Lighting Question For Frag Tank

[mmckaig]

Hey all I am sure this will start a firestorm of comments but trying to see what I can do... I bought a 12" tall frag tank 48x24 and using it for sps and some Lps. I have good color and ok growth but.... I struggled a lot with the setup when I had all 8bulbs on the t5 unit running. I had hair algae, tons of algae on the glass and general things associated with high phosphates. I was also bleaching soft corals pretty quick....

I have this frag tank hooked into my system with a 100gal sump and another 150gal display upstairs....

I though maybe old bulbs? So changed them and algae continued... So, shut off 4 bulbs and problem solved. I am running fine now but, now thinking that I'd like to have all 8 bulbs running but don't want to hammer the corals with 4 more bulbs and cause issues.

I raised up the light recently, I had it about 14"above the water. I was thinking of starting up the other 4 bulbs for a few hours a day to condition the corals. Anyone here have a 12"deep frag tank with a 8bulb48" fixture...
Thoughts on setup?
How high up are your bulbs from the water
Length of time you're running light?
Bulb type/combinations.

The other option I have is to move to led but not sure yet on that . Led works great on my bigger tank but haven't wanted to mess too much with what works on the frag tank.

Thanks!


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[scubasteve]

12" is very shallow the 8 bulbs would be overkill except things that need intense lighting. if 4 bulbs is working then stick to it the issue is you dont have the depth to decrease intensity to keep a broad range of corals so the whole tank is pretty much the same level of lighting.

you could use some screen over the top part of half the tank to shield some of the lighting for the lower light species but thats the only idea i have

 

[mmckaig]

I bought the setup from Harley mike and I swear that he had all 8 bulbs running.... But if I recall he had like 3 feet from the water to the lights or more. I was thinking of buying some kessil's. At least I can play with intensity.... Any thoughts on how I do the seaport without making a big mess of things?


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[EricTMah]

Why don't you run the 4 bulbs for the full duration of time (8-10 hours) and have the other four bulbs on the a peak period of like an hour or two?

I started doing that with my leds on my dt and I'm getting amazing growth and colour now. I have my lights peak for 2 hours a day only and down to 70% for the rest of the time. All my sps are loving it and my lower light corals are doing well too.

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