I'm Halide curious

[theokie]

I've been an Led guy from my start in reefing and with my upcoming build I'm getting a bit curious about Metal Halide.

I was planning to go with Kessil A360's as I already had purchased 4 of them, and the internet swears that that will be enough light for a 48x48x20h tank, but I'm just not buying into that.

I'm considering using the Kessil's as my primary lighting but to have a 20K Radium, either 250 or 400w in the center of the tank to use as my "high noon" time, running for 4 to maybe 6 hours a day.

Doing amperage calculations, a setup of 4 A360WEs and a 400w Radium would still have me at under 7 amps consumption at peak draw, which sounds pretty good to me as my SPS tank, a 150 tall tank draws 5.8 amp as measured thru my apex of actual usage.

Now the major deal breaker question for me is, if I do go with a Halide to supplement my leds, would I realistically have to keep my chiller online year round? My current setup only needs the chiller for about 3 weeks a year and then only for a couple hours a day.

I guess I should also mention my plans for this new setup, I'm hoping to go mainly with LPS out on the edges of the tank and move my clams out of my frag tank and into a center "Clam bed" that would be directly under the potential Halide. I'd also like to move a few of my 18 month old mangroves out of my sump and up to a nice Atoll type rock scape, and I figure they would really appreciate having a halide mounted a bit higher up allowing for growth. I'm sure that as this tank progresses a few SPS probably will migrate over, as honestly who can resist making it a mixed reef especially with 8ft of surface area to work with.


Also if I do move forth on this endeavor what sort of reflector should I be looking at? As since this is a shallow tank I'd like to get a good spread, 3x3 if not 3.5'x3.5' again, again using the 4 or 6 Kessil lamps to be the primary driving light.

Thank you