Wanna Cringe?...I just got some new PC's!

Originally I had PC's, on a 5yr old tank I bought off CL, and they still worked. I bought new bulbs, and things were fine.

Then ONe of the blues quit working, tried everything.
Then my working one fell in, and fried the ballasts. So now only one out of 4 bulbs were working.

Looked around for used fiixtures, nothing that would suffice.

So, I bought 2 x 36in fixtures for my 6ft. 125 DT.

Each fisture has 1 x 1200K 96W; and 1 x 'true actinic'? , and 3 LED moon lights.

The PC's alone would cost about $85-150+, without the LEDS.
I paid ~218 for both full fistures including bulbs, free shipping to my door!

The lights are adequatefor me for now. I have sps, lps, softies, and anenomes. They are really enjoying the fuller light again!

So, what's the main difference between a 10K bulb and a 12K?
I had a 10k, the new ones are 12K.

 

The K refers to the colour temperature of the bulb. 10k is whiter going up to 20k which is bluer.

 

T-You Coylee, I guess what I really meant was;

what wavelength does our corals use mostly?

 

Are you hoping to associate the Kelvin of the bulb to wavelength? Its not quite that easy lol. Each brand of bulb will be different. As for which wavelength our corals like best, it's a mix and there are a few really good threads lately with that info. It's just way too much to repost lol.

 

Understood, I have seen a post that even referenced a paper about it, etc.

I'll keep looking, and be glad my seems to do well with lights virtually no one uses anymore! ;-)

 

I wanna say it was Seano that did that paper but not positive.

 

im supprised you could find replacements. Most people can't these days. Where I live i bet 60% of the reefers use PC's on their brown coral.

 

Now with my Blue moon LED's, my actinics, and my 12K, everything is very bright and vibrant and very colorful with the flourescent glow to the corals, and fish! Even my LFS has bulbs, expensive, but they got 'em.

 

If they work for you and you are comfortable with them that is what is important. Congrats on getting everything back up and going with full lighting.

As for what lighting the corals use you want to find the light ranges that zooxanthellae use for photosynthesis. The ranges are generally around 455nm and 600nm, blue and red respectively. You still need the other wave lengths to make other colors show well. 400nm to 420nm wavelengths also help in making the colors look great.