T5 bulb combination- Acropora dominated

[Reefahholic]

I wanna change up my bulbs. Instead of running bulbs that please my eyes, I figured this time I will try to please my corals and get the best possible growth that I can.

Anybody care to discuss their current bulb combination from front to back and why you have chosen it. Would be nice to hear what you like about your current combination and what you may want to change in the future.

The ATI Blue plus remains one of the most popular bulbs to date. Most reefers continue to run more blue than ever before. The question becomes how much blue is too much? In the last 5 years I’ve noticed a big shift to Giesemann Actinic’s. Anybody care to elaborate why that is and if these are indeed better bulbs achieving more growth or is this just a personal preference of brand?

I’ve been running a KZ and ATI mix, but I’m thinking about going back to mostly ATI because I had better growth. I tend to like a more white/purple look, but I may only run that in the early morning ramp time or late in the evening and run heavy blues for the majority of the photo period.

All suggestions, comments, pics, welcome.

Who doesn’t love T5’s!

 

[madweazl]

I like a whiter appearance in the tank and also think there are benefits to running more than blue spectrum simply because the sun provides much more. It stands to reason the corals are doing something with the rest of that light.

I run 3 Blue+, 2 AquaBlue Specials, and a Purple+ over the 150g and 2 Blue+, 1 Aquablue Special, and a Purple+ over the 75g. These recommendations were from ATI's post for a 10,000k-14,000k appearance. With that said, I believe most of the bulbs available have the requisite spectrum to keep the corals healthy regardless of choice.

 

[Reefahholic]

I like a whiter appearance in the tank and also think there are benefits to running more than blue spectrum simply because the sun provides much more. It stands to reason the corals are doing something with the rest of that light.

I run 3 Blue+, 2 AquaBlue Specials, and a Purple+ over the 150g and 2 Blue+, 1 Aquablue Special, and a Purple+ over the 75g. These recommendations were from ATI's post for a 10,000k-14,000k appearance. With that said, I believe most of the bulbs available have the requisite spectrum to keep the corals healthy regardless of choice.

I agree. The sun is definitely not all blue light. This is not my area of expertise, but I feel that each color has its place even if it’s very little or only for a short duration.

The blue plus is a mix of a blue bulb with roughly 460nm with an Actinic bulb of about 420nm. Far different than the sun. I do understand that the water filters out a lot of the reds and greens, but they still get through to some extent. The sun is about 5900k and that’s not even close to a blue plus bulb. Do the reds, greens, yellows, etc get filtered out that much?