How far should be my T5 lights from my 125 gallon surface?

thespsguy

Non-member
Can anyone help me? My is 5 foot long T5 AquaticLife
Right now is hanging on the ceiling and 10 inches above my water surface.
I do have glass covers on it to prevent too much evaporation
Thanks guys
Paulo
 
It is about right


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You shouldn’t have a glass cover on your tank. You need it to be wide open for gas exchange. Also ATI recommend that the T5 can be 8” above water surface at the minimum
 
are you sure? sorry to ask you that, but couple people said I should put cover to not evaporate too much water
 
Yes, your tank need to be open for gas exchange and also, if you put a cover on it, there are water all over the glass, how will the light penetrate that and provide enough light to your corals? It’s okay for water to evaporate. Just fill it up with fresh water. Use an auto top off. What are you trying to accomplish by not letting water evaporates?
 
Yes, your tank need to be open for gas exchange and also, if you put a cover on it, there are water all over the glass, how will the light penetrate that and provide enough light to your corals? It’s okay for water to evaporate. Just fill it up with fresh water. Use an auto top off. What are you trying to accomplish by not letting water evaporates?
I'm just the new man on this. and I'm doing this brand new tank, however last week by listening one person from a store, I changed 50% of my water and I killed my entire aquarium, anemones, corals, more than 9 fishes, more than $1,200 not just the price, but my son 5yo cried for a couple days. it was very sad. Thanks for your help, what kind of auto top off do you recommend?
 
Rule of thumbs is to never shock the system. Change only 10-20% of water. I use a cheap one called AutoTopOff. Their website is also called autotopoff. It’s cheap and doesn’t look good but quite reliable so far. Have it for about 10 years. I got the double float switch one. There are plenty of good options on auto top off out there. Why are you changing 50% water? What are you trying to accomplish? Trying to dilute the bad stuffs? What do you use as your filtration?
 
Swing by Dong’s and pick up a coralbox ato. If you want something smaller and still affordable ReefBreeders just released a new ato system exo-ato. Dong is a retailer for reef breeders so he may have the new one now too. @dz6t is the person I am taking about.

I have the coralbox n50 for my tank and love it, but the smaller computer on the new EXO is a nice feature too!


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Thank you very much for the recommendation.
I do have the Reefbreeders new Exo ATO in stock. This new ATO is very simple and elegant. It is a clone of AutoAqua smart ATO.
I also have a used Autoaqua Smart ATO for sale too.


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My 125 has the aquaticlife 6 bulb fixture. The light is about 4 or 5 inches above the water mounted w the legs provided. You dont need a cover, and an ato is necessary if u r keeping coral unless you dong mind refilling 1 to 3 gallons of fresh every day which is what will evaporate daily
 

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My 125 has the aquaticlife 6 bulb fixture. The light is about 4 or 5 inches above the water mounted w the legs provided. You dont need a cover, and an ato is necessary if u r keeping coral unless you dong mind refilling 1 to 3 gallons of fresh every day which is what will evaporate daily
Hey man thank you very much, yes I use the same light but I did hang on the ceiling and is about 10 inches from the water since is very strong, the person who did my entire installation is employee to Petco on Marine depto for saltwater for 25 years, and he was the one who put the covers and he didn't sell me at all, he recommends for evaporation control and he said it does affect the gas exchange and it's very hard to me when I listen to many different opinions, since I'm new and going all by this guy. The first time I listened from someone this week to change 50% of my water since my Nitrate was too high, it killed my entire aquarium 46 gallons
 
My 125 has the aquaticlife 6 bulb fixture. The light is about 4 or 5 inches above the water mounted w the legs provided. You dont need a cover, and an ato is necessary if u r keeping coral unless you dong mind refilling 1 to 3 gallons of fresh every day which is what will evaporate daily

The reason aquaticlife t5 have such short legs was that the short legs were adapted from fresh water t5 lighting. When t5 was used for fresh water, all bulbs are identical, so there is no need to mix different bulb color and the bulbs can be closer to water surface. For reef tank, you need to hang the light higher in order have better color mixing.


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The reason aquaticlife t5 have such short legs was that the short legs were adapted from fresh water t5 lighting. When t5 was used for fresh water, all bulbs are identical, so there is no need to mix different bulb color and the bulbs can be closer to water surface. For reef tank, you need to hang the light higher in order have better color mixing.


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Hi dong, will i be ok to grow coral the way i have it? The color blen appears good, although i have not tried mounting it. Anyway i would not want to mount it from the ceiling because i like having the light inside the canopy to prevent blinding myself when on the couch. Just hope im not doing something wrong by having it mounted by the legs..
 
Your fine mounting it on the legs.

T5 blend better than most regardless of mounting height. Height dictating color blending is more of an led thing. T5 naturally is a well blended diffused light. Thus the lack of shimmer, unless you really have some current at the surface.
 
The reason aquaticlife t5 have such short legs was that the short legs were adapted from fresh water t5 lighting. When t5 was used for fresh water, all bulbs are identical, so there is no need to mix different bulb color and the bulbs can be closer to water surface. For reef tank, you need to hang the light higher in order have better color mixing.


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Hi dong, will i be ok to grow coral the way i have it? The color blen appears good, although i have not tried mounting it. Anyway i would not want to mount it from the ceiling because i like having the light inside the canopy to prevent blinding myself when on the couch. Just hope im not doing something wrong by having it mounted by the legs..

Not a big problem, it will grow coral just fine.


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T5 blend better than most regardless of mounting height. Height dictating color blending is more of an led thing. T5 naturally is a well blended diffused light. Thus the lack of shimmer, unless you really have some current at the surface.

I have to disagree. Shimmer comes from point source light, not from color blending.
The simple test is to put a piece of white paper near the water surface, if the t5 is hung low, you can see color different from front to back.


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