View Full Version : 6500K vs 50/50 Coralife Power Quad?
mwoneal
03/28/2007, 07:57 PM
I have a Coralife 96W PowerQuad that I'm running a 6500K bulb in on advice from my LFS. The reasoning they gave was that it would provide more light in the red / yellow spectrum, encouraging growth in my 10g softie tank. This makes sense and everything is doing well, but I am not impressed with the coloration this gives to my zoanthids and mushrooms. I'm thinking of switching back to the 50/50 10K/Actinic stock bulb, but don't want to sacrifice growth. Any thoughts?
thorsky
03/28/2007, 08:45 PM
I've run both. The 6500K coloration is nasty but it will give better growth. I'm running the 50/50 over a 15g right now. Color is good and my anemone seems to like it just fine. Best advice I can give is try it out and see.
Shade00
03/28/2007, 08:50 PM
PAR will be significantly higher with the 6500k bulb, but over a 10g, I don't know that there will be much difference. A 96w PC over that size tank is a bunch of light. Switch out the 50/50... see what happens.
mwoneal
03/29/2007, 06:07 AM
Shade00, what does the acronym PAR stand for? I've seen it mentioned in several threads now, but can't figure out what it is. Thanks everbody for the tips.
Photosynthetic Active Radiation, or "PAR" is basically a unit of measurement used to determine how much "useable" light a lamp produces. Higher PAR is better. For example, in the MH tests located in the sticky at the top of this forum, the bulbs used produced PAR levels ranging from about the 200's to the 800's in some cases. Usually, the more yellowish bulb temperatures (5500k, 6500k, 10000k) will produce higher PAR levels, resulting in better coral growth, but less eye-appealing color. The more blue-colored bulbs (12000k up to 20000k) look better to most peoples eyes, but have a lower PAR and coincidently, lower coral growth. Hope this helps clear things up a bit. :)
mwoneal
03/29/2007, 07:15 PM
K9, thanks for the info, it is a great explanation. I tried out the 50/50 bulb, but noticed immediately how much dimmer the tank appeared, all though the color was more pleasing. I understand now why folks with big tanks and room to use lots of bulbs are using what seems like every spectrum in the rainbow. With the limited space above my 10g, I'm sticking w/ the 6500K bulb, would rather see corals grow than flouresce (sp?).
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