coralife 36" bulb question

[thisoldfish]

A spinoff on my other post:

I have an old coralife HO T5 4 bulb 36" fixture that I'm going to use to augment the the 2 Current USA LED strips I have atop my 65G mixed reef.

1) I've heard that coralife bulbs are different size than standard ATI T5 bulbs in the 30" fixture-- is this the case with the 36" too and am I stuck with only getting coralife bulbs?

2) the fan on the unit died. Is this essential? Is it unsafe to run it without the fan? I see the smaller units don't have the fan. Probably easy to just get a replacement computer fan and install, but the old was noisy and annoying so if it doesn't matter would prefer without.

3) Any good recs on what the best bulb makeup is (if I use ATI's)? Someone on my other post mentioned mixture of coral plus/blue plus. I was thinking of getting 2 of each? Any suggestions from lighting gurus?

Thanks all,

Brad

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Pretty sure you can get 36in ati.
The fan ya want to cool the electronics and depending on the fixture, the tubes as well. There is an optimal temp range for them.

Tube color choice is really visual preference. Coral plus and blue plus is pretty common.

Head over to the ati site , there’s a lot of good info. I belive there is a choosing your ati tube thread here as well from ati. Look in their forum.

 

[thisoldfish]

thanks- appreciate the reply!