48 inch 4x54W t5 Sunlight Supply Tek Light

[Dancing4raiin]

So im crusing arounds craigs list cause im looking for a light for a 20 long i want to build when i stumble upon a 48" 4 bulb tek for 10 bucks. It comes with a busted ballast which i searched on there website could be replaced for about 60 bucks. I want to know what kind of coral i would be able to keep in a 60 gallon? Anyone with experience let me know. Plus i would like to hear from the veteran TRT members.

[shaggy420]

how many watts does the light put out?

[Dancing4raiin]

216, or 3.6 per gallon but i heard the individual reflectors make the difference

[shaggy420]

as long as you stay away from sps, you should be fine with most others.

[crvz]

No, if it has individual reflectors, you'd be able to keep just about anything. YLChik (Amy) was using 4 normal driven T5 bulbs in individual reflectors and was growing SPS like crazy. Granted, deep water acros are probably not going to thrive, but anything from monti's to birsdnest to psammacora to poccilipora would have quite a chance of doing well under that fixture.

[snow_man84088]

I say go for it if you can really replace the balast for ~60 bucks!

[Dancing4raiin]

Im mostly interested in keeping high end favia's. YLchick if you could jump in here i'd appreciate it. How big was your tank? Thanks for all the replys guys.

[Wiskey]

I had a 50G with the 4*54W (48") Tek light retro and kept and all SPS and Clam tank,.. they did great! I later upgraded my SPS tank and kept that tank and light setup for softies and LPS,.. They also did great after I moved the lights a little higher up.

I think in your tank you would be able to keep about anything on the top half of the tank and the bottom half I would stick to mostly monties, lps, and softies.

If you want to keep favia's, I would actually hang the light just a little higher off the water than you would if you want to keep SPS, I think it might be a touch much if you slam it right down on the water's surface.

Whiskey

[crvz]

Originally Posted by Dancing4raiin

Im mostly interested in keeping high end favia's. YLchick if you could jump in here i'd appreciate it. How big was your tank? Thanks for all the replys guys.

her's was a 55 gallon. And I agree with whiskey about the favias, they don't really need as much light that a number of SPS corals do.

[YLChik]

howdy! i heard a call for me so I came running...

yup I ran a 55 gallon with 4 54w t5's on it for about a year. It was my first sps set up and as far as I can tell stuff grew like mad and my color was good as long as my nutrients were in check.

I know alot of the reefes in this hobby swear by MH, but I haven't fired up a tank with them yet so I can't speak on them, but I will say I think the idea that you can't have an sps tank with T5's is bull.

I found the lighting to be too intense for some of my lower light corals like brains and things. I had some open brains bleach out, a closed brain frag that keeps hanging on, but I have bleached a few times, acans that need shading as well as a few favias. I had several acros, digi's, passamocora, birdsnest, monti's, poccilipora, and stylophora all which grew to verying degrees.


Make sure you make shaded areas in your rock work so that you can keep lower light things with out bleaching them.

T5's have a very even spread of light from end to end on their reflectors were MH don't. So you will need to provide shady spots on your own.

All that to say I woudl certainly go for t5's. I wish I could fit them under the hood of the corner tank that I am in the process of building, or I would. But I can tell you I will be running them on my frag tank. Love them can't say enough positive about 'em.


HTH

[Dancing4raiin]

Great, do you have any pictures? Im getting pictures from the seller to see how good of shape the fixture is. Makes me hesitant for only 10 bucks

[YLChik]

up feel free to look through my member gallery as well - if it's sps it was growing in that tank.

this is a shot of the tank after I put the t5's on it about 9 months earlier



hmmm i went back to a bunch of the threads I hae had on my sps growth but the pictures didn't make the transfer when we switched servers *sigh*

best place to go is to search my images - hope that helps you.

[aquawolf]

I definitely agree with Chris, Whiskey, and Amy as I have seen plety of people keep wonderful SPS under those lights. You have a much better bonus in the indivdual reflectors as much more light is directed straight into the tank.

I would jump on the deal before someone else does.

[Dancing4raiin]

I asked him if i could pick it up this weekend and he said that was fine. I sent him an e-mail earlier about I'd probably drive down there on sunday but have not heard anything back. I just check the sunlight supply website and the ballast is only $40 not $60 as i thought. I hope i get this light you guys got me all excited.

[aquawolf]

Sounds great, let us know how it goes.