Ok I'm still really tring to get a better understanding. Blue plus is the key bulb. What would happen to corals let's say sps, zoa and paly if all bulbs where blue plus bulbs? Not as good of color and great growth? If that is correct. What would happen if u used all coral plus? I beleive they r a stand alone bulb? Same question for purple plus. I'm not sure about aqua blue special. Just tring to really understand what the different bulbs do to the actual coral? I have read the spectrum charts but I don't understand then that well
1. All Blue Plus Growth on 90% of corals would be very good to exceptional. Floresenct Color would pop on 80% of corals. Reflective Collors would be extremly dull and dark. The tank would almost monochromatic with the exception of the floresent colors. Fish would look very drab.
2. All Purple Plus 75% of the corals would have good growth. Some corals would shut down to protect themselves from the excessive red light. Some corals would bleach out from the excessive red light. The over all tank would look purple or piink dependent on the individuals eye. Fish that are yellow would look darker almost brown.
3. All Coral Plus. Per ATI you would have balanced light. You would have fair coral growth, some florescense and reflected colors would look fairly good. Addition of any additional blue would help growth out. A few corals would shut down growth because of excessive red, and some delicate low light corals would bleach out from the excessive red.
4 All Aqua blue Special. The tank would look very bright. Reflective colors other than reds would look fantastic. You would have very marginal growth of corals as well as very marginal florescent colors.
5. All Atinic. The tank would be very dimly lighted by normal standards and have a violet glow to it. Florescent colors would pop but most of everything else would fall into a near black monochromatic look. Coral growth would be extremly slow to even none existeant.
Generaly speaking the Blue Plus and simular Bulbs like Super Blue are the bulbs that concentrate the light in the wave lenghts used the most by corals for growth and florescense. The Full spectrum bulbs (GE-6,500K, 10,000K, and Aqua Blue Special) are used to bring out the reflective colors, and the purple bulbs (fiji purple, purple plus) as used to bring out reflective reds in the corals the lack with the full spectrum bulbs and help with the growth a few shallow water corals. The Coral Plus is ATI's combination of all three of the prior groups in a balance they think is best.
If you went by ATI's literature the perfect lighting would be in a 2 to 8 bulb fixture having all the bulbs as coral plus. Most us however would look at this as too bright of a tank and would not be happy with the coral growth, or florescent colors. Fortunatly they realize everyone does not have there taste in color balance and therefore continue have the other bulbs manufactured for them which t allow us to custom our tank for our own eye preference.
