Metal Halide bulbs?

[scottminot]

I was at Lowes home improvement center the other day and was browsing through the light bulb section and came across Sylvania brand metal halide bulbs. They ranged from 400 watts on down to 75 watts. The 400 watt bulbs were priced at around $30.00 I believe.
So what's the difference between these bulbs and the more expensive ones that are sold by aquarium retailers?

 

[scottminot]

Did a little bit of research on Sylvania's website and found what might be the difference. The bulbs that I was looking at are 4200K. I'm not too sure that would work out too well for a reef tank.

 

[impur]

Yep, the bulbs at Lowes have lower Kelvin temps, giving off a very yellow color. Algae loves the lower temps of those bulbs so we use bulbs with more blue to discourage the algae and give the corals a nice color. Of course, we still battle algae time to time.

 

[jimdogg187]

You want to get 10k, 14k or 20k bulbs. 10k would be the best for coral growth; however, they tend to give off a yellowish color as well. Many reefers supplement the 10k's with actinc PC's, T5's of VHO's in order to give the tank a better look (if you like that). I use Hamilton 14k's and get great coral and anemone growth as well as a "nice to look at" color IMO.

Jim