Actinic T5's / Just for "Pop" or Good for Corals Heath Too?

[GoVols]

Been pushing the Giesemann "Super Actinic" bulbs in my led/t5 hybird.

Love the "pop".

Do actinic's provide anything like par or pur for corals, or are they just for looks?

Thanks so much,
Freddie

 

[Crabs McJones]

Been pushing the Giesemann "Super Actinic" bulbs in my led/t5 hybird.

Love the "pop".

Do actinic's provide anything like par or pur for corals, or are they just for looks?

Thanks so much,
Freddie

Great question
Following along as I currently have two blue+ and 2 true actinic bulbs in my fixture

 

[Reef Dude]

I wondering this too. I have 2 blue+ and just replaced the other 2 blue+ With 2 ATI actinics. Used for dusk/dawn in a Spectra halide fixture running a Radium bulb. It’s nice for the extra pop, but I am wondering what benefits the actinic bulb spectrums provide other than the pop only while they’re on

 

[Bpb]

Well considering the bulk of its effective range, as well as the wavelengths of its discrete peaks are in the highest absorption sections of chlorophyll a, as well as secondary peaks in chlorophyll b and perindinin, I’d say they have great value for growth and color alike. They just don’t look or read as bright on a meter because of their small range of output and how short the wavelengths are.

 

[jda]

Most TA bulbs have more real UV in them than B+ (or the like). This can help corals actually make more color as well as reflect color.

Energy gets used by most coral and then spit back out at a lower energy. ...so waves that go in at 400nm, for example, might get spit back out at 440 nm - I just made this up. ...so if you want violets and blues to pop, then you have to shine real UV in there. Even though UV is not in the visible range when it is emitted, it can be once the coral has used some of it for energy.

Lots of zoox strains can also get energy from spectrum down to 350nm.

The reason that they do not pop a meter is because the hobby-grade meters that we use only capture visible light, but also really suck at the ends under sampling below 450nm and above 675, or so. If you put a TA on a good spectrometer that could capture from 350 to 850nm, it would likely have the same PPFD as a blue plus.

I would use TA bulbs alone just for the UV.

 

[jda]

Oh, it can take a month or six weeks for the corals to develop some additional color.

Has anybody ever heard of how legendary that the Super Actinic VHO bulb was? You can kinda do the same thing with T5s... and UVL makes this bulb with the same phosphors in a T5 equivalent.

 

[SashimiTurtle]

I'm going to give them a try on my new tank. Its a 36x24x24 and I'll be running the 36" Aquatic Life T5 hybrid with 4 ATI TA and 3 Kessil A160s. I'm very interested in seeing what all that blue can do for some acros.

 

[Dana Riddle]

Been pushing the Giesemann "Super Actinic" bulbs in my led/t5 hybird.

Love the "pop".

Do actinic's provide anything like par or pur for corals, or are they just for looks?

Thanks so much,
Freddie

Actinics are a good source of PUR. They also provide radiation that induces production of colorful fluorescent and non-fluorescent proteins.

 

[GoVols]

@Dana Riddle
And all the above posters:

Thanks so much for taking the time.