308 Gallon tank

I have a 308 gallon tank sitting at my house doing nothing. It was my dads but he passed away unfortanately. Had three of those with ocean clears and pumps but gave two away. Anyways back to the point. The tank is 308 gallons i want at least 4 watts per gallon probably 1232 watts in total. Anyone know where i can go to get that type of lighting. I wanted to make a large reef tank with that.

 

reefgeek is a good place. thats a big tank my friend.

 

Whats the dimensions of the tank?

 

yeah thank you pretty big tank. The tank dimensions are 75x38x25 might be off a little.

 

holy moly, my man. HUGE tank. do you have a stand or a canopy?

you're probably going to want to go with a number of metal halides and supplement it with some t5 actinics (blues). depending on your monetary situation, lighting seems like a place where people seem to want to skimp (i did). i recommend taking the hit now (if possible) and not closing the door on any later corals. i've upgraded twice already and i would have saved money in the long run if i would have just jumping in at the start.

there's TONS of options as for lighting and everyone on this sight has an opinion. hopefully some of the more seasoned vets will chime in with the best bang for the buck lights. i, for one, have heard very good things about Bluelife's SPS bulbs as well as Reeflux. for a ballast i would say that Icecap is your best option.

 

i also have a 300 gallon tank dimensions are 60x48x24 the lighting for that tank uses 2 large lumen brights reflectors. with the dimensions of your tank 3 large lumen brights would work. they cover a 3x3 area. its not the watts per gallon but the lumens per day depending on the coral. what type of coral are you wanting to keep?

 

YOu could do 4 mhs, or stager 8-10 5 foot t5 bulbs.

 

I run a 370G and use 3X 400W MH in a luminarc reflector. and 8X T5

J

 

For a reef tank I would run a couple halides (3-4), and enough t5s to fill the rest in nicely.

Does the tank have braces on the top, and if so, how many?

 

like zjPETER stated it will depend on if you want to run a canopy or not as to what lights to run. with that hieght you can get away with 3-4 250 m/h I would go 4 and also supp with t5's for that extra Par. but if your not getting a canopy then you will limit yourself as to what you can run.