The T5 Q&a Thread - split

[brizhound]

I have an ATI 10 bulb power module. My question is what is the best way to change the bulbs. I was planning to rotate changing one bulb a month or maybe a couple every other month which is going to be a pain. Is this the best way or should I replace all bulbs at once?

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[creefer01]

I think dropping the GMAN midday will help reduce algae a little, it has alot of red spectrum.
GFO will help alot more on the algae tip.

Midday has already been removed in favor of a coral +. Purple + was swapped for an ATI true actinic. Algae didn't show up until I added the midday. Params are in check. So the question remains.....

Am I good for solid color and growth with this combination or should I swap the ATI true actinic for a Purple+? I'm still new to T5.......only been running them for a year.

 

[Michigan Mike]

You'll be fine. 40b is a very shallow tank.

 

[Michigan Mike]

I have an ATI 10 bulb power module. My question is what is the best way to change the bulbs. I was planning to rotate changing one bulb a month or maybe a couple every other month which is going to be a pain. Is this the best way or should I replace all bulbs at once?

Sent from my DROID BIONIC using Tapatalk 2

Powermodule is heavy, I wouldn't want to mark(date) the bulbs and remove one. @ a time.
I just change them all and raise the fixture a few inches and run an hour or two less a day for a week, then add an hour until all is happy.

 

[creefer01]

You'll be fine. 40b is a very shallow tank.

I would think. My tank is an inch shorter than a standard 40b and it's rimless, so the water level is another 1.5" below the rim so it's even more shallow than the typical 40b. My fear with running the purple + in that combination was that I'd have too much red thereby contributing to the potential for algae, which I hate as most of us do.

Thanks.

 

[Michigan Mike]

You need to be careful with Blue Plus and Atinic bulbs. While they do not increase the PAR reading as much as full spectrum bulbs do on most Par meters that does not necessarly mean they are not putting out a lot of light in the short wavelenghts. The sensativity of most PAR meters drops off considerably on the edges of the PAR range. This drop off is close to the decrease in sensativity to the human eye in those

There's a big PAR difference between the ATI BLUE PLUS & ATI ACTINIC. The BLUE PLUS bulbs put out a lot of PAR, ACTINIC does not.
I can grow anything with blue plus, not the case at all with actinic.

 

[tegee]

Powermodule is heavy, I wouldn't want to mark(date) the bulbs and remove one. @ a time.
I just change them all and raise the fixture a few inches and run an hour or two less a day for a week, then add an hour until all is happy.

+1.....with my (2) PM fixtures on both my LPS and SPS tanks I simply change them out all at once and lower the photoperiod accordingly for a couple of weeks.

I don't have the time, energy or patience to change my 6 and 10 bulbs fixtures out over the course of several weeks.

IMHO

 

[biecacka]

Looking for a few possible recommendation for 48/48/24 cube. Mostly soft lps corals...
Corey

 

[jarrod13]

I have a 90g with a 6x54w T5HO fixture, I keep softies and minimum lps. From what I've been reading I think I will get good color and growth with a bulb combo of 3 blue+, 1 purple+, 1 true actinic 03, and 1 coral+, all ATI brand. What do you think? And what order should I put them in? My fixture has 2 switches, 3 bulbs in the back and 3 bulbs in the front.

 

[rtparty]

You need to be careful with Blue Plus and Atinic bulbs. While they do not increase the PAR reading as much as full spectrum bulbs do on most Par meters that does not necessarly mean they are not putting out a lot of light in the short wavelenghts. The sensativity of most PAR meters drops off considerably on the edges of the PAR range. This drop off is close to the decrease in sensativity to the human eye in those ranges.

When your balancing light it is true that Blue light is the most important light for most corals. However people forget that you can have an excessive amount of blue light and still have your tank look dim. This is bacause your only seeing part of the blue in comparison to the other colors your used to seeing.

Once you have the proper level of blue light the next step is to brighten up the tank to meet your viewing preference. Look at the fuller spectrum bulb like this.

GE 65000 = 100% full spectrum
Aqua Blue Special = 50% full spectrum 50% Blue
Coral Plus = 25% full spectrum 75% Blue
Purple Plus = 25% red 75% Blue

How many and which full spectrumed bulbs you use is realy up to personal preference. People tell me my tanks are too blue. However mine are not nearly as Blue as rtparty recommends. I'm running 1 GE6,500, 1 Purple Plus, and 6 Blue Plus. Besides that I have a pre-dawn to post dusk kicker with 454nm LED's roughly 24 Watts.

When you selecting Blue Bulbs the thing to keep in mind is that corals prefer a spectrum between 410 nm and 480 nm. Simply saying Atinic or blue can be very deceiving. Because of the variety of bulbs out there. Some examples
Atinic that peak at 420 nm
Atinic that peak at 445 nm
Older Blue Plus that peaked at 454nm
Newer Blue Plus that peak at 460 nm.

T-5 bulbs do not have a very narow spectrum of 5 to 10 nm like LED's. Usualy there spectrum width is closer to 50 nm or more. Therefore you do not need 3 or 4 different blue bulbs to cover the needed of the corals. The 454 blues historicaly were all you neded but since the blue plus bulbs are now peaking at 460 it is not a bad idea to provide a shorter wave lenght atinic bulb to boast the shorter wavelenghts. But keep in mind that 420nm atinics have shorter life spans than 445 Atinics. And 445nm atinics do cover the wavelengts easily as low as 420nm and as high as 470 nm.

Remember end results should be something that you yourself like not what someone elses likes.

Really? I stopped reading after the first two sentences. Pretty sure after 7 years, I know how to select bulbs. I left this thread once already because I couldn't stand your jabber. Let's not start it again please.

I have an ATI 10 bulb power module. My question is what is the best way to change the bulbs. I was planning to rotate changing one bulb a month or maybe a couple every other month which is going to be a pain. Is this the best way or should I replace all bulbs at once?

Sent from my DROID BIONIC using Tapatalk 2

There is no right way here. I don't like replacing every bulb at once but that's just me. Half now and the other half in a few weeks.

Midday has already been removed in favor of a coral +. Purple + was swapped for an ATI true actinic. Algae didn't show up until I added the midday. Params are in check. So the question remains.....

Am I good for solid color and growth with this combination or should I swap the ATI true actinic for a Purple+? I'm still new to T5.......only been running them for a year.

You should be fine. I've never had the purple bulbs contribute to excessive algae growth personally. I bet the combo of purple and midday might have been a little much though.

Looking for a few possible recommendation for 48/48/24 cube. Mostly soft lps corals...
Corey

Halides. You are looking at 12 bulbs minimum with t5.

I have a 90g with a 6x54w T5HO fixture, I keep softies and minimum lps. From what I've been reading I think I will get good color and growth with a bulb combo of 3 blue+, 1 purple+, 1 true actinic 03, and 1 coral+, all ATI brand. What do you think? And what order should I put them in? My fixture has 2 switches, 3 bulbs in the back and 3 bulbs in the front.

Blue
Actinic
Purple
Blue
Coral
Blue


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[Michigan Mike]

Looking for a few possible recommendation for 48/48/24 cube. Mostly soft lps corals...
Corey

For real wide tanks like this and softy dominate I would just do 2 250w halides with lumenmax large or lumenbright (raised very high, like 20") instead of changing a bunch of T5 bulbs. I like Phoenix 14k for color,par,cost.

You could try a couple 6x54 fixtures over it, have a few inches between the fixtures. I don't see that being a problem with LPS, just expensive for bulbs.

 

[creefer01]

You should be fine. I've never had the purple bulbs contribute to excessive algae growth personally. I bet the combo of purple and midday might have been a little much though.


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That's what I thought, too. I'm going to play with the difference in the purple+ and true actinic and see what the tank likes best.

 

[Michigan Mike]

That's what I thought, too. I'm going to play with the difference in the purple+ and true actinic and see what the tank likes best.

It doesn't matter if you run only 6500k bulbs if your phosphates/water quality is good.
Like I said before you need GFO or more of it more often. New bulbs will help but there is a water issue at hand also if its as bad as you make it sound.
I had the same thing happen, I dropped my GE6500 bulb for an actinic, didn't help much, these are 4 month old bulbs at the time.
More blue, less red spectrum, less hours, new bulbs, more GFO should slowly help. Removing a red spectrum bulb will not help much unless you take care the underlining water issue.

 

[Jester376]

Hello, currently I am using a 10 bulb PM using this combination bulbs

Blue Plus
Blue Plus
Purple Plus
Blue Plus
GE 6500K
Blue Plus
Purple Plus
Blue Plus
Coral Plus
Blue Plus

Looking to Change out the 6500 to get more of a blue look and also add 2 Atinic 420nm bulbs in place of 2 Blue plus. What do you suggest I change out the 6500 to in order to get my desired look of more of a blue spectrum?

 

[Michigan Mike]

ATI bulbs- aquablue for a little more blue, then the coral plus for more blue or another blue plus for a lot of blue.
I'd add another blue plus if your going to swap a couple for actinics anyway.
I think 2 actinics for dawn/dusk will look great, I use 1 blue & 1 actinic though.

 

[TropTrea]

Looking for a few possible recommendation for 48/48/24 cube. Mostly soft lps corals...
Corey

For such a large surface area I would strongly consider LED's. Especialy with a DIY LED fixture individual LED's can be evenly distributed throughout the surface area.

For T-5's at least 2 6 bulb fixtures however if your virewing from all side you could have an issue of yet with even light distribution. Possibly opting for 3 4 bulb fixtures.

Metal Hides would work with 4 each covering 25% of the tank. But these should be backed up with Atinic or Blues bulbs which again puts you in the same place as T-5's.

 

[Jester376]

ATI bulbs- aquablue for a little more blue, then the coral plus for more blue or another blue plus for a lot of blue.
I'd add another blue plus if your going to swap a couple for actinics anyway.
I think 2 actinics for dawn/dusk will look great, I use 1 blue & 1 actinic though.

So thinking of running this setup, all ATI bulbs:

front to back
Blue+
Purple+
Atinic dusk/dawn bulb
Blue+
Aquablue
Blue+
Coral+
Blue+ dusk/dawn bulb
Atinic
Blue+

 

[SDboatguy]

T5 retro questions

T5 retro questions

Need some help ... I'm retro fitting my canopy on a 60x18x20 mixed reef. I'm getting ATI Ballast and bulbs but don't have room for 6 bulbs. So do I add a 5th bulb or possibly some LED strips( thinking Ecoxitic stunners). Any input would be welcome. I currently have some LPS , shrooms,polyps, fish. Might add more softies down the road and possibly a piece or two SPS.

 

[jarrod13]

Blue
Actinic
Purple
Blue
Coral
Blue

I'm assuming the I should do the first three for the dusk/dawn correct? The blue, actinic, and purple?

 

[rtparty]

Hello, currently I am using a 10 bulb PM using this combination bulbs

Blue Plus
Blue Plus
Purple Plus
Blue Plus
GE 6500K
Blue Plus
Purple Plus
Blue Plus
Coral Plus
Blue Plus

Looking to Change out the 6500 to get more of a blue look and also add 2 Atinic 420nm bulbs in place of 2 Blue plus. What do you suggest I change out the 6500 to in order to get my desired look of more of a blue spectrum?

I haven't tried this setup as I don't
have a ten bulb setup but it could be really cool.

4 blue plus, 2 actinic, 2 coral plus and 2 purple plus.

So thinking of running this setup, all ATI bulbs:

front to back
Blue+
Purple+
Atinic dusk/dawn bulb
Blue+
Aquablue
Blue+
Coral+
Blue+ dusk/dawn bulb
Atinic
Blue+

That could work as well.

Need some help ... I'm retro fitting my canopy on a 60x18x20 mixed reef. I'm getting ATI Ballast and bulbs but don't have room for 6 bulbs. So do I add a 5th bulb or possibly some LED strips( thinking Ecoxitic stunners). Any input would be welcome. I currently have some LPS , shrooms,polyps, fish. Might add more softies down the road and possibly a piece or two SPS.

With any LEDs in there make sure to cool everything properly. The stunners won't do anything except for dusk dawn stuff.

I'm assuming the I should do the first three for the dusk/dawn correct? The blue, actinic, and purple?

Yeah or move the purple back one slot so you have 2 blue and 1 actinic.

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