Habitat - Indoor :: 40G to 120G Tank Upgrade - Lighting Question (Metal Halide)

[EdieOnline]

I am in the process upgrading from a 40G to a 120G. I am interested in buying Metal Halide fixture/s for lighting this time. I searched the forum here and saw a couple people were possibly interested in buying the Exo Terra SunRay Metal Halide fixture a year or so ago, but no updates (that I saw). It appears some of you have the MegaRays as well. Any feedback/input on Metal Halide fixture/s before I move forward? In looking at some charts, it appears the Exo Terra SunRay would need to be about 30 inches away from the basking spot. My 120G tank is 5 feet long and I was going to have 2 basking spots, basically one on the left and one on the right. Would 2 of these Exo Terra SunRay's fixtures be too much across a 5ft tank? One for each basking spot. In my head I think it would work. 3 feet up and 3 feet apart from each other.

[steve]

Awesome tank upgrade. Metal halides are indeed an option, though not as popular as MVBs in the US. I have no experience with them (Exo Terra is an OK company) and you could get Mega Rays at a slight discount (look for a coupon code on their Facebook page).

I have one basking area in the center of my 125G, and I think it's enough. One at each end might be a bit much, though you probably have more creative ideas than me I also think turtles have favorite spots, so a second area might not get any use.

[EdieOnline]

So what would we consider an acceptable UVB range for our water turtles? I've read anywhere from 10-15 µW/cm2, 30-40 µW/cm2, and even in the 50 µW/cm2 range from the text below I copy/pasted from the AustinsTurtlePage. Granted it was written in 2005.

"We don’t know just how much UV-B radiation turtles generally need, or how that varies by individual, gender, size, age, diet & species. Robert MacCargar considers ~ 50 µW/cm2 a decent figure to aim for; very likely enough, very unlikely too much."

[steve]

Interesting, Robert MacCargar is the owner of MegaRay/ReptileUV. I'm not sure what would be the most acceptable range, and since most of the pellets we use for RES have D3, I would not stress over it too much. You don't need the highest producing model or "desert" versions, at least that's my current opinion.