150 or 250 watt halide for 24"x24"x13" frag tank

[J.guokas]

I am in the process of putting together some equipment for my frag tank and I want to go the halide route. I have never ran halides so I was wondering what I should go with. Any and all help is greatly appreciated. Thanks

 

[SynDen]

Well I'm not a MH guy either, but know how you like to pack in extreme amount of corals I would say the 250 would give you the best range of options. Others may have other opinions though.

 

[sethsolomon]

definitely 250w 14k phoenix would be my recommendation.

 

[Walter White]

I recently switched from led to 250 pheonix over my 60 cube and am loving the results so far. Id say growth has doubled, color is good!

 

[MuralReef]

definitely 250w 14k phoenix would be my recommendation.

+1. That's what I run.

 

[aztecdreams]

I agree with the 250. I just switched back to MH from a short affair with LED

 

[DyM]

Just know you'll have to deal with heat dissipation. Not sure of the location of your frag setup but if it's standalone with no sump, you'll see temps climb a few deg in that small of a tank. I run my frag setup downstairs, and at night, and still see the temp climb 2 deg. FYI is all.

 

[jda123]

Either would be fine. People don't seem to think much of 150W HQI, but they are awesome lights on par with all but the best 250W SE setups. 14K phoenix bulb in either is awesome. Radium makes a 20K bulb in 150W HQI, but not in 250W.

With either, you will need a big reflector in a frag tank... something made to spread 24x24... like a lumen[max,elite,etc] or cayman sun.

 

[Cake_Boss]

I'd go with the 150. I was cooking my corals with a 250SE radium 3 feet above my 24x24x10 frag tank I had.

 

[Walter White]

I'd go with the 150. I was cooking my corals with a 250SE radium 3 feet above my 24x24x10 frag tank I had.

Did you ever happen to take any par readings with that set up? Just curious what they would have been on that arrangement.

 

[Cake_Boss]

Did you ever happen to take any par readings with that set up? Just curious what they would have been on that arrangement.

I took par readings on my 60 cube. I had a 20000k Radium running on an IceCap magnetic ballast with a sunlight supply lumenmax elite 2 reflector, I had the light about 2 feet above the tank. I'll have to look but I was getting 350ish on the sandbed and 800 right below the water line.

If I had to guess on par measurements for the frag tank, I'd say somewhere around 600-800.

 

[Walter White]

Ok so that is allot higher than i am seeing with my 250 14k Phoenix which is 10" over my 60 cube and I am reading about 230-250 at the sand bed and about 600 right below the surface. I'm also running an electronic ballast that's not over driving the bulb.

 

[Cake_Boss]

Sucks I never kept a build thread for my cube, I've been scouring the archives for the numbers I posted. I'll look again when I'm off work, seems to be around 2/12 time frame, maybe even 3/12.