What do you guys think of this bulb arrangement?

H

Hookem2006

Premium Member
I have a 75gal tank with 2 430 ice cap ballasts. I need to replace the bulbs and I have never bought bulbs for T5s before. I am trying to do SPS in the tank and the guys over at BRS told me this combo would give me a good 14K look.
The ballasts are wired as follows:
The 2 back bulbs on one ballast
The 2 front on the other ballast

BRS suggested going with:
3x ATI Aqua Blue Special
1x ATI Blue plus.

What do you guys think? I want a nice actinic look too, but am not sure if this is going to do it. I hear the Blue Special bulbs are kinda whiteish.

Thanks for yall's help!
 
Blue special is a white bulb with a hint of blue. That combo doesn't seem like what you want. If you are sticking with those bulbs, I would do 2 and 2. I am about to buy bulbs for my 4 bulb fixture and plan on 1 Aquablue Special and 1 Coral+ on one ballast and 2 Blue+ on the other. Also, you may look inside the fixture to see how difficult it is to re-wire what bulbs are on what ballast so you can have more control over them. I did it for mine and it was just a matter of swapping some plug-in wires around.
 
I just did mine and everyone recommended coral+ over aqua blue special all around. I have two blue+, one coral+, and a KZ Fiji purple over my frag tank and it's a little white for my liking. If I did it again, I would prob get rid of the purple and just do 3 blue+ and the coral+. Hope it's worth something. :)
 
@Titus wrote:
Blue special is a white bulb with a hint of blue. That combo doesn't seem like what you want. If you are sticking with those bulbs said:
Do you suggest I stagger them? That's what I was thinking. I am trying to get a nice blue look.
Click to expand...
 
@Hook'em2006 wrote:
[I]@Titus wrote:[/I][quote="Blue special is a white bulb with a hint of blue. That combo doesn't seem like what you want. If you are sticking with those bulbs said:
Do you suggest I stagger them? That's what I was thinking. I am trying to get a nice blue look."]
Being that you have 2 ballasts, it makes sense to take advantage of that and run them for different periods. Many run just blues for an hour or 2 before and/or after all of the lights are on. If you wanted to do this and leave the wiring the way you have it now, you would have from front to back, something like BBWW. This could leave you with an uneven look in the tank. If you re-wire it, you change what sockets are paired together so you can do something like BWWB or BWBW. I played with mine and liked BWWB the best, but I guess it is really personal preference in the end.
Click to expand...
 
for a 14K look I would do 3 Blue+ and 1 Coral+. Tha ABspecial is way to yellow for my liking...and in a 6 bulb set up on my tank with 5 Blue+ and only 1 ABS it makes my tank look like 10K....just from one white bulb. So I'd go with the broader spectrum of the Coral+ and then 3 Blue+

Front:
Blue+
Coral+
Blue+
Blue+

that should give you a nice 14-15k look and the corals will grow nicely. ;)
 
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