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toobrie said:
youre right they do whiten up a bit, the nice thing about them is there is no need to add actinic. Nice lookin tank btw.
thanks! :) I had to rework the LR a bit. I intend on tryin a 10K once I get my T5's for actinic but that'll be in about 8 months or so when I need to replace bulbs :) I went with the 14K since I got such a great deal on a brand new bulb (thanks to tomasz) however I think i will try the 10K since I want to get more growth for a while. Then I will switch back to the 14K or a 12K for appearances :)
 
Discussion starter · #24 ·
Tide2Water said:
I didn't know they made a 12k. So they make a 10k, a 12k and a 14k? Does any other manufacturer do that? I'll probably look into 12k over 14k I'd like to supplement with actinic but don't want it to be too blue. Black do you supplement with actinic?

Tide
I have 4 39 watt T-5 super actincs on the tank....
 
Tide2Water said:
Really? I know the blbs we habve at work are reeflux...and I cold have sworn the little white letters say 14000k lol. Makes me wonder what they really are. I'll have to check this afternoon.

Tide
The regular Coralvue line is available in 10k, 14k, and 20k varieties. The Coralvue Reeflux line is available in 10k and 12k only. I really like the Reeflux 10k lamps on electronic ballasts. Very nice white with obvious blue tint. The 12k look decent but are not nearly bright enough for me and are really quite blue on eballasts (much more blue than the 10k lamps). The 12k on a PFO HQI ballast looks great (burns whiter than on eballasts) but there are still other lamps out there with much higher PAR values. It all depends on what priorities you have for your lighting.

Personally, I stick with one of the following with two 110 watt tubes of VHO actinic.
1) Ushio 10k (lowest price)
2) Aqualine Bushke 13k (higher price)
3) Giesemann 14.5k Megachrome Coral (highest priced)
Note: some have suggested that all three of these lamps might possibly be made by BLV (Germany).

The Kelvin rating on lamps is very deceiving. The Ushio, AB, and G-Man lamps all really look similar and are very bright and really do provide good natural reef coloration. Don't let the Kelvin ratings the manufacturers put on lamps fool you. It really helps to see the different lamps burning in person to aid in your decision process.

For me the thing with the lamps in the 10k spectrum is that they really look like how the reef looks in the first 0 - 30 feet (the depths at which a lot of our corals are really coming from). The "bluer" lamps just tend to make the aquarium look too washed out to me. But that is certainly personal preference. That being said, a wonderful lamp that balances great color with decent growth potential is the Aquaconnect 14k. They are expensive and somewhat hard to find (available often at Premium Aquatics) but look great on HQI ballasts especially in my opinion with strong PAR value for a higher Kelvin rated lamp. I've burned two pairs on my PFO HQI ballasts and they look great. I just still prefer the more "white" and brighter lamps I noted above.

Surprisingly, the one 10k lamp I really just don't like at all is the XM 10K. While it provides very high PAR values I just don't care for the coloration of corals and the tint of the water under these lamps. The XM 10K lamps are apparently more "white" than the AB or Ushio but I just don't dig the color.

In the last 13 years or so I've used lamps from Ushio, AB, Giesemann, Coralvue, Coralvue Reeflux, SPS, Avalon, XM, Aquaconnect, Hamilton, Radium, (and others I'm forgetting I'm sure) and I keep coming back to my top three: Ushio, AB, and G-Man. Why? Reliability, growth, color, intensity, and aquarium hue.

Anyway, just some personal preference and feedback to share with you. Hope it helps somehow. There are some many options these days for us reefers. That's a great thing but it does also make the decision making process more difficult. Go with what you like the look and what accomplishes your goals for growth vs. color vs. cost etc. The other thing I've learned is not to trust (rely on) photos you see posted on the Internet of aquariums with different lighting. There's just to many variables including ballast choices, aquarium water clarity, age of lamps, white balancing of cameras etc. that can make them look different on your own tank. If you see something you like in person, go for it!
 
Discussion starter · #27 ·
thanks well i have the the super actinic t-5 by UVL. nice actinic color and ya XM 10k color is just wrong.. with my blueline ballast i am just going to try a few used and see how they look. if i have to i will do DE and get the 14K pheonix since that is my favorite bulb of all time. just modding my reflectors to put DE in there and making sure my ballast fire them... so many choices!!!!
 
Discussion starter · #30 ·
I got a 14K hamilton from balz2dwall to try. I must say I like it.. doesnt pack the punch or spread that my 10K xm's had but the color is much better. I like it a lot. with the actinics, did anyone have the hamiltons and switch to something else they liked more? or less???
 
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