New to the hobby. Proper lighting?

[mkp523]

I recently started a 30 gallon SW tank and just added 30 lbs of assorted uncured live rock about 3 days ago. It came with the standard florescent light i guess. Is that good enough? If not what should i get and will i be able to just replace the bulb?

[The Grim Reefer]

You probably have a single tube fluorescent which ain't gonna cut it for growing corals except for actinic supplimentation maybe. A PC (power compact) will probably do you unless you want SPS corals and clams. You will need a new fixture to hold the lamp.

If you are only doing fish (for now) your standard lamps will be OK as long as itis designed for a marine tank meaning it has the right color output, usually around 10000K is best.

[Dr. Chek]

like you I bought a tank that came with a regulay 20 watt tube. Well, I quickly figured out that I needed something more especially if I wanted to utilize the biological filter of Live Rock and the of course have nice pieces of coral.
For a 30 gallon, probably the most economical is to get a 2x55 or 2x65 Watt Power Compact. I have Dual Satellite, which I got from www.marineandreef.com for 120 bucks. I looked all over; every other site I saw wanted more, heck my local LFS wants $220 for it!!

good luck

[Falko]

I Don't know how much you know about lights. So I will tell you what I know about good lights. First of all. Check that the light that you buy is above 10000k like "The Grim Reefer" said. Second of all. What are you going to keep in the tank? Well lets see. You have some fish and LR at the moment. If that is all you are going to keep. Then T5 lights might be the thing for you. T5's are the smaller version of the standard T8 fluorescent tube. What I like about them are that they are very flexible in terms of your light spectrum. And if one tube goes. Then there are still others for backup. But take note that you will need a electronic ballast to run them. Otherwise. If you are going to keep corals. Then I would recommend a Metal Halide. Same goes for the Kelvin rating on those. But Your standard T8 you have now will not do. One thing that makes a Metal Halide better than a tube bulb. Is its LUX rating. Where LUX is the intensity of the light per volume. Hope that helped you. But I think you might know most of what I have told you.