[bananablack]

Hello all, im new to the reef setups. I have a PFO Lighting VHO Retrofit Kit that holds 4 vho 110 watt bulbs. I have a 55 gallon tank and plan to make it a reef setup. My question is what should the mixture of the bulbs be...should i get 2 actinic and 2 aquasuns or is there any other combination of bulbs that would work better

[jimw369]

Originally Posted by bananablack

Hello all, im new to the reef setups. I have a PFO Lighting VHO Retrofit Kit that holds 4 vho 110 watt bulbs. I have a 55 gallon tank and plan to make it a reef setup. My question is what should the mixture of the bulbs be...should i get 2 actinic and 2 aquasuns or is there any other combination of bulbs that would work better

Depends on what you want to achieve. High growth? Great color? Your actinics are a given.

[NATIVEVAMAN]

Andre, at 8 watts per gallon and a shallow tank you may just have to much light,depending on the efficiency of the built in reflectors.I am sure that sps coral may love it the less light loving deep water corals may bleach.The bulb choices you have listed should be fine but if you do have a bleaching problem you might consider cutting back to 3 bulbs.VHO's are not very popular because of heat issues and short bulb life so the bulb choices narrow down to maybe 4 that are aquarium friendly.Most lfs's sell VHO bulbs but not all on line sellers do because they are very delicut and not great sellers.I once considered VHO for all my tanks but in the end t-5 was the choice.I even have t-5 on two fresh water tanks.

[Rainman69]

I used 2 vho one actinic one 50 50 from uri on a 55. I had various lps and softies for over 3 years.The 50 50 bulbs give a somewhat pinkish look.As for heat I dont know about pfo but with my Icecap the bulbs ran cooler than 2 40 watt on a hardware store type ballast.