MH T5 request for recommendations

[mandarin417]

I am putting up a new tank and want to use a MH T5 setup at this time. The tank is 36” wide 30” from front to back and 27” tall. I plan to have a mixed corals tank but really don’t expect it to be dominated by SPS – I do like the color varieties and shelf like montiporas and plan to incorporate them in the system. I am also sort of hooked on the “tropical forest” landscape look of soft coral polyps, zoas and mushrooms.

I picked up a very nice used Hamilton fixture with a single ended halide socket in the middle and with 4 T5 lamps. I have a switchable electronic ballast than can run both 250W and 400W lamps.

With my mixed tank approach, may I ask for your recommendations on what T5 lamps I should be using in this system and recommended wattage and brand on the MH lamp?

I may be muddying the waters on this request but I also have access to a pair of new AI Hydra 52’s and also have been considering them for the system with T5 supplements as an alternative to the MH T5 combo.

I would really appreciate your thoughts,

Bob (manadrin417)

[rsaha]

Comes down to personal preference really. The 400W Radium SE is supposed to be gold standard for 400W bulbs. I don't think you can use the Radium 250 bulbs with your ballast (You need an HQI ballast for those bulbs). You have 4 T5 to play with which is nice. Maybe two true actinics and then play with the other two (Blue Plus, Purple Plus, Coral Plus) to see what you like.

At the other end of the extreme the 250W XM10K are PAR monsters but are very yellow to my eye. With 4 true actinics you might be able to balance them out and then your growth would be crazy for SPS but you might have too much light for some other corals. If you google Sanjay lighting (on manhattan reefs) there is a wealth of information of MH/Ballast combos.

[jda]

I would use the Hamilton 10K 400W and blue up and tank a bit with the T5s. The 10K will put about about half again more output than the 20K radium and it looks pretty good.

The Hamilton 10K is a very nice 10K that is white. Most other 10Ks are yellow.

[rsaha]

I ran the Hamilton 250W 10K when I was running SE and I did like it. Nice crisp white as I recall.

[dcmartinpc]

Radium 400W SE with 2 ATI True Actinic and 2 ATI Blue + and call it a day. With the larger footprint, you are going to want to raise that fixture a bit, but you should be fine with the 400W bulb to do so.

I love the Radium 400. You get the PAR of a 250W 10K with the color of the Radium.

This is exact same T5 combination I run on my tank only I have 2 400W Radiums and I run them on the PFO HQI ballast.

The color is superb and the PAR is great.

Don