MH vs. T5, my experience

[BigJay]

All the tanks I've ever had in this hobby I've talked myself out of halides.
I've been running my 90 Oceanic bowfront (48" wide and 28" from light to top of substrate) with a Nova Extreme pro 6 x 54w T5 for about 1.5 years. Finally I decided to switch to Halides. Growth has been explosive! Coloration improved and polyp extension on SPS massive comaparitively.

Some notes on these experiences.

First why this isn't scientific thread but an opinionated one.
1. 324w of T5(10w of LED) vs. 500w of 14k halide(18w of LED)
2. No PAR or Lux meter used. all my observations are naked eye.
3. Shallower tanks may show T5's closer to halides. Distance of highest placed coral to light is 14" s in my tank.
4. While this T5 fixture does have a simulated individual reflector different units with different reflectors and ballasts may give you different results.

My experiences...
1. T5's are more then adequate in this fixture for all LPS and softies I have housed all the way to the substrate.
2. Even though I buy what I consider to be the best T5 bulbs all have significantly reduced output after a few months and all start to color shift around 6 months or less. (brands used Geisemann , ATI , UV lighting)(4 in the 10 -13k kelvin , 2 actinics)
3. Because of number 2 I change bulbs every 6 months. 6 bulbs x $20 average is $120 + additional shipping charges for longer bulbs is nearly = cost of replacing 2 250w halide bulbs of good quality. I do not believe that T5's are truly good for 1 year to 18 months as advertised.
4. T5's are indeed cooler. The halides have raised my tank temp 4.5 degrees. With a house temp of 74 this is a welcome increase. I'm also employing my hood now so this increase isn't a true accurate representation between the two types of lighting.
5. Growth on all softies and LPS has been good under T5. Coraline growth under my T5's have always been poor. SPS growth has been mediocre to slow. Maxima clam growth decent even at 28" 's.
6. All SPS showed an immediate and explosive growth after the halide switch. Coloration on my acropora has shown an immediate improvement. Polyp extension on all SPS has been down rate insane. I had decent polyp extension on some SPS like montis under T5's but many other species not so much.
7. My mobile inhabitants of the tank seem to appreciate the dark and light zones caused by the point of light of the halides. Of course this would be negated in halide/florescent combos.


In summary , I'm kicking myself for shunning halides for so long. I'm not condemning T5's as I feel they do have their place but I am no longer of the opinion their positives outweigh their weaknesses.
I hope to revisit this thread in about 6 months to provide a more long term opinion. I wish I had taken pictures of the first day of putting the light in. Some of my colonies have shown so much growth in such a short time I'm afraid to post how much in fear of being called a liar. Anyhow for the time being though, I 'm sticking with old school halides to get'r done.

(interesting enough I plan on using the T5's in a shallow frag tank of 14" 's)

anyone feel free to post your experiences.

 

[Exo]

I'd be interested to hear if anyone has had experience with an 8 bulb T5 set-up versus MH. The power with the bigger fixture would be a lot closer wattage wise to the MH's Jay is running. Not sure how the PAR would compare.

 

[BigJay]

yes it is somewhat unfair comparatively , but 8 bulb T5 would then technically be more expensive then halides in bulb replacement costs based on my experiences with loss of output and color shifting.

 

[Eric]

Welcome to the BRIGHT SIDE

 

[Jeremy0322]

I like it Jay! We all know that I have always been a big advocate of T5 over MH, but thats from what I have read and have heard, I have no personal experience with them sadly. I would like to see pictures of your tank under the old T5 and then under the MH, not for growth reasons, just to see the visual difference. Heck, maybe I will look into a small fixture when I set up my new 20 gallon tank. Something small of course, but it cant hurt to try something new, right?

 

[PIMPALA]

Could the growth change possibly accounted for with an extra 35% more wattage? and more LEDs?

cost... what about the increase in electricity usage factored in?

 

[BigJay]

of course it could be. But having used the T5's this long I don't believe that if wattage's were 100% equal that growth would be the same. But that's anecdotal since I don't have a 500w T5 fixture to compare it to. Only educated guess based on experience. I'm trying to be upfront about the incomparable nature in the wattage's. But it does need to be said the difference between the halide and the T5 were not minor. Its incredible. Believe me I want T5's to be the better fixture. I like the swappable nature of the individual bulbs to achieve different colors.
As far as electricity cost if we are going apples to apples . 1 watt of T5 is equal to 1 watt of halide(except halides do consume a bit more due to the ballast) but your correct the halide fixture is going to cost me about $7.50 more a month to run. If I went to an 8 bulb T5 fixture the cost difference would be about $3.50.

 

[rgfast]

nice to have some shimmer in water to. I use t5s over my ref. and FWLR tank but MHs over all my DTs

 

[GlassMunky]

Everything has its place. T5's are great for alot of reasons. but for SPS, MH just seem the way to go. I noticed a huge difference when i switched, and even after i changed the old bulb out to the new one.

 

[stiffler70]

Well if any of you are aware with SeaUmarine, he has his SPS cube tank running on 12....yes 12!!! HO T5's

check it out... http://seaumarine.com/sea%20u%20marine%20Live%20homepage.html

thats what he has growing in his tank with 12 T5's

 

[BigJay]

Btw my intention in this thread wasn't to say Halides > T5 . Just my experience with this T5 fixture and why I am currently preferring halides in my 90. I do have a major gripe with T5's on the color shifting reduced output but unfortunately I know quite a few halides experience the same issue. Really it was meant as there wasn't a reason I should have been shunning halides and I'm glad I finally caved. It's not hard to look at the beam leaving the halide fixture and its focused nature versus the spread out nature of the T5 fixture and make and educated guess the halides are delivering more light to the corals while the T5 did a better job of illuminating the entire tank and water column.
I also am not touching on anything really new or unknown in the hobby. But perhaps it may get someone making a lighting decision thinking. Who knows I may end up changing my mind again in 2 months.

 

[Frankie]

Great topic.
I am curious what your responses will be to this question. This is a quote from another forum:

Hi guys,
I read a lot about lighting and try to choose between mh and t5. One thing which i do not understand is people saying that you can save money with t5?
Lets take fixture 2x250w MH + 2x80w t5 VS 8x80w t5... What do we get price wise? first fixture takes 660w second 640w. I do not think that 20w per day makes big difference in the end of the month? Or 100w of MH is more expensive than 100w of t5? Maybe i do not get something here?
When speaking about changing bulbs - to change combo bulbs would cost 2x 80$ + 2x 25$ = 210$ By the way T5 are normally changed every 6 month, so in the end of the year my expenses for combo bulbs will be 260$.

8 T5 after 6 months will cost me 8x25= 200$ which gets to 400$ by the end of the year. So how somebody can make any savings with T5.

 

[Frankie]

Well if any of you are aware with SeaUmarine, he has his SPS cube tank running on 12....yes 12!!! HO T5's

check it out... http://seaumarine.com/sea%20u%20marine%20Live%20homepage.html

thats what he has growing in his tank with 12 T5's

That is a probiotic system. You cannot give credit to the lighting for the explosive colors in that aquarium.

 

[Rhodes19]

Tagging along for the learning experience . Frankie got me switched to MH and I must say my sps's have colored up and I am now seeing polyp extension that I never saw under T5. Can't wait to see some pictures.

 

[BigJay]

Hi guys,
I read a lot about lighting and try to choose between mh and t5. One thing which i do not understand is people saying that you can save money with t5?
Lets take fixture 2x250w MH + 2x80w t5 VS 8x80w t5... What do we get price wise? first fixture takes 660w second 640w. I do not think that 20w per day makes big difference in the end of the month? Or 100w of MH is more expensive than 100w of t5? Maybe i do not get something here?

Well according to all the data out there on the internet, Halide is more expensive then T5 in that the ballast will require slightly more electricity. The Difference would be hardly factorable given the current average cost of residential electricity the cost would be somewhere between $1 to $2 more a month for halides if comparing T5 fixture to halide that are nearly equal in wattages.

When speaking about changing bulbs - to change combo bulbs would cost 2x 80$ + 2x 25$ = 210$ By the way T5 are normally changed every 6 month, so in the end of the year my expenses for combo bulbs will be 260$.

8 T5 after 6 months will cost me 8x25= 200$ which gets to 400$ by the end of the year. So how somebody can make any savings with T5.

This is my current stance. although I know many people that replace the halide bulbs around the 8-10 month mark, in either situation, if wattages are equal in fixtures, T5's in general, are not cheaper then halides as far as bulb replacement cost. This idea that it is , is born out of misleading advertising by the manufacturers.

The other factors I'd analyze before making the decision the guy is faced with is...
1. My current tank temperature. Will I be forced to run a chiller to run the halides, if so T5's become a more electrically efficient option.
2. What is my tank depth. If I am deeper then 16" 's from light to lowest placed light demanding coral then I would strongly consider the halide.
3. What am I primarily housing in my tank or plan to. If I'm not planning on keeping SPS, either T5 or halide becomes a matter of taste not growth.

 

[BigJay]

ok here are some pics. Pics are taking with a Canon Rebel XS set on macro under the 250w 14k (current's stock bulb) with no LED's or accent lighting. I didn't have time to play with the settings on the camera and I didn't have enough ambient light so the flash fired occasionally causing some wash out in some pics.
I also silted the tank a bit which you can see in some of the pics , which caused several of the SPS to retract some what.

frag less then 1 month old, encrusting very fast under the new lighting.

parent colony previous frag was taken from. This is the shade side so its hard to see the polyp extension but the color is night and day from the T5s

neon candies, coloration or pop , better under the T5's due to lack of actinics in the system now.

This coral has grown approximately 2.5 inches since halide installation on the longest arm. Showing extreme polyp extension , improved coloration and massive amount of expansion.Colony about 8 inches tall and 7 inches in width

probably one of the best indicators of growth. Although its hard to see thats about a 5" tall birdsnest colony that I laid on its side about 22" 's from the light. The upward growth is approximately 2" 's since the halides installed a couple weeks ago.

nothing to do with light, just saw a baby berghia nudibranch on the glass and had to take a pic of it.

frogskin frag in the back has more then doubled in size

yellow tort, bad pic

orange cap looks amazing , growth is RAPID!!

love having a shaded area for fresh frags

my true eagle eyes coloration is amazing under the 14k halides

favia always extends its feeders if I silt the tank

even in the most shaded corner this neon leather has easily doubled in size

here you can see the silting really well that caused some of the polyp retraction. This is the underside of the coral from when it was fragged. Side facing the back has amazing neon polyp extension

darn flash! For some reason these rics never did well under the T5, much better under Power Compacts actually so I expected them to suffer from the halide but actually they are doing quite well

 

[GlassMunky]

NICE PICS! I love seeing shots of favias with their feeders out, cause mines never do

 

[Rhodes19]

BigJay,

Nice pics. 2 questions. Does laying the birds nest on its side make it grow new branches? And, what are you doing when you silt the tank? Are you stirring up the substrate or dusting off the rocks? Thanks.

 

[BigJay]

Corals are just like plants. You can train them to grow different directions and get different effects. I let the birdnest grow out to a decent size then stuffed it between two rocks so it would grow up but while sticking out away from the rocks. I have a ton of rock and the top is more or less completely filled so its a good way to occupy the middle areas of the rock, filling in the tank while ensuring the coral isn't shaded to much by upper corals. Birdnests grow alot like trees in that they tend to grow from the tops. So yeah it will force new branches in new directions mostly from the outer most point.
If you look at that neon candy cane I employed a similar training technique. I fragged out a piece let it grow into its typical floral pattern of about 8-10 heads placed in the sand. Then I picked it up and laid it upside down on the rock work. These type of LPS can react extremely fast to these situations and all the heads will turn out and up within a couple days. This gives the candy canes an extremely stable flat base to sit on instead of the single point of the originally broken branch. Branching hammers can be manipulated in very much the same way as they typically can react and change directions in a couple days.
It is important to note not all corals handle these types of manipulations equally. So just like a Banzai artist needs to consider the type of tree he's shaping you must consider the type of coral and what your trying to achieve. I'm not sure if there is any information out there on the net on this. It's something I've just learned from experience with corals. Perhaps I should talk about it more and we can get more people trying it and seeing what we can achieve.
As far as silting. My powerhead was being pulled by the cords of the halide fixture. I didn't notice it that it was tilted just a bit and when I started running the cleaner on the glass to get the pictures I stirred up a little bit of sand and the powerheads direction amplified it. It's my modified K4 @ around 3000 GPH.

 

[BigJay]

here I tried to get a few more pics of the Birdsnest. Unfortunately the problem with a bowfront means it gets distorted images and taking a top down shot would take me 20 minutes to remove everything on top to get the pic.