Watch out!!!
- Thread starter zanski
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Did he get the 1,000w bulbs??
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Well at least he is reasonable. 250's are good.
:lol2:
:lol2::lol2::lol2::lol2:
:lol2::lol2::lol2::lol2:
Man, I'm not even around to defend myself! 
I do have two 1,000 watt lights, as does Andy @ MRC and Tim The_Hit_Man. It's an exclusive club of those who pay outrageous electricity bills....(!)
For those interested, a few interesting tidbits:
- The initial+ cost of the setup is pretty reasonable- pretty much in line with 250 or 400w setups
- They are very bright and VERY hot. I have to plan my moves into the tank, for fear of burning my arm
- They pull 9amps each, which means the two of mine require their own 20amp breaker
- The only timer I could find that could handle the load of both of them was a 40amp hot water heater timer
- The humming of the ballasts is so loud they had to be moved to my basement. I ended up running 10gauge romex wire between the ballast and light
- I run 14k Hamilton bulbs for a nice color and no actinic. I get around 1500 PAR at the surface and ~500-600 PAR pretty easily at 7-8" down in the tank. I get around 250 PAR at the bottom of a 26" tank
Other than that, they're just like any other MH setup. Just a bit more oomph...
I do have two 1,000 watt lights, as does Andy @ MRC and Tim The_Hit_Man. It's an exclusive club of those who pay outrageous electricity bills....(!)
For those interested, a few interesting tidbits:
- The initial+ cost of the setup is pretty reasonable- pretty much in line with 250 or 400w setups
- They are very bright and VERY hot. I have to plan my moves into the tank, for fear of burning my arm
- They pull 9amps each, which means the two of mine require their own 20amp breaker
- The only timer I could find that could handle the load of both of them was a 40amp hot water heater timer
- The humming of the ballasts is so loud they had to be moved to my basement. I ended up running 10gauge romex wire between the ballast and light
- I run 14k Hamilton bulbs for a nice color and no actinic. I get around 1500 PAR at the surface and ~500-600 PAR pretty easily at 7-8" down in the tank. I get around 250 PAR at the bottom of a 26" tank
Other than that, they're just like any other MH setup. Just a bit more oomph...
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Wow 1000's. Thats my dream. I got two 150's. on a 75 gallon with two actinic pc's
No desire for that electric bill!. If you run good bulbs on 250s your fine easily to 30" deep. On mine 25" deep I get almost 300 PAR at the bottom with 250 10k XMs around 1200 at surface and 500 at 10" or so.
Obviously water clarity plays a huge role. If you don't run carbon or ozone and have a decent bioload you will need the extra light because the water will absorb so much that at the bottom you will be in double digits.
Of course it also depends on what look you want. If you want to run 20k bulbs you need at least 400Wers to equal a 250W good 10k bulb.
Here I plugged in my setup for 250s and compared to an a 400W Hamilton 14k bulb on an Icecap and it is only abot 60% of the PAR of my 10k setup.
http://tinyurl.com/ylu6n3">http://tinyurl.com/ylu6n3</a>
So Chris's is probably roughly equivelent to mine but 4x the electicity.
Now having said all that. 10ks alone look really really white so I do supplement with actinics. I actualy have a mixture of 3 10k and 2 20k bulbs also so to me more then anything it's about looks then decide what you need. Chris wants to run 14k bulbs. Given that he needs really high wattage to obtain the neccessary PAR.
Also if he ran 250W 10ks He would need a large amount of VHO or T5 he would probably need another 100W of flourescent or so to get a look he likes. So of course you would have to run all the numbers but by the time the setup costs are taken into account the breakeven point is probably quite a while of just buying 1000W bulbs so in order to run no supplementation he needs the wattage. I like the dawn dusk effect of the actinics also so that plays into my decision. It's all personal taste as there are lots of ways to get there but you can't say blanketly that 250s are enough or 100W are to much. depends on the bulb, ballast, what your trying to keep, the look you want, etc, etc.
Obviously water clarity plays a huge role. If you don't run carbon or ozone and have a decent bioload you will need the extra light because the water will absorb so much that at the bottom you will be in double digits.
Of course it also depends on what look you want. If you want to run 20k bulbs you need at least 400Wers to equal a 250W good 10k bulb.
Here I plugged in my setup for 250s and compared to an a 400W Hamilton 14k bulb on an Icecap and it is only abot 60% of the PAR of my 10k setup.
http://tinyurl.com/ylu6n3">http://tinyurl.com/ylu6n3</a>
So Chris's is probably roughly equivelent to mine but 4x the electicity.
Now having said all that. 10ks alone look really really white so I do supplement with actinics. I actualy have a mixture of 3 10k and 2 20k bulbs also so to me more then anything it's about looks then decide what you need. Chris wants to run 14k bulbs. Given that he needs really high wattage to obtain the neccessary PAR.
Also if he ran 250W 10ks He would need a large amount of VHO or T5 he would probably need another 100W of flourescent or so to get a look he likes. So of course you would have to run all the numbers but by the time the setup costs are taken into account the breakeven point is probably quite a while of just buying 1000W bulbs so in order to run no supplementation he needs the wattage. I like the dawn dusk effect of the actinics also so that plays into my decision. It's all personal taste as there are lots of ways to get there but you can't say blanketly that 250s are enough or 100W are to much. depends on the bulb, ballast, what your trying to keep, the look you want, etc, etc.
In Chris' defense we both worked on running several ballasts, bulbs, temps, wattages and tested PAR at multiple intervals of his tank all with different configurations and height settings.
After running the numbers and analyzing the data, we found that for the cost of the ballast and PAR output with the color he liked, that the 1000w bulbs were the best application for HIS setup. That's what's so great about this hobby is that you can have an almost infinite array of options and two tanks will never run the same way.
He actually used to run 4 250w DE bulbs and the numbers were quite disappointing!
After running the numbers and analyzing the data, we found that for the cost of the ballast and PAR output with the color he liked, that the 1000w bulbs were the best application for HIS setup. That's what's so great about this hobby is that you can have an almost infinite array of options and two tanks will never run the same way.
He actually used to run 4 250w DE bulbs and the numbers were quite disappointing!
Yup- kwl hit the nail(s) on the head. 1000w is overkill for almost all tanks. I probably wouldn't do 1000w if I had to do it over again (probably go down to 400w), but it does give me serveral benefits:
- two lights cover the tank. not a big deal until you realize I have a large acrylic center brace that could easily melt.
- As kwl said, I get plenty of PAR out of my blue 14k lights without the need for supplemental lighting
- I also like the dusk to dawn effect, and have a separate flourescent ballast that cuts on for a while when the MH's go off for actinics. Adds complexity, but oh well
Again, kwl is right - what I have is overkill, and adds unnecessary heat. Why don't I change? Because I've already changed everything to support 1000w from the 4x250DE I used to have, and doing 4x400 wasn't that much different (1600w total vs 2000w total). I don't like the look of 10k bulbs, even with the [much] higher PAR value they give.
It all comes down to what you want. Choose carefully and have a chiller on hand...
Also, my electric bill isn't all that bad. The MH lights run 9 hrs/day. That's 540 kWh per month, or ~$43/mo for my lights. Figure another $10 or so for the chiller.
- two lights cover the tank. not a big deal until you realize I have a large acrylic center brace that could easily melt.
- As kwl said, I get plenty of PAR out of my blue 14k lights without the need for supplemental lighting
- I also like the dusk to dawn effect, and have a separate flourescent ballast that cuts on for a while when the MH's go off for actinics. Adds complexity, but oh well
Again, kwl is right - what I have is overkill, and adds unnecessary heat. Why don't I change? Because I've already changed everything to support 1000w from the 4x250DE I used to have, and doing 4x400 wasn't that much different (1600w total vs 2000w total). I don't like the look of 10k bulbs, even with the [much] higher PAR value they give.
It all comes down to what you want. Choose carefully and have a chiller on hand...
Also, my electric bill isn't all that bad. The MH lights run 9 hrs/day. That's 540 kWh per month, or ~$43/mo for my lights. Figure another $10 or so for the chiller.
Wow how nice to have an intelligent conversation with no mud flinging, roasting, etc. Sorry for the digression but I'm still a mod on the DFW boards and the above would never have been so civil on such a debatable topic so kudos to the folks here!
Back on topic it is amazing to me how much difference there is in bulbs. I mean even same ballast same wattage, and same supposed K (which is a big racket anyway) can be a factor of 2 apart just amazing. I guess I shouldn't be that suprised but it does get you thinking also about other things. What are the quaity difference between filter and reactor media, salts, foods, etc. There has been some research done on carbon, phosphate removers, salts, etc but it's small. It's actually kind of scary!
Back on topic it is amazing to me how much difference there is in bulbs. I mean even same ballast same wattage, and same supposed K (which is a big racket anyway) can be a factor of 2 apart just amazing. I guess I shouldn't be that suprised but it does get you thinking also about other things. What are the quaity difference between filter and reactor media, salts, foods, etc. There has been some research done on carbon, phosphate removers, salts, etc but it's small. It's actually kind of scary!
Yeah- I agree. It's funny how people get so bent out of shape on the same topic. There are plenty of ways to accomplish the same goals. Some are more expensive and some are more glamorous, but if the animals thrive, then something must be going right.
I remember doing those test with my ballasts, your ballasts, and some different bulbs and seeing a remarkable difference even in things with the same ratings. You're right- there's so many different combinations, it's amazing that they all work as well as they do (or that the corals are so adaptive)!
