Your ideal lighting setup

[muddskipper]

OK so whats everyones ideal lighting setup? color temps, wattage, lighting periods, moonlights, dawn and dusk periods ect..

Since I am not happy with the 400w and 2 vho actinics I have I am considering building a complete light system in march? I have an idea of what I want to do and need opinions as well as what everyone else thinks..
Heres what I am considering..

(fixture) 70w, 150w, 250, 150w 70w (fixture) with 4 T5s on the sides..

All bulbs except the 250 will be DE with electronic ballast and the 250 Im not sure about yet..( might keep the 400 for this purpose.. )
70s would be 20ks
150s would be 14ks
250 would be 10k
T5s would be 2 tru blus and 2 actinic 03s

lighting period would be in order of on and off..
actinic 03s on first
tru blues on 1/2 hour later
70s on 1/2 hour after that
150s on 1.5 hours later with 70s going off
250 on 1 hour later
250 off 3 hours later
70s on and 150s off 1 hour later
70s off 1/2 hour later
tru blue off 15 mins later
actinics off 15 mins after that
moonlights on or off depending on what I can find for moonlight cycles and a controller..
total lighting time..8 hours may be extended to 11..

So now the ? is.. is there a programable light system out there that will manage this with the mooncycles and control a heater and chiller as well???

By the way this is all for a 65 gallon tank.. ( yea I know NUTZZZ lol )
On the serious side .. lets hear what your ideal system is and whatcha think of this one for dawn to dusk cycles and what do you think the growth an health of everything will be and do you see any benifits to trying to replicate Mother Nature closer to what we they are used to..

 

[muddskipper]

No one has a comment on this? No ideal light systems out there?

Might have to rethink the 70watters though as it seems like I cannot locate a 20k bulb.

On the plus side though I found this controller Neptune AquaController III it seems like its going to do what I need it to do for dawn to dusk and moonlight cycles..
Anyone have experience with this controller?

 

[Chris L]

free

but seriously, i think that that is more then you need. what was the problem with the 400's? not bright enough? not enough growth?
se or de?
i think for my setup i would like to eventually go to 3x250 watt hqi de mh retros with some t-5 actinics, they would have to be under 5' so i guess duel 40 watt t-5 would work, and some nice moonlights for that great flourescent look

 

[MikeG]

I am going with a 36"x36" tank and I am going to do a single 250 in a luminarc on an icecap ballast and probably a Hamilton 14K bulb. I am going to put the whole thing on a light track so it will move about 1' side to side throughout the day. This will hopefully acomplish several things.

1) Be very inexpensive to run
2) Illuminate many corals from several angles to obtain the best coloration and have no shadowing.

I am just hoping I can get enough coverage front to back. My other thought if I dont is maybe run 2 T5's at the front of the tank for lower light corals.

I was also considering going all T5's but with the footprint of the tank, I would need a lot of bulbs. Maybe 2 5 bulb fixtures. If I do have the 2 T5's in the front, one would be actinic and one a daylight of some sort to balanc out the color but I could have a very faint dawn dusk effect.

 

[grundig5]

I really like my lights now, especially since I got new MH bulbs.

I run 2 X175 SE XM 10Ks with Eballasts, 2 Actinic+ 54W T5s, 1 Actinic 03 54W, and 1 Aquablue+ 54W T5.

The 2 Actinic+'s go on at 1030AM, then everything else comes on at 11AM. Off at 1030, then Actinic+'s off at 11PM. This is a 75G tank. I'm not entirely sure yet, but I may swap one Actinic+ for an 03, or maybe even another Aquablue for the extra white. Good luck, we seem to never be satisfied with our lights (or anything for that matter)
Josh

 

[muddskipper]

As far as my current setup, Im not happy with the intensity I see, the color, the effect, and low to no dawn to dusk effect. ( 400watt se PFO setup 10k bulb with 2 vho actinics )

As far as overkill on the tank with what I am considering keep in mind that except when the 250 is on there is never more than 2 halides on, what I am looking to do is to replicate the actual faint to bright light and photoperiod of what is actually found on the reef including moon cycles with no real large shifts in light intensity from the shifts between halides and T5s. the cost initally will be more expensive but there will be a larger savings in switching between the wattage amounts throughout the day instead of running just a 400 and vho's for 9 hours a day. also because of the spread and angles of the light as someone else said it will help illuminate the tank from all angles sisde to side.. the color temps of the bulbs will also help look more like what you would see on a reef from sun up to sun down.
Bulb life would be greatly extended as well since the bulbs would be on fewer hours a day than just having one or 2 bulbs..

Maybe its all alitlle overkill, maybe not.. Thats why Im posting and looking for opinions..