I am working on putting together a 190 gallon acrylic tank (72" X 24" X 25"). Unfortunately, because I wasn't aware of this problem at the time I purchased the tank, the tank has a foot-wide, acrylic central brace. At the same time, because it is a 72" tank I initially wanted to put three 250 watt MH lights in the canopy.
I realize that putting a MH over an acrylic central brace is a big "No No," however, the one difference between my situation and most of the other posts I've read on TRF is that I built my own canopy and so my canopy is 18" tall. Hence, any MH I put over the central brace would be approximately 15"-16" above the central brace. This raises a couple of questions:
1. Is it safe to put a 250 watt MH bulb over an acrylic central brace when the bulb will be about 15"-16" above the brace?
2. If not (i.e., if I am stuck with only two MH bulbs), should I put in two 400 watt MH bulbs over the two openings? And should I aling them parallel to the front of the canopy (instead of perpendicular - as recommended)?
3. Also, I was planning on putting in two 60" Actinic "03" VHOs along with my MH. If I am knocked down to two 400 watt MH would it make sense to put in two 60" Daylight VHOs in addition to the two 60" Actinic VHOs?
Thanks in advance for your responses. [For the sake of argument let's assume that I want to be able to keep everything from LPS to clams. Real reason is that I think I have a one time shot at investing in the high cost equipment before SWMBO clamps down on the funding

]
K.M.