T5 lights

I wouldn't.

 

I've got a Metal Halide on my nano and love it. The stock lighting is good for softies most lps and some lower end sps, but i would recommend higher lighting, i think the T5 lighting would be perfect. But thats just my opinion.

 

to explain why we wouldn't recomment that light. Is because you won't get the light watts that you are looking for if you are thinking of upgrading your current light. Champ has a sunpod with a 70w mh, and when or if i ever decide to do a nano, that is what I will do. The cost at first is more, but in the end you will be so much more please with your tank.

 

Ya I would go with metal hallides or if you want to go stock look try retrofitting one of the nanotuner kits into the stock hood. But then you may have to worry about heat.

 

I wouldn't because I have the nova 4x54 watt. I think the lamps are junk along with that fixture. No one else makes T5's in that length that I know of so if you'd ever like to upgrade you'd have to replace the whole thing.

 

http://www.marinedepot.com/ps_AquariumPage~PageAlias~lighting_metal_halide_jbj_k2_viper_hqi_clamp.html

Try this (70w), unless you've got your mind pretty well made up on T5's, which I still don't think would be terrible.

 

How long or wide is your tank?

 

At 15" I really do not think you'll find a good T5 soloution. Most of the big lamp mfrs shortest lamps are 24". I'm not sure what you're planning for your nano but the 70w Mh or even a 175 would probably be better. Just my opinion and I'm a big T5 fan.

 

I understand not wanting to lose actinics but in the long run I think you would be satisfied with the MH and some LED lunars. I am currently running a 150W Sunpod over my aquapod and love it. I mostly have softies and LPS no SPS currently. The hallides work for everything and this way if you decide to go with some SPS sometime you will be ready for it. The sunpod units are nice because I can control the MH, blue leds, and white leds all seperately. I run the MH for 8 hours, the White LEDs for 12 hours kicking on 2 hours before the MH and 2 hours after it goes off. The Blue LEDs I run constantly mainly because I dont have a timer for it but it doesnt effect anything during the day.

 

I currently have T5's on my tank and love them.  I have them retro fitted in a canopy I made.  If you can find a T5 unit that fits and has a decent wattage you can go with that.  I have never used a MH before but i would go with that in this situation since T5's arent made that small.  When looking at wattage for a tank try to be around 3-7 watts/gallon to grow corals.  The more watts the better growth to a point something like 20 watts/gallon would be insane.  I have right over 5 watts/gallon right now and it is doing awesome.  If you go with the MH and get a 20,000k bulb you don't need actinics.  Or you could get a lower k bulb and add T5 actinics.  Just keep in mind that MH do produce a lot of heat so you might also want to look into getting some fans.  I built fans into my canopy that work great, computer fans.  I have pictures on here from when I was building it.  Good Luck