Ballasts

[Salty Dog]

What do you guys perfer for balast's on MH. Im thinking of doing a complete re do of my current light fixture. Right now its an Aqua Medic fixture 72" with 4-250w halides and 4 39 w actinics.
I was thinking of changing the balast's to 400 w mogals but was not sure on a great quality unit, was considering Icecap's but not sure.

My tank is a 225g sps. Light fixture is coming up on a year old so its time for new bulbs, But instead of ordering 250 watt Im thinking of just changing the ballasts, and up grading tyo 400 watt x 4

Thanks All Bill

 

[AZDesertRat]

I use Coralvue and IceCap myself with great results.

 

[Salty Dog]

should I stay with the 250 w bulbs my tank is 26" with the sandbed

 

[MikeB]

should I stay with the 250 w bulbs my tank is 26" with the sandbed

If you have a DSB or at least 2" sandbed I would say 250W is fine. I run 2 x 250W on my 120 and its 4x2x2

 

[roscoe]

I say stick with 250s. You will probally have most of your light loving corals on your top water colunm anyhow and just put your corals that don't desire much light towards the bottom of your tank.

 

[dantimdad]

ditto.

I wouldn't up it to 400 unless something went wrong with the old ballasts and even then i might just replace them with the same wattage.

dantimdad

 

[Eggs]

I have 250W about 32" above sand bed with no problems.

Ice Cap ballasts.

 

[livingstone]

Lumatek

What do you guys perfer for balast's on MH...

I've only been using mine a couple months now so I can't attest to their quality personally but I think you'll find the Sunlight Supply Lumatek has a great reputation. It is certainly worth considering.