# Lighting up a 75 gal



## Ed_Alfonso (Dec 10, 2005)

Hi All,
It has been a few years since I had water in my 75 gal tank, but I have finally started to set this one back up.
I have an Ice Cap 660 ballast and was going to go with VHO. But then I was reading about PC's & T5's.
I am a bit confused about the lighting with T5's, since the bulbs are for my tank are 45.7 and 54 watts.
is one watt of T5 light equal to 2 watts of VHO light? What kind of set up would be used over a 75gal?
Ed


----------



## Gary Greguire (Jan 13, 2007)

actualy if you use the icecap 660 on the 54 watt tubes it over drives them to 80 watts each you shuld put small fans blowing at the end of the tubes to keep them a little cooler but don't over due it. 2 bulbs with good reflector will be more than pleanty of light...you can get peices to do a retro @ ReefGeek > Aquarium Supplies for Marine, Reef, and Saltwater Aquariums


----------



## niko (Jan 28, 2004)

Ed,

The IceCap ballast overrides the T5HO bulbs quite a bit. Despite all the discussion on how overdriving affects the quality (spectrum) of the light there is a definite, visible shift toward the blue part of the spectrum. Plants can use the red part of the spectrum better so overdriving a bulb that is designed to supply red, green, and blue is not that great of an idea.

But on the other hand a lot of light seems to compensate for the lack of red in the spectrum. Basically blast the plants with any strong light, feed them well, and see if they refuse to grow 

So my opinion is that with the IceCap ballast your plants will do fine, except having to deal with the extra heat as Gary pointed out. A T5HO run with a Workhorse ballast has no overheating problems and it's overdriven very little to not al all (depending on the bulb wattage). 

In both cases - using IceCap or Workhorse - put on your sunglasses before turning the lights for the first time 

--Nikolay


----------



## K20A2 (Aug 12, 2006)

When I set my 75 up this summer, (hopefully) I as of now plan on using a TEK T 5 HO fixture. Very nice clean look to it, and from what I’ve read it doesn’t disappoint.


----------

