Ah but Doug, you use T5s as your only source for light. Of course you want PAR out of them. If your primary light source is MH you don't need high PAR from the T5s.

As far as Fiji Purples go, I do agree they have a lot of red spectrum, but something about them really makes the color pop on corals. If I have a T5 only fixture like yours Doug, I would only use one strip of Fiji Purple, but if you have MH with one or two T5s on each side, they have to be the same on one side as they are on the other or you will get different shades in the front of the tank as the back. That doesn't bother some people, but it drives me nuts. That's the only reason I would suggest more than one strip of Fiji Purple.

I have bulbs that have 18 months of use on them and their color spectrum hasn't faded as much as the AquaScience 17,500K with 6 months on them. One of these bulbs is a Hagen 18000K. :lol:

I'm also not a fan of Giesemann T5s in most situations! :lol!:

Well in my eyes, if Im gonna use energy to drive bulbs, the light they produce might as well be useful...even if I were running MHs with T5s I would choose a T5 bulb that actually has some sort of benefit besides just color....I will be the first to agree that Fiji purps look great, but most peoples systems simply dont handle the red spectrum to well....Ive tried almost every bulb available to me at the shop, KZ, Giesemann, Aquascience, aquamedic, even ran the hagens when I first started( decent looking bulb btw)....I will continue to push and use the AS bulbs because the proof is in the puddin:wink:

Sorry I started the thread but have not been able to get on here to reply. I personally think im gonna add 2 fiji purples but I dont know what the other 2 bulbs that im gonna use. I agree with what everyone is saying on this thread. I want colour but I also want some growth out of the T5's also. Right now the fixture is running 2 super antinics and 2 blue+ (54w). I find that since ive installed the hood Ive had an algae boom.

You don't need two Fiji Purples IME. One is enough.

Right now supplementing my MH (Iwasaki 15,000K) I'm running 1 x Fiji Purple (T5HO), 1 x Gman Actinic+ (T5HO), 2 x UVL Superactinic (VHO)

Ok I'll give your t5 mix a shot. Hopefully it will take away the yellow I'm getting from my 10k mh's

cheers
Ray

what about the URI super actinic? they make them for T5HO now and they were the best color for VHO and I think it is about time they made it for T5. they are a fantastic color.

Steve

I have 2 of those right now along with 2 ati super blues maybe ill keep those and switch out the ati's with a fiji purple and a ....... lol

Ok but at what depth does their par loose penetration value?

hmm I was going to make some smart a$$ remark about T5s here, but there is something that bugs me here and because of it no one can answer your question.

it is fine to say a bulb will produce 330PAR or 400 or 800 ect.. but at what distance and through what?

T5s have a fairly rapid drop off, but is this realy true... nope, it only seams that way because of some of the stupid ways people are rating bulbs. same thing happened with MH and it lead a lot of people to thing they were getting something better than they were (IE when the DE bulbs first came out) light is light and it loses intensity with distance at about the same rate weather it is VHO, T5, MH, LED. but alot of people do measurments from 1 or 2" away from the bulb wich is useless as if you look at the loss of intensity over distance for a rough guess say it will lose 1/2 the value over 4X the distance (don't quote me on that I can't remember the exactr ration but this is for an explanation)

so if you measure the PAR at 1" and get 1000 PAR, then measur at 4" you should get 500, at 20" you should have 250 ect... so now this has been exploited by fudging the distance by different manufactures.. if I do the same measurments at 2" I would get 750 as a start, but at 8" I would get 375 which is the same as you would get in the first senerio at 8" but which one sounds better.

there needs to be a standard brought in between all bulbs MH, Flouressent, LED, ect.. and as far as I am concerned any measurment taken under 10" is useless for comparasons as the numbers are so large everything looks good.

I think a good way of measuing would be to take a PAR reading at 10", then one at 20", and one at 30" this would give you some good referance numbers for any common tank depth and give you a very good idea of the amount of drop off asociated with the light bulb.

personaly I am putting LED over my next tank.. got some of the stuff on order already.. going to cost me about 500.00 to build it but it should last 12 years or more and give me an ouput comparable or higher than a 250watt DE fixture with the consistant lighting that T5s give you. oh and I will be able to change my color with two dials. so if I get tired of 20K, I can change it to 10K, or 11K, or 12K, or maybe 12.5 ect.. you get the idea :mrgreen:

Steve

^^^
Very true, the variables in grim reefers testing of bulbs were never noted but his tests have been very useful with buying bulbs

Pure actinic's are useless. Its like walking around with a black light and seeing what they form of lighting is doing to the colors around you, only visual changes. T5 bulbs rated at 22,000k are very benifical and in my latest changes I am starting to notice my blues pop alot more. As for the DUO comments, yes they are a very white bulb for their kelvin rating but with the hint of red spectrum in them and running them for a month now i believe i am starting to notice my reds coming back. Great bulb

To the OP If i were you i would pure three 22,000k rates bulbs in and maybe a fiji purple. If your adding suppimental bulbs why not put something worth while in?