Question about lightning

[juanro]

So my friend, and yes it really is a friend, not me , has been running a 10 gal and its filled with all kinds of coral, and he says they are healthy, but hes running T8s, one 50/50 and an actinic.
Are T8s really enough?
From what I understand, T5, MH and LED are the way to go for corals and have always had the assumption that T8s aren;t good enough.
Am I right or are the corals starving?

 

[snakeblitz33]

Do they even make a 20" T8 light fixture? He may be getting the terminology incorrect. Look at the lights yourself and see how big they are. T5s are 5/8ths inch, T8 is 1" and T12s are 1 1/4" (I 'm pretty sure) The smaller the diameter bulb, the lower the T number.

 

[meowzer]

Yeah

 

[juanro]

Quote:
Originally Posted by SnakeBlitz33 http:///t/388699/question-about-lightning#post_3429576
Do they even make a 20" T8 light fixture? He may be getting the terminology incorrect. Look at the lights yourself and see how big they are. T5s are 5/8ths inch, T8 is 1" and T12s are 1 1/4" (I 'm pretty sure) The smaller the diameter bulb, the lower the T number.
Yes, they are T8, he bought some hood that had a filter in it and space for 2 T8 bulbs.
I even gave him a T8 bulb I had lying around (the 50/50 he is using).

 

[snakeblitz33]

individual reflectors? what kind of corals does he have?

 

[michaeltx]

There are a lot of lower light corals that will survive under t-8 but they wont have optimal growth or coloring to them. I had a 55 gallon that I used t-8 on when I first got into Reef keeping and kept several corals and they even grew. Once I got better lights and really started to research things on my own is when they started to take off and color up real good. so its possible just not optimal if that makes since. We are also talking about a very small tank as well so anything setup high in the tank is getting light.
JMO
Mike

 

[juanro]

Dont believe it has any reflectors, from what I remember all it has is a splash guard, if it does have a reflector, its not individual.
He has zoas, candy cane, acans, frogspawns, hammer, xenia, GSP, toadstool, ricordeas, yumas, duncans, a suncoral (just throwing it out there), probably has some others but thats what i can remember right now.

 

[florida joe]

The T stands for "tubular", and the number is the diameter of the base in eighths of an inch. So a T8 bulb is 1" in diameter, and a T5 is 5/8 of an inch.
The main difference between T8s and T5s is their size; they also come in different wattages. T8s generally start around 17 watts and normally reach about 42 watts, with the standard being 32 watts. .
T5 lamps go from about five watts to 54 watts, I believe 54 Watts are the only ones with the HO label. That being said there is more info needed then just the T rating