Best T5 For Coral Growth?

[TaknByD]

I was wondering what your opinion was on the best T5 bulb for coral growth? I know that there has been coral growth with just my coralife T5 (2 Blue, 2 White) fixture and bulbs, but was just wondering what you guys thought was the best bulb for the buck.

[justahobby]

GE's 6.5K has been recommended many times by T5 gurus. You should be able to offset the yellow tinge with an actinic, blue plus, and another white bulb like 10 or 12K. Procolor bulbs (pink) make colors POP too.

[Gseclipse02]

Procolor bulbs (pink

i belive this one is discontinued there using fiji purple

[Europhyllia]

IMO even the best bulb doesn't work well if you have it in a crappy fixture. I always used good bulbs: GE, Giesemann, ATI etc.
and looked at the PAR ratings here: http://sites.google.com/site/tfivetesting/par

But my first fixture didn't have any cooling fans, reflectors weren't that great, etc. so I didn't get as much light into the tank as I could have due to the reflectors and the bulbs' lifespan was cut short by not keeping them cool.
Upgrading to a better fixture was such an eye opener for me.

Anyway, check out the Grim Reefer link above to get a run down on PAR. Like the Fiji Purple for example has almost as much PAR as daylight bulbs, etc.

[cbianco]

GE's 6.5K has been recommended many times by T5 gurus. You should be able to offset the yellow tinge with an actinic, blue plus, and another white bulb like 10 or 12K. Procolor bulbs (pink) make colors POP too.

+1

I have a 6 bulb T5 fixture. I am running front to back:

Blue+
Actinic
Fiji
Blue+
GE 6500
Blue+

It is only recently that I included a 6500 in my fixture, instead using a Aqua Spezial. I believe that the replacement of the Aqua Spezial with the 6500 has resulted in better/faster growth of my corals. However this is opinion and purely anecdotal.

Christopher

[alton]

The best growth I had was with ine ATI Aquablue Special, Giesemann Actinic, UVL Actinic, and UVL Actinic White. I just replaced lamps and since I can not find ATi and too far to drive to Austin for Giesemann I went with UVL Actinic, UVL 75-25, UVL Aquasun, and as soon as I can change out the new Coral Life Actinic with another UVL

[roscozman]

We also have a 6 bulb retro and use ATI, GE & Korallen Zucht Figi Purpl. I am running from front to back:
Blue+
Korallen Zucht Figi Purple
Blue+
GE 6500
Blue+
Blue+

I asked the very same question on Reef Central and this bulb combo was recommended also by Grim Reefer on RC. He is the T5 expert. You can go on his T5 thread, ask a question and he will respond. You can see our tanks here:
http://www.maast.org/showthread.php?...133#post804133

However... it is time for us to replace our bulbs.