DIY 70 or 150 MH lighting for $100 or less?

[silence]

ive been looking at some of the posts lattley on DIY metal halide lighting sence ive never even looked at it before because it was so $$, but from what i understand all you realy need is a ballest like from balllestwise(do they sell 150 ballests iam not sure witch to get?)a 300wat haligen flood light from home depot witch will hold the buld, some wire, a power cord and bulb(pheonix 14k is the best without actinic right?)conect all the wires and mount in your hood right? iam doing this for 24g nanocube, iam either going to make a hood(if you have MH can you use a wooden hood for it?)or hang it but iam not sure witch to go with the 70watt(witch i think would be cheeper?)or the 150(i cant seem to find a cheep 150 balast though?), with the 70watt i gess i cant have clams or many SPS, but i dont whant a lot of SPS anyway, would the 70 give good light coverage and bring out the colors of the fish? if i get the 150 can i have an anemone and a clam if there high up? any other info on DIY MH lighting would grate sence i dont whant to screw up

[silence]

after looking some more i found the 150 watt MH ballasts on ballestwise for $50 and the 70watts are $30 so iam not sure weather to get the 150 or the 70 now, what would i have to do difrentley to fit the 150 into a flood light fixture that the 70w would fit into? dos the 150 produce a lot more heat than the 70w?and could someone tell me the best place to get the MH bulbs? are cheepy ones on ebay and reefshops.com any good? or should i look for ushio astrolux any other good brands? it seems to me the MH bulb is the most expensive part of all....

[ReeFur]

the 150 bulb is bigger than the 70w one..so the 150w one would not fit into the floodlight without mods..yeah 150 produces more heat but more light.14k astralux is the way to go

[eklikewhoa]

I built one for about $50 with the cheap MH bulb from Ebay....could probably do one with the Astralux bulb for about $80

[starcat]

There was a thread I found on this site which showed how to do everything from start to finish, including pictures. It's actually pretty easy if you're mechanically inclined - I used the Ballastwise 70w and an inexpensive 20k bulb from ebay and built a hanger that's mounted to the back of the tank cabinet (BC 14 and stand). It works great for my tank, but I'd say if you're going thru the trouble of making your own light, do it right the first time. If your tank is 24g, maybe the 150w would be worth the extra $. That way 6 months from now if you get the urge to grow some high light corals (clams) you won't be kicking yourself about choosing the smaller/weaker light. BTW, sometimes Ballastwise puts there stuff on sale - I bought mine about 2 months ago when they had everything $10 off.