SPS lighting on a budget

rushbattle · Nov 21, 2019

AdamB said:
I have the same tank. Using hydra 26’s at 11” over water . I would like to know my what my par values are and thinking about renting a par meter. No one in my area owns one . I live in the sticks!

You can borrow mine, I’m local to you. Do you know Jake?

Backreefing · Nov 21, 2019

ycnibrc said:
Ocean revive t247 led sometime eBay have it for 155$

I think I bid against you .

jason17star · Dec 11, 2019

I like the Hydras, cant go wrong with it.

Afterburner · Dec 12, 2019

Lousybreed said:
I would go 18” if you can! 12” at least.

Thank you for the advice. I guess I just got lucky since I have them at 12". The buddy that told me to get them has his at about 3-4" with great results, but I wanted to have room to get in the tank without constantly moving them. They are hanging, so I can adjust the height if needed. When I first turned them on, they overpowered my tank and algae took off, so I turned down the white considerably and slowly ramped the blue up over a few days. I have them on WiFi home automation switches that I use for the timers and it is easy to ask Alexla to turn them on/off when someone visits. The White is on the lowest setting and about 3 hours a day, but I am going to slowly add time to this circuit now that my CC and a little reef flux took care of the algae. The blue is on from 8am-5pm at 100%. I may get a PAR meter some day, but my Corals seem fine with this set up so far.

Afterburner · Dec 12, 2019

Dana Riddle said:
The debate about 'best light' is as old as the modern reefing hobby. Fluorescent and metal halide lamps can get the job done. So can LEDs. But your question was 'SPS lighting on a budget.' IMHO, LEDs would be the way to go. Some of the black boxes are inexpensive and can provide enough light plus many have programmable spectrum and photoperiod. I can't tell you how many times I've had long discussions on this subject. Nor how many times I've received a reply along the lines of 'I got the lamp(s) you recommended but the wife doesn't like it because it makes the carpet look purple.' So, the adjustable spectrum is important.
I skimmed through the comments here, and none of the advice you've gotten will lead you wrong. Personally, I prefer LEDs.

I agree 100% anything will get the job done, even sunlight if you can place your tank near a window, but the flexibility of LED really shines (no pun intended). Years ago I briefly worked in the LED lighting industry for a start-up that was going after the Cannibus grow light market. Their claim to fame was LED with flexibility to change spectrum using your cell phone. This way you could use the same light for growth and then force budding/flowering by changing the spectrum and photoperiod by a simple app on your phone. We built some and tested with a customer in Denver. What we found was that the main improvements over conventional lighting for LED were heat dissipated, operational cost (power bill and less replacement), and ability to change spectrum resulted in better quality of end product (ability to tune spectrum for specific results). Ultimately the company fumed out (ran out of angel funding), but I found a old customer testimonial on my youtube channel that might be of interest ( it's only about 1 minute long). I am thinking that someday I might use a spot light approach along with my cheap black box to experiment with some specific corals in my tank, but I am still a newbe in this sport and have a lot to learn.