t5's, t8's or t12's

project5k

project5k

Reef enthusiast
So, i have this new 210, and ihave my old 75's canopy, now i can strip out the 48 inch t5's and ballasts, and try and use them over my 72" 210, or i can sell the canopy, and use that money towards something new...

well, t12's are easy to handle, and very familiar, but they put out the most heat of the 3... not to mention that the bulbs are an inch and a half in diameter, so that limits how many i can have...

t8's are very familiar to me, i've used them all over my house now, easy to handle, and 1 inch in diameter.. better than the t12's but not as good as the t5's

t5's are the new great thing(so far as i know) and i've been using these in a 48 inch version over my 48 inch 75gal tank, but 48 inch bulbs dont fit well over a 72 inch tank... I suppose i could fill in on either one end, or a little on each end if i center the 48" bulbs, but still, thats starting to sound like a hodgepodge mess...

I'm kinda starting to think that i should just build myself a new light fixture, one that will fold up outta my way when i need to work on the tank, and one that covers the tank properly. Now to do that, my thinking is to go to 36 inch bulbs... and the thinking would be to put 2 end to end, to make the 72 inches in length i need...

at 39 watts each, i'm gonna need over 12 bulbs to get to 3 watts per gallon, and to get 5w/g i'm gonna need 27 of 'em... holy crap...

so, then i start thinking about the t12's just cause i can get 72" bulbs, and at 160w each, i'd only have to have 6 of them, or the 36"ers i'd need 12 balparkn and rounding up to the next nearest even number of bulbs...

so... my ballasts arent big enough to drive the 72" bulbs, but i can drive 2 of the 36 inch t12's on a single ballast....or 4 of the 36" t5's.....

so, if you had my 210, and had the option, but not lots of money, what would you do?

I'm only shying away from the MH from a heat, and electricity prospective, i know flour. systems, and i can build and work on them, but i dont know squat about MH...

would the mh be any cheaper to set up? whats the life expectancy of say, a 150W MH bulb, when compared to either a t5 or a t12???

or do i just give up and just have a 210 FOWLR?
 
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T5 are the cheapest and probably a decent choice for any setup, you can easily pack these into a canopy and get the lighting you are looking for. Bulbs are much cheaper than a MH and heat production, is more dispersed rather than a MH which is localized, so less burn off of water.
 
I have 48" bulbs over my 63" long tank and don't have any dead spots. Not saying you wont but you could probably make them work temporarily
 
Hmmmmmmm
Do you think you can drive any bulb with any ballast? You can not drive a T5HO bulb with a normal output fluorescent ballast. You need a High Output ballast. You can not drive a 72" T12 VHO on a regular ballast. You need a VHO ballast.
well, t12's are easy to handle, and very familiar, but they put out the most heat of the 3
Click to expand...
How did you come to that conclusion? Let's take 3 4' bulbs....a normal output T12 at 40w, a high output T5 at 54w and a very high output T12 110w. The least heat will come from the T12 normal output at 40w, followed by the T5 at 54w and finally the VHO at 110w. The size of the bulb diameter has absolutely nothing to do with it. It's the wattage. A watt generates the same amount of heat no matter where it comes from. Higher wattage = more heat.
 
wpg if I recall right, doesnt have much bearing in the hobby anymore, at least in a lot of articles I read. More people are measuring lighting based on need and spectrum. I'll find a link to the article and post it.
 
ya know what ccCapt, i'm gonna give you a chance to go back and re-read what i wrote, and fix your post before i reply.
 
really, i had thought about the overlap, but i was afraid that it would cause a bright spot in the tank....

oh and yes i understand that the WPG rule dosent really apply any more, but its the only tool i have to get any kind of an idea now much energy i'm putting into the tank... I'm allowing for some correction factor in my math, perhaps not enough, but its there...

i also know that the old 5w/g rule was for the t12's, so, it would seem that something in the 3w/g area with t5's should be about the same amount of energy just due to the increased eff.

so anyway...

t5's are 5/8 inch in diameter, but by the time i add reflectors they are almost 2 inches wide, but i suppose i could just use 3' reflectors, and not have the overlapped portions of the bulbs reflectorized... so, then, 12 * 5/8 = 7.5 inches worth of bulbs, and ihave about 15 inches front to back that i'd like to keep the lights in, so, thats gonna be just about right if i overlap them in the middle.. i think i like that...

hmmmm

now you 've sent my brain spinn'n again...
 
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it wont be that bad on your tank and then you have dimmer sides for lower light corals an a center with higher light corals
 
well i know that my ballast is listed as being able to drive 2 of the 80 watt bulbs, but i'm not familiar with them, and i'm not seeing them on drsfoster website, i'm sure i'm just missing something simple, could you point me towards them please?
 
For reference I'm running 14-39w at 36'' long.Well,in reality they are 34'' long.It's the Aquactinics Constellation.

If you want to run less bulbs or go higher in watts then go retro.Icecap makes ballast that can overdrive T5(T5-VHO).

Remember,your choice of bulbs is very limited with T12.
 
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ccCapt said:
Hmmmmmmm
Do you think you can drive any bulb with any ballast?
Click to expand...


project5k said:
so... my ballasts arent big enough to drive the 72" bulbs, but i can drive 2 of the 36 inch t12's on a single ballast....or 4 of the 36" t5's.....
Click to expand...

um, obviously not....

i'll leave the rest alone...


oh, and i went and looked at the one that ted linked to, wow, thats not a bad way to go... my only hesitation is the compacts... they just get so darn hot, and with my experiences with my old light system, they dont seem to last as long as the t5's...
 
reeffreak said:
For reference I'm running 14-39w at 36'' long.Well,in reality they are 34'' long.It's the Aquactinics Constellation.

Can you please explain the "aquactinics constellation" i dont understand the reference...

If you want to run less bulbs or go higher in watts then go retro.Icecap makes ballast that can overdrive T5(T5-VHO).

True, but dont over driven bulbs have shorter lives?

Remember,your choice of bulbs is very limited with T12.
Click to expand...


i've been noticing that the choices are very limited...

i dunno... the more i think about it the more i cant decide what to do...

i really like the idea of using what i already have, and just having the bulbs overlap a foot in the middle for a "high intensity" area, which really works out kinda neat cause thats also where the "lagoon" or open area of sand is gonna be if i end up aquascaping it the way i'm planning... more intense light right where i'm gonna be putting things the deepest...

but then i like the idea of building a new setup, running the 3foot t5 bulbs, and fixing the engineering mistakes i made on my first canopy... not to mention that if i do go with the 3 footers, i could build it into 2 sections, and that just makes working on it, moving it, working on one end or the other of the tank easier.. but it also means i have to buy all new bulbs...

then theres the thing that Ted suggested... looks like an easy fix... but the compacts worrie me...

i just dont know what to do.....
 
ahhh its a fixture, very nice, but definately outta my price range for now...


ok, so its not as bad as i thought then... hmmm...

well, darn, decisions decisions...
 

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