Matt's 225g Build Thread
- Thread starter meschaefer
- Start date
Not being very familiar with VHO, I have been taking a further look into them.
The first thing I notice is that they have a much higher output then an equivalent length of T5. Is there an efficiency issue with going with VHO as opposed to T5.
I also notice that the ice cap retrofit kits don't come with reflectors, as the bulbs have internal reflectors...do all VHO bulbs have internal reflectors?
I can get a 2 x 160w VHO with URI bulbs and a icecap ballast for $225, or 4 x 39w T5 with bulbs, Tek Reflectors, and an icecap ballast for $284. It seems that the VHO is cheaper up front, and the bulbs are less expensive to replace. What about other onging costs. I.e. do I need 320W of VHO?
The first thing I notice is that they have a much higher output then an equivalent length of T5. Is there an efficiency issue with going with VHO as opposed to T5.
I also notice that the ice cap retrofit kits don't come with reflectors, as the bulbs have internal reflectors...do all VHO bulbs have internal reflectors?
I can get a 2 x 160w VHO with URI bulbs and a icecap ballast for $225, or 4 x 39w T5 with bulbs, Tek Reflectors, and an icecap ballast for $284. It seems that the VHO is cheaper up front, and the bulbs are less expensive to replace. What about other onging costs. I.e. do I need 320W of VHO?
- Location
- Ossining, NY
Matt,
I ditched my VHO retro kit after about 4 months when i first set up my 180 - I had space issues - VHO's are bulky IMO, but nice color.
Are you using them for lighting or color purposes? 320w of VHO is crazy, again, IMO.
keep in mind that IceCap Ballasts will overdrive the T5 as well.
Sounds like you're down to the nitty gritty - so close you cna smell the salt
MORE PICS!@!!!!!
House
I ditched my VHO retro kit after about 4 months when i first set up my 180 - I had space issues - VHO's are bulky IMO, but nice color.
Are you using them for lighting or color purposes? 320w of VHO is crazy, again, IMO.
keep in mind that IceCap Ballasts will overdrive the T5 as well.
Sounds like you're down to the nitty gritty - so close you cna smell the salt
MORE PICS!@!!!!!
House
Matt,
I ditched my VHO retro kit after about 4 months when i first set up my 180 - I had space issues - VHO's are bulky IMO, but nice color.
Are you using them for lighting or color purposes? 320w of VHO is crazy, again, IMO.
keep in mind that IceCap Ballasts will overdrive the T5 as well.
Sounds like you're down to the nitty gritty - so close you cna smell the salt
MORE PICS!@!!!!!
House
It's the nitty gritty that will kill ya.
Good, question...what is the purpose of the supplemental lighting. I kind of seperate light into two categories "food" and "aesthetics". The primary source of "food" will be provided by the MHs, While the supplemental lighting is supposed to take care of the "aesthetics" . I would like to run the MH for about six hours a day, and have the Supplemental lighting on the rest of the time.
Because the purpose of the MH is "food' I want a high par bulb, which pretty much means 10K. I am not overly fond of the color of 10K and have used actinics in the past to "correct" the color, but they where too blue when they were on by themselves for two hours a day. This time around the supplementals will be on for six hours (assuming I can meet my "food" needs with he MH on for only six hours) by themselves and i would rather they be more aesthetically pleasing to the eye.
Does that make sense?
When you got rid of the VHO, what did you have running on your 180?
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- Location
- NY
Nothing. No supplemental lighting at all. He ran four Phoenix 250w DE on BlueWave 3 ballasts with Reef Optix reflectors. The colors were still amazing......landed his 180 the notoriety of being Advanced Aquarist TOTM in November, 2006.
swimmer
That is exactly what I have in my setup. I started out with 10Ks which I used for about 12 monthes and when it came time to change the bulbs I opted for 14Ks just to try something new. I have to say that I like the 14Ks better because of the color diffrence but I have been supplenting with 4 six foot VHOs the entire time. With the 10Ks I definately needed them to "blue" the color a bit but since my bulb chane I could really do without it.
Some said the spectrum from actinic lighting are needed for corals to color up, it is not just to please your eyes.
No one makes a VHO (T-12) reflector for use in our tanks. URI makes bulbs with an "internal" reflector, they are not as efficient as parabolic T-5 reflector.
Two 5 foot VHO bulbs may be too much, two 4 footers staggered will work better for your tank as "supplement" lighting. I suggest getting 4 foot bulbs in either type of bulb, anything larger gets hard to find and expensive to ship. T-5's with reflectors are much brighter than VHO's, I just don't like the color as much. You can come by to see the VHO actinic, URI T5 actinic, and D&D actinic bulbs this weekend, I am around.
No one makes a VHO (T-12) reflector for use in our tanks. URI makes bulbs with an "internal" reflector, they are not as efficient as parabolic T-5 reflector.
Two 5 foot VHO bulbs may be too much, two 4 footers staggered will work better for your tank as "supplement" lighting. I suggest getting 4 foot bulbs in either type of bulb, anything larger gets hard to find and expensive to ship. T-5's with reflectors are much brighter than VHO's, I just don't like the color as much. You can come by to see the VHO actinic, URI T5 actinic, and D&D actinic bulbs this weekend, I am around.
Perhaps I should keep my opinions to my self considering the top reefers talking here. But what the heck. In my tank I run two 6' VHO actinics, 1 superblue & 1 white actinic because I don't like that dark tank look. By combine the two my tank as a nice mello look to it. I run my VHO's 12 hours a day, and my MH three XM 175 watt 10K for 6 hours. The MH run for less time due to electric that they pull. And my animals seem to be happy with this combination which is what is most important to me.
Pierce, I'll PM you if I can make it out to you this weekend.
(sorry for the long post, but I have been racking my brain on the lighting issue since I decided to set this tank up, I really appreciate any thoughts or ideas anyone may have)
One of the things I have been thinking about in terms of my lighting is using it more efficiently. In the past I ran my MH (2 x 175 over a 65g and a 75g) almost 10 hours a day. I think that this may have been overkill, especially over the 65g, and wasteful as I have noticed that many people are running them only 6 hours a day. I would like to start by only running the MH six hours a day. This leave me with the need for another light source to illuminate the tank for the other six hours.
I would consider adding a 4th MH to the system. I would then need to run MH for the entire day, as they would be the only source of light. I am worried about getting an even spread over a six foot tank, without having to run 3 -4 MH all the time. If I ran only two MH, I don't think that the spread would be even and the tank may look strange. Add in the fact that running two MH during the "supplmental" period, is running 500w an hour as opposed to 320w for 2x VHO or 156 for 2 x T5 (I am worried less about the money, as opposed to being efficient in terms of my electricity use so I am willing to lay out more money for more efficient use of light even if I never recoup the upfront cost..think carbon footprint it makes my wife happy).
If I go T5 or VHO, they will be mounted in front of, and behind the Lumnearc Reflectors. Because of the size of the reflector the lamps will be pretty close to the front and the back. As Pierce mentioned, T5 have a much more efficient reflector, which I believe translates into a tighter spread. So with T5 I am somewhat concerned with their ability to create an even spread across the width of the tank. Especially if I mixed bulbs to achieve a "better" color.
This also poses the question, do I need to run the supplmental lighting during the six hour burn of the MH. This comes down to two issues, one do the corals need that extra light and two does the color of my MH bulb just look plain ugly. I have looked at the 14k bulbs, but am concerned that they don't put out as much PAR as the 10K bulbs. Although I wouldn't need the supplemental lighting for the look, I may need to run it during the MH burn for the extra PAR, which would negate the reason for using a higher K bulb in the first place - to get the look I want without having to supplement.
:banghead:
(sorry for the long post, but I have been racking my brain on the lighting issue since I decided to set this tank up, I really appreciate any thoughts or ideas anyone may have)
One of the things I have been thinking about in terms of my lighting is using it more efficiently. In the past I ran my MH (2 x 175 over a 65g and a 75g) almost 10 hours a day. I think that this may have been overkill, especially over the 65g, and wasteful as I have noticed that many people are running them only 6 hours a day. I would like to start by only running the MH six hours a day. This leave me with the need for another light source to illuminate the tank for the other six hours.
I would consider adding a 4th MH to the system. I would then need to run MH for the entire day, as they would be the only source of light. I am worried about getting an even spread over a six foot tank, without having to run 3 -4 MH all the time. If I ran only two MH, I don't think that the spread would be even and the tank may look strange. Add in the fact that running two MH during the "supplmental" period, is running 500w an hour as opposed to 320w for 2x VHO or 156 for 2 x T5 (I am worried less about the money, as opposed to being efficient in terms of my electricity use so I am willing to lay out more money for more efficient use of light even if I never recoup the upfront cost..think carbon footprint it makes my wife happy).
If I go T5 or VHO, they will be mounted in front of, and behind the Lumnearc Reflectors. Because of the size of the reflector the lamps will be pretty close to the front and the back. As Pierce mentioned, T5 have a much more efficient reflector, which I believe translates into a tighter spread. So with T5 I am somewhat concerned with their ability to create an even spread across the width of the tank. Especially if I mixed bulbs to achieve a "better" color.
This also poses the question, do I need to run the supplmental lighting during the six hour burn of the MH. This comes down to two issues, one do the corals need that extra light and two does the color of my MH bulb just look plain ugly. I have looked at the 14k bulbs, but am concerned that they don't put out as much PAR as the 10K bulbs. Although I wouldn't need the supplemental lighting for the look, I may need to run it during the MH burn for the extra PAR, which would negate the reason for using a higher K bulb in the first place - to get the look I want without having to supplement.
:banghead:
making the animal happy, is the first priority... this begs the question of what type of animals are you keeping. This tank will be almost entirely SPS.
My babies are mostly lps, softies, shrooms, zoas, leathers, a couple of sps 3 are caps, 1 is patchy, 1 is a digi, and the big one I'm not sure what it is, it is very tall with lots of branches (a gift from Chris[Louismustdie]). I did lapse in my water changes for a little bit, went from weekly to a month consequently my caps & the digi suffered. Or perhaps it was the heat, my tank hit 84 during the heat wave. I'm back to weekly w/c, so we'll see if that helps.
By the way, the way my bulbs are set up is 1 VHO in front, and the other is behind the MH(3 MH bulbs) my tank is 6'.
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I spent a good part of my afternoon researching further into supplemental lighting, and have to admit that i am no better off than when I woke up this morning. I am pretty sure that I need something other than the MH, as I can't justify running 2 of them to just light the tank (aside from the six hour "food" burn). That is 500w of unnecessary usage, when I could illuminate the tank for 320w of VHO or 158w of T5.
T5 has the advantage of only being 158w, though I am worried about the spread and its ability to light the whole tank.
VHO has the disadvantage of being 320w for two six footers, but it looks like they will provide enough coverage to illuminate the tank evenly. Awibrandy..how wide is your tank?
Each has its advantages and drawbacks...what would you do?
T5 has the advantage of only being 158w, though I am worried about the spread and its ability to light the whole tank.
VHO has the disadvantage of being 320w for two six footers, but it looks like they will provide enough coverage to illuminate the tank evenly. Awibrandy..how wide is your tank?
Each has its advantages and drawbacks...what would you do?
While looking into the various ways I could set up my sump, I started thinking a little more about plumbing my system together.
The water will drain from two external overflows into my sump, with a "T" in in one of the drains so that I can gravity feed my skimmer. From the sump the water will be returned to the tank via a Sequence Refflo Dart. The water coming from the dart has to go to a manifold so that I can spread the flow out. Water not only needs to return to the display tank, but I would also like to feed my Phosban Reactor from it and eventually a chiller and a fuge/frag tank . These will be added within the next year, so i want to figure them into the whole design from the get go. Here is a plumbing diagram, that I created to help me think about the whole thing.
Obviously, the most critical link in the whole chain will be the manifold. It needs to be able to spread the flow from the Dart out to five different lines, and I will probably add a sixth just for good measure. Each one will have a ball valve on its output
I honestly, don't even know where to start. The Dart has a 1.5 inch output leading into the manifold. The outputs will need to be varying sizes. 3/4 inch for the phosban, and I think one inch for everything else.
Is is as simple as connecting a five or six PVC "t"s to each other.
Any ideas, pics or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
The water will drain from two external overflows into my sump, with a "T" in in one of the drains so that I can gravity feed my skimmer. From the sump the water will be returned to the tank via a Sequence Refflo Dart. The water coming from the dart has to go to a manifold so that I can spread the flow out. Water not only needs to return to the display tank, but I would also like to feed my Phosban Reactor from it and eventually a chiller and a fuge/frag tank . These will be added within the next year, so i want to figure them into the whole design from the get go. Here is a plumbing diagram, that I created to help me think about the whole thing.
Obviously, the most critical link in the whole chain will be the manifold. It needs to be able to spread the flow from the Dart out to five different lines, and I will probably add a sixth just for good measure. Each one will have a ball valve on its output
I honestly, don't even know where to start. The Dart has a 1.5 inch output leading into the manifold. The outputs will need to be varying sizes. 3/4 inch for the phosban, and I think one inch for everything else.
Is is as simple as connecting a five or six PVC "t"s to each other.
Any ideas, pics or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Hey Matt... The entire system is going to be in your basement right? The Dart will not be able to effectively pump water up to a second floor if you are planning on having the sump room in the basement and the display upstairs. I have my Dart spilt two ways right now and I'm sure it has lost some GPH from head pressure, change in pipe diameter, etc. Just something to keep in mind. From your diagram it looks like the bulk of your water is going into 2 returns and the chiller which I think you should be fine with.
The tank 6', which is why I chose the VHOs. My previous tank was a 5', and I used 4 - 4' VHOs on that one without the MH.:Hydrogen:
The whole thing is in my basement. The "fish room" is right behind the tank, so I am not dealing with allot of head pressure. There is a possibility that they dart will not be strong enough once everything comes on line. The only reason I bought the dart, is that I got a very good deal on it. If I need to replace it with something larger, the dart will serve as a back up for emergencies.
At least with my plan, where everything is pretty much dependent on one pump...not having a backup could be disastrous.
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