1 Cubic Foot Reef

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 Ryan Thompson wrote:

Actually mark you are incorrect. All energy creates heat. A watt is a watt. The reason people think that PC and T5 don't produce as much heat as MH is because you can't "feel" it. When running a 150w halide you have 150w crammed in a tiny space. Get a T5 tube and make it 3-4 inches then cram 150w through it. Trust me it will get hot.

All energy creates heat. It just depends on how that heat is taken care of. I am not a scientist nor can I prove with formulas what I'm talking about but I've read more than enough threads and papers about the subject. There was a time when I believed like you that all watts weren't equal. A 50w heater will add just as much heat as a 50w internal pump.

Enough hijacking though of lurkerz thread. We can continue this elsewhere if you like.

Great tank Lurkerz! I hope to have mine set up within 60 days. Your light hanging idea has given me some ideas.

I agree we shouldn't hijack the thread here but come on we got to get this right...
Mark is absolutely correct.  A 50 watt pump won't heat the water anywhere near as much as a 50 watt heater.  That's crazy talk Ryan.  

The item uses 50 watts.... but it can dissipate that energy in many different forms.  It can be transfered into heat, light, sound, etc.  Some lights are very efficient and convert a lot of energy into light, with little given off as heat of sound.  Such as led.  Some give off less light but produce more heat.  Such as pc.  Some give off even less light and even more heat, such as incandescent.  And then there are some lights that are absolutely inefficient.  They give off nearly no light, but a lot of heat.  We call them heaters and we stick them in the sumps.  

When you spin a top on a table you give the top energy.  It eventually stops spinning because it has released it's energy.  Either into motion (transfered to the surrounding air), into heat, into sound, or into something.  Add up all that energy and it equals the energy you used to spin it.... regardless of how much energy was dissipated into each part.

Adam