marineland reef led with 56 column

[altezza01]

i am looking at the marineland reef led but i guess my tank it not a common size. i have a 56 gallon column tank that measures 30"wide x 18"deep x 24"tall. i was thinking about going with the 36" marineland reef led and let 3" hang off each side or would i be better off going with 2 18" and place them front to back instead of long ways. let me know what you think i should go with. thanks

 

[TheEngineer]

What are you trying to keep in the tank? Those marineland won't support a reef at all IMO.

 

[SPStoner]

What are you trying to keep in the tank? Those marineland won't support a reef at all IMO.

I'd say you are not exactly correct in your opinion. Depending on what type of corals you want to keep, these lights re more than capable of supporting a reef. Here is a picture of one of my 45 gallon cube tanks. It has been running for over a year with 2 of the 24" RC lights, and 1- 18". AS you can see, I have colorful, growing corals of all types. SPS, LPS, clams, you name it. Are these as feature laden as some of the high end fixtures? Certainly not. Are they high output Cree's? Nope. But to say you cannot support a reef is just not correct.

to the OP, altezza, I would go with 2 of the 18" for your tank. It would look better (not hanging over the edge...) and would give you better spread front to back. With 2 of those lights, you should be able to keep most corals in the top third of your tank, but will be limited in the bottom half or so because of the depth. Certainly, you could spend more and go with something more high end, but don't believe everything you hear, lol.

 

[cdness]

Honestly I would stay away from the Marineland LEDs. As you can see there is a reef they are supporting, but I can tell you from personal experience with them that they are not as good as the marketing they have. We had one on loan for a frag swap hosted in Fargo and it didn't give off a good color or PAR numbers so all of the corals looked bad. We had the 18" one over a 10G tank and it wasn't bright enough for us.

You would be better off going with a light from Evolution and setting it up as a pendant. It would be brighter, higher quality, and will look better too. The better optics will get the light penetrating down into the tank better so you can be more flexible with coral placements.

Just my $.02...

 

[TheEngineer]

SPStoner, I'm happy to hear that you are having good results with using the Marineland LED lights. From the picture of your tank, it looks like you have corals that are all fairly tolerant of lower lighting levels. It's hard to tell from the picture since it looks like the flash was on (and LEDs are impossible to get good pictures of, for me at least) but I've seen these lights on tanks and the light levels that they kick out and the colors that they bring out just don't do it for me. To me supporting a reef is more than just having corals grow, it is having them thrive and produce vibrant colors.

Your tank is also 5.5" shorter in depth than altezza01's. LEDs without proper lensing gives poor penetration.

Here's the par values for these fixtures:

64 par directly under the fixture at 24"? Sorry, you won't convince me that this is capable of supporting a reef. PC's put out more than that.


EDIT: I'm not trying to be antagonistic, I'm just trying to show the basis for my original statement.

 

[bairdimusprime]

if hes keeping that clam alive long term i'd say the lights are doing something right.. congrats on success with this unit i've been considering one for my 30 gallon long for some time..

 

[ReefLEDLights]

64 PAR at 24"...:sad:

45 Cree XP LEDs with optics at 700mA will give you at least 5x that and only burn 160 watts...

Sanjay says you need a min of 100 and we like 200 for clams at the sand bed.

Bill

 

[Reef Breeders Verified Sponsor]

+1, and I heard that marineland leds go dim after a year and a half or so of use, and only put out 10k light or full actinict

 

[_sludgefactory]

I personally wouldn't purchase any marineland product at all after the stealth heater fiasco. They replaced my stealth on recall with a visitherm that didn't even work. Poor quality products all around.

Sent from somewhere using something.

 

[Reef Breeders Verified Sponsor]

+ 1, Ive had a pump of theirs short circuit b/c the back cracked somehow, but I do use visi therm heaters with ok results, I had a stealth heater stop working though. Anyways, I would go with diy or Ai's

 

[TheEngineer]

Here's the link to that picture from above:
http://www.3reef.com/images/misc/products/marineland/ho_led_par.jpg

Looks like 3Reef doesn't allow hotlinks.

I've seen one of these fixtures in person now and I've gotta stand by my previous statements that I don't think these can adequately support a reef. It is a slick looking fixture, but it really does not put out much light.