irish1028 Posted October 28, 2003 Share Posted October 28, 2003 Gents, On my ten gallon reef setup. I wanted to put a metal halide over it. I was thinking a 150watt. But would a 20k be overkill? Thanks Irish Link to comment
Jahkaya Posted October 28, 2003 Share Posted October 28, 2003 Irish: If this is to be your only light source I would go with 20k. 20K is actually Dimmer than a 10k. If you went with 10k I would recommend supplementing actinic. Link to comment
kennerd Posted October 28, 2003 Share Posted October 28, 2003 Don't think of a higher kelvin rating in terms of more or less light. It's techinically a color quotient. 10k is pretty close to a bright, pure white, with 20k being more blue. I run a 10k without actinic over my 10 gal as you can see here: http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/showthread...&threadid=14602 I should receive my 20k bulbs in the next day or two, and will post pic differences. Link to comment
kennerd Posted October 28, 2003 Share Posted October 28, 2003 I'm looking forward to my new bulbs: they are CoralVue's, and are supposedly a little less blue than the XM's Link to comment
jdsabin1 Posted October 28, 2003 Share Posted October 28, 2003 20k's over a nano are the way to go IMO. That way you don't have to supplement actinic and the tank isn't so bright you don't have to wear shades to look in it. I love my XM's and are using them on my 150 gallon tank as well. HTH! Link to comment
Jahkaya Posted October 28, 2003 Share Posted October 28, 2003 As a General rule 20k's will always have less par then a 10k or 6500k. Ken What kelvin are the Coralvue you are getting? They have a 10, 15 and 20k I was thinking of replacing my radium with a Coralvue 10k, to get better coral growth. They are cheap and supposedly have good Par. The color is nice as well. Link to comment
kennerd Posted October 28, 2003 Share Posted October 28, 2003 I'm getting the 20k. Can't beat it at under $60. I run pretty white on all of my tanks, and the 10 looks great with the 10k only, but I really need a new bulb, so I figured why not try the CV 20k. Those pics of my deresas are under 10k with no actinic: picture them with some blue in there.... Link to comment
Jahkaya Posted October 28, 2003 Share Posted October 28, 2003 Picture them with a 20k and actinic 36w PC. I need more light, so it's either trade out the bulb for a 10k and lose blue, of upgrade to a 20k 250. Which is cheaper, hmmm, let me think. Link to comment
kennerd Posted October 28, 2003 Share Posted October 28, 2003 250 bulbs AINT cheap. Personally, I light the look of 10k with actinic...balances nicely. in fact, over my 65 I run a 175 mogul 10k ushio and a 250 DE 10k ushio, paired with 2x110 URI actinics, and you really can't see the actinic very much. Snap em on/off and it really is nothing more than a better, full spectrum light, but the actinics on the dawn/dusk are wicked. Link to comment
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