2 Bulb T5 over IM20

[gobybryant]

I just added a 24" 2 bulb T5 light over my IM20 tank. It's an SPS dominant tank thats been running for a few months. I was previously using two 30 watt Nicrew LEDs. Now that I've set up the T5s, everything seems...not as bright. At least not as bright as the T5s I have running over my other tank (4 bulb ATI).

Both bulbs are Coral+

 

[oreo54]

First thing " bright" to you is different than bright to corals.

Coral plus are heavy blue.
Also you only have only 2 tubes.
Unless your ballast is malfunctioning or you have poor/dirty reflectors you have a decent amount of photons,dull ones or not.

 

[Miami Reef]

First thing " bright" to you is different than bright to corals.

Coral plus are heavy blue.
Also you only have only 2 tubes.
Unless your ballast is malfunctioning or you have poor/dirty reflectors you have a decent amount of photons,dull ones or not.

Coral plus is NOT “heavy blue.”

It’s a blue and white hybrid bulb.

 

[gobybryant]

Yea I was gonna say, it’s not very blue. I picked it since it’s neither too blue or too white.

@oreo54 that is a good point re: the lights being “bright”. They’re also mounted 3” off the top so it’s not like its far from the corals.

 

[oreo54]

Coral plus is NOT “heavy blue.”

It’s a blue and white hybrid bulb.

It's actually a RGB (tri-phosphor) bulb with a lot of blue in proportion to r/g but enough to perceive it as
white-ish.. but its pretty darn blue.

Yea it's not an actinic or the like..

Aquablue special is whiter..

Comparison, a generic white bulb.. 6500k has even more reduced blue footprint.

Human eye lies..and it is not how photosynthetic organisms "see" it.

 

[oreo54]

Yea I was gonna say, it’s not very blue. I picked it since it’s neither too blue or too white.

@oreo54 that is a good point re: the lights being “bright”. They’re also mounted 3” off the top so it’s not like its far from the corals.

You eye is extremely sensitive to green. Not so much to blue or red for that matter.

https://www.nde-ed.org/NDETechniques/PenetrantTest/Introduction/lightresponse.xhtml

 

[gobybryant]

Hmmm- might get an Aquablue special then to compare the two!!

 

[RedoubtReef]

Here are some good comparisons of bulb combos if you have not seen this:

 

[gobybryant]

This video is actually the reason I got these bulbs lol. It's starting the grow on me. And it's possible that some of my SPS browned a bit under the weaker Nicrew lights. I'll give it time to get a better sense of the colors.

Edit: Second video is very good, hadnt seen that one.