that would make sense, but if you look at all the ATI fixtures and etc they all claim that by cooling the "cold spot" it increases output, but i might have misunderstood that and it is actually increasing bulb life. as for the DIY skills i like to refer to it as "too much time on my hands" haha:lol:

i made the lights myself i had the plastic shop cut the tubes down to size but the flanges on the side i dremeled and sanded. It wasnt too hard just alot more time consuming than compared to a CNC machine doing it.

Hi Imisky,
Thanks for the reply...I will be off to plastic shop tomorrow now..I have a few lights that I can maybe utilize, I have 150W MH and some t5HO stuff I think also..I will see shat I can come up with.
Jim

no problem jim its good to know that i can help someone or at least provide the ideas. good luck!

a little update/question for everyone,

its been roughly a year nice i last replaced the bulbs and time for new ones, i am planning to get ushio 10K bulbs as im starting to like the natural white look more but i'll still be using suppliment actinics for the colors.I was wondering what everyones thought on T5HO combo would be for a 10K bulb. As everyone know the more readily avaliable T5HO bulbs in Canada are the UVI, Giesemann, Aqua Science, and Korallen-Zucht bulbs and not many stores sell the ATIs at least i dont know of any in BC that sells them anymore.

so i was thinking about going with this combo:

2x 150 ushio 10K + 2x 24w UVI super actinic blue (PAR is much better than Giesemann pure actinic)
or
2x 150 ushio 10K + 2x 24w UVI 75.25s

i cant really decide which one i want to go with yet or if you guys have any combos which doesnt end up producing a super blue hue like the phoenix im open to suggestions. im looking for something with a very little amount of blue yet it gives off the florescence of the sps.

now that that question is out there i got a picture i took a few days ago by luck. enjoy
http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y29...y/IMG_2075.jpg

heres a picture of the bleached bali tri color but im sure it'll come back in no time as the colors are somewhat still there.
http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y29...y/IMG_2146.jpg

and the FTS:
http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y29...y/IMG_2145.jpg

Hopefully the tri-color will get better soon.
Do you know what caused the bleach?

most likely my hands :lol: it was out of water for at least a good 45mins with me holding it and snaping it into pieces prior to that it was perfectly fine ii just moved it so i can give the pink lemonade more space togrow

a little update but not much changed.
recently picked up a yellow candy stripe hogfish so far its been playing nice with the fairy wrasse and eating well. Added a geometric pygmy hawk to the tank thanks to oceanics soft opening and also got a blue polyp digitata......now i have a problem haha...i have no room:redface:

hm...moved the rock work around a little so that the corals have JUST a little bit more room to grow maybe a cm or two for a few selected corals, and lowered the millipora in the center as it was getting a little top heavy and constantly falling over. Now its got more room to grow.

heres some photos FTS and the hogfish, the pygmy hawk is still shy but should be out once it gets used to my feeding schedule, we'll see.

http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y29...y/IMG_2337.jpg

http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y29...y/IMG_2319.jpg

so since the olympics is here and all the universities in the GVRD is close i have alot of spare time to kill so i am finding things to do. I havent had moonlights for a while on my tanks but started to miss it a little and so i started planning this project a few weeks ago thinking how i want this to be as natural looking as possible and decided i didnt want blue LEDs instead id go with white ones to replicate what the corals would be exposed to in nature. With all the planning done (took i think 15mins) i went out and bought all the parts and went to town and got it all finished today.

So.. Parts

3x 1/4W white LEDs
1x old cellphone charger with 5.5V and 550ma output
1x acrylic tubing i think its 1" thick
3x daily contact lens casing (for the reflectors that i dont think does anything)

total price? i think its less then $5 if you count out the contact casing that you can keep.

I forgot to take progress photos but i think a project like this shouldnt be too hard. I chained up the LEDs in series so i could avoid the use of resistors, the LEDs are a little underdriven but thats fine for this project as i wanted to keep things dim as the tank is in my room. Cut the acrylic tubing a little longer (1mm) than the 2 MHs beside it and the pressure from the pendents keep the moonlight tubing held pretty well.

heres some pictures.
http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y29...y/IMG_2378.jpg
http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y29...y/IMG_2379.jpg
http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y29...y/IMG_2381.jpg

and what the tank looks like: (in real life its about 10x dimmer)
http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y29...y/IMG_2384.jpg

Tank is looking awesome! Really starting to fill in for ya!