light cycles

[cgarr017]

what light cycle do you recommend? 12 hrs on, 12 hrs off(moonlight)?

[Scuba_Steve]

In my tanks, I have always turned my actinics on for the full 12, and day bulbs/halides on for about 8 hours.

[an411]

depends if you have coral or not I have FO right now and I put my antics on from 530pm to 1230 and my 10000k lights on from 630 1130. For coral I would think that you would want to extend those hours by at least 2 for each cycle.

[sprinj76]

i have mine on 10 hour days with 3 hours of moonlight after my main lights go off.

[cgarr017]

just for clarification- this is a reef tank-75g with 250w MH with 14000k bulb , 260k flourescents with actinics and led moonlight.

Scuba steve- you are saying 8 hours of day bulbs then the extra 4 hours with only the blue actinics and then 12 hrs of nightime?

Also how expensive is it to implement a timer for the lighting? right now i just have manual switches for each feature on the flourescents

[GlobaLPimP]

you can pick up a nice digital timer from Home depot for around $20. I over-drive a 4 bulb T5 set-up on my 75 for 8hrs a day and my corals have excelent growth and color. Each tank is a bit different regarding light requirements. You just need to give yourself a starting point and then tweak it until it suits your liking (and of course the livestock's too:) )

[123and456]

you only need 6-8 hours for your corals. I have had really good results running two light cycles per day. I run 6 on six off and repeat. IMO a timer is a must for consistency. As for moonlights are more for looks but can be ran all the time or just when the lights are off it doesn't really matter unless you have really bright moonlights.