New Odyssea 716W metal halide T5 combo fixture

That's right I said Odyssea.

I did my research and its not the most popular light fixture and had bad rumors about ballasts burning up and causing fires. But that is the older style fixtures. I am on a budget and did my research and the redesigned fixture has the new electronic ballast ans has added fans for cooling.

Here are some pictures of the new fixture. It is 2 - 250W metal halide bulbs and 4 - T5 Actinic bulbs with 6 led lights for night. It has several vents on top plus 2 large cooling fans. I have read several forums about this fixture but no real people talking about one they own. So here it is. good or bad i hope to document this setup and tell anything that goes wrong.

So far though its great. I have seen my corals soft and hard respond well to the new light and the colors that it is bringing out is great. I ran the halides for 4 hours today as part of my acclimation and the fixture was cool to the touch. The tank with no chiller rose from 76 degrees to 79 degrees. Not bad so far.

 

I just purchased the same tank as you, and am looking at that same light. I will be following this closely. Can you let me know where you purchased it from?

 

before and after

Here are some before and after pictures going from my old PC fixture to the new one.

 

I bought them from this vendor on ebay. I had to pay taxes since i live in Texas but if you live outside Texas you dont have taxes. He also shipped it the same day i purched it and I recieved it next day.

48" Metal Halide T5 Light Saltwater Aquarium 716W 2x250 - eBay (item 300452489864 end time Sep-02-10 05:34:58 PDT)

 

Awesome, thanks K+!

Keep us updated!

 

Heres the other website I found that i could have saved about $70 but $30 extra was just because I live in Texas.

Odyssea Metal Halide System

 

Thats actually the website I was looking at. I am working on getting all my rock and sand first, then worrying about a light. That way it can be cycling while I make up my mind...

 

the ballast burning issue was taken care of at least 4 years ago. Haven't heard of many troubles with them recently. All of my tanks have either their T5" or MH lighting.

 

Im loving it so far. what size tank do you have?

 

I have the same fixture that I bought for my 29gal, but smaller. I did some mods to it though. The stock MH ballast & all the bulbs are not that great. I changed all the bulbs & the MH ballast. It was a HUGE differfence with the changes & mods.

Also, I custom made the stainless mounting hardware. The legs were very weak. Best of luck..