I want to add more actinics. Thoughts?

[Eder]

I’ve posted before. And I’ve taken input seriously. I just still don’t have the spectrum I want (to my eyes). I know a lot of us knock on actinics and always want to see pics with whites and no filter. I’m one of those too. But admittedly almost everything glows so much more intense with actinics. So I ask what Do y’all expect would happen if I went 50/50 or 60/40 actinics to B+ on my 10 bulb ATI with kessils?

Growth would slow down, but continue? Colors pop a ton more? Everything die? Hmmmm.

Here’s a pic from several months back for reference.

 

[HB AL]

Cant hurt to try

 

[jda]

This might illuminate corals the way that you want, but you will stuffer from actually rendering color in them. You have to have color for them to "pop."

Daylight provides the best color in the coral, but is not good at illumination to most folks. Most people like the Actinic or Blue Pop for illumination. You need both. I would mix in a few 6500k bulbs for the daylight to render some good color. If this is not blue enough for you, turn them off when you want to view and leave them on for 5-8 hours the rest of the day.

Do you have separate channels in your fixture? If so, then give 3 or 4 6500k a try along with equal number of Actinic and then finish the rest in B+. Turn the 6500k during your viewing time if it is too white, but most people do not mind a non-windex, crisp white tank as long as everything pops. GE 6500k from hellolights will work just fine... or Giesemann Tropic.

Whatever you do, it can take 4-8 weeks to see the real results. ...so be patient.

 

[jda]

One more thing about Actinics - some people bash them because they do not pop a PAR meter. Ignore this. They just put out spectrum that the bottom end of PAR meters cannot actually read - so the meter "sucks," not the bulbs. They put out just as much usable light as a B+ or C+.

 

[pluikens]

@Eder What bulbs do you have in the T5 fixture now? The ATI Actinic bulb has a spike at 545nm and, to a lesser degree, 575nm. And to @jda point, the light in the actinic is down closer to 400nm (I believe the peak is 420nm) where there is still chlorophyll absorption but the PAR may not register with common meters. IIRC, the Seneye registers about 60% of the PAR at 400nm.

 

[jda]

The other thing that Actinics add beyond food for the zoox, is high energy illumination. Zoox take in wavelengths, use some of the energy and then spit the light back out at lower energy. When this starts to get around the visible range, then having true UV can really help. For example, a T5 Actinic (or any MH bulb) might drop some 380nm non-visible waves on a coral... which get used and then spit back out at 400-405nm which is nice and violet to our eyes. Without that UV from most LED setups, the 400 to 425nm lights get reflected at 425-450nm and the lack the deep violet pop that you can get with a MH or T5. Sorry if I did a bad job of explaining this.

What the 6500k adds is more in the yellow, green and red area, not really the violet, but the Actinic can handle violet. All of them should be able to do blue. 6500k can also provide some IR if you are a believer in The Emerson Effect (I am).

 

[bubbaque]

You will have no issue running actinic and blue+. Jason fox runs those bulbs and his corals coral up pretty well. He does not use any bulb with white spectrum besides on one tank where he uses halides for a few hours a day.

 

[Eder]

Thanks for all the responses fellas. Below is a picture of my lights right now. The numbers to the right represent the channel they are on.

I do have some 6500k bulbs that I’ve tried for some time and just never liked them or liked the color. Even two bulbs were too much for my preference. As a matter of fact I have about 20 bulbs in the closet since I’ve been playing with spectrum for some time.

Thus the purpose of this post. I want to see what y’all think I can do with all actinics and B+ and I appreciate the input!