvin" ratings, if I am not
mistaken, describe the spectral output of stars at certain temperatures.
Man made light bulbs are most often NOT going to match these 100%.
Light may look the same, but put it through a prism, and see waht the
output is in different bands, and you are going to see differences.

So, is that 20,000K blue white light mostly blue with some yellow and a
touch of red? Or is it even more blue, with less yellow and a bit more
of green and a bit more of of red? Overall color may look exactly the
same, but there would be a big difference between the two for xooanthellae.

I'm hardly an expert in this area - I have only owned 1 metal halide
myself, and have only had that for 4 months! FWIW, it's a coralife
double ended HQI 14K "hang on tank" I have no idea of the actual
spectral output.

So, in a nutshell, I can't give you an simple brand recommendation and
keep a clear concience.