lighting questions again

[screwsloose]

i am almost finished with my tank 130x36x34tall . i am planning on running (4)400w mh's and using t5s for atinic. the question is how much t-5 would i need to completely cut out the mh's? would it be cost effective or around the same with more bulbs to mess with?

planning on a mixed reef with alot of monticaps

[reefscape15]

You would need way too many t-5's to push out 1600 watts. Assuming you went with 3 36" bulbs just to make one row of lights down the tank, that would only be 117watts. You would need 13 rows just to get to 1500 watts. And in only 36" front to back, you would have your bulbs pretty much on top of each other, and a total of 39 bulbs to change and keep lit. It would be cheaper on electricity i would think, but in the cost of 40 t-5 bulbs, you could buy some pretty expensive MH bulbs. It wouldn't be worth the time and headache of having to remember what bulbs to change when, and keeping them all clean! I cant wait to see some pics of that tank when it's up and running though! 900gal is HUGE!!!!!

[screwsloose]

thanks. then i will sitck with the original plan of using the mh's and running atinics on t5's

[reefscape15]

I think thats your best bet. Also just the look of MH is enough for me to use them!