T5 lighting & purples acro keeping
 

Does anyone who uses only T5 & have success with keeping very dark, rich colored purples sps? If so what bulbs are you using? Or are you able to keep that rich color with T5's & dosing some kind of supplement? Thanks.

I'm prettty happy with mine, it was a browned out stub when I got it a little over a year ago, now it has grown into a palm-sized multi branched colony with a pretty good purple colour. I will post a pic when I can get a camera going.

The lights are 8-bulb Powermodule and the bulbs are 4 ATI Blue Plus, 2 ATI Aquablue Special, 1 Giesemann Midday and 1 KZ Fiji purple.

I don't supplement other than adding sugar and having a calcium reactor and occasionally topping up Magnesium.

The coral is near the top of the tank however I don't think it needs to be this high.

IME the challenge is finding a true dark purple SPS, one of the more challenging colours to get your hands on. With over 10 years searching, I really only had 2 I would call dark purple.

Hmmm let me guess......purple monster and kevins tricolor?

I find sometimes purple SPS light less light to get that dark colour....you can try that.

purple moster yes, but I also had a wicked purple slimer for quite some time that turned out real nice and a solid purple (bought it brown, and slimey). Purple tips do not count :)

I hear the pink T5's bring out purples, red and blues...

Here are some pics of the suspects
This 1 I got about a month ago from a friend who has High No3 but had 1 250w 14k Halide over it, it was way darker
http://i971.photobucket.com/albums/a...6/may15002.jpg
The 2 right in front of the Monti, 1 is a purple milli, the other a purple Acro w/Green polyps, both used to be much darker/richer purple
http://i971.photobucket.com/albums/a...6/may22002.jpg
& finally this 1 was darker & richer as well.
http://i971.photobucket.com/albums/a...y122011001.jpg
I just switched lights about 4 months ago to a tek 6 bulb fixture & now I'm thinking of going to a T5 halide combo. I'd prefer to stay as is but wonder if it's possible to influence the pigment with just T5 & some kind of supplement, food or mineral?
Also I just got this deep water frag from another canreefer last night & would like to keep it's color. It's color is a bit darker than the others but gives you an idea of where they started. Purple is really the only color I'm having an issue keeping. It's the 1 to the lower left.http://i971.photobucket.com/albums/a.../newpurple.jpg

Also my tank is only 36" so I'm wondering if there is a ATI 8-10 bulb in this length, but preferably a 2 X 250 halide with supplemental T5 on either side F & B for color. Thanks.

Yep, both 8 and 10 lamp fixtures are available.

http://www.reefgeek.com/lighting/T5_...dule_Fixtures/

Nice reef....Im going to suggest raising the light or lower those corals....or even feeding more.

Somethings to try anyway. I don't think its a co-incidence that you just switched lights 4 months ago either.

Thanks Man, I looked briefly the other night, but obviously not very hard. & ouch looking at those price's tells me that halide is probably the better option if I can find a good combo.

I don't think it's the light or the height of it because the original light was even closer to the surface. The Tek does have better reflectors so it's probably delivering better par, but the corals in the pics haven't really changed at all either way since the lighting was changed. I use a fair bit of zeo products for both feeding & supplementation, & like i said purple is really the only one I'm not happy with. Also I feed some phyto & zoo plankton, they're the Kent products, so I'm certainly open to suggestion as to what more to feed. I've read that people have had positive results using iron for purple. but have not tried it yet. Others I've talked to don't do anything but they have halide's & realy great looking purple coral's.