Why isn't my hammer bright green like in the lfs?

[sphelps]

Here's a pic of my first reef tank, at the time all that was available to me was power compacts and NO fluorescent. I think it had two of those 50/50 34" bulbs and two NO fluorescent 22000K bulbs on a 3 foot 50 gallon. Seemed to work just fine, LPS and soft corals did great, color looks pretty good to.



That said I'd still consider purchasing a new fixture. I've seen plenty of used T5 fixtures sell here with new bulbs for less that what you probably paid for that one 34" CFL bulb. So it's probably cheaper than trying to add more of what you have. A 4 bulb fixture would be ideal.

If you can't justify any of the LED options then don't purchase them and ignore anyone that tells you different. The PAR38 bulbs are an OK option but you'll need a few of them and when you compare price/watt to other options like the D120 they are not overly cost effective. They also usually can't be dimmed and don't offer control of the blue & white spectrum.

[intarsiabox]

You can always post a "looking for" thread on this site. Lots of people have converted over to LED's and probably have some good T5 fixtures they could part with for a good price. A good T5 fixture with the right bulb combination will grow anything that LED's can you just don't get as much control, have the shimmer effect and have to replace bulbs fairly often.

[MoreDakka]

Originally Posted by intarsiabox

You can always post a "looking for" thread on this site. Lots of people have converted over to LED's and probably have some good T5 fixtures they could part with for a good price. A good T5 fixture with the right bulb combination will grow anything that LED's can you just don't get as much control, have the shimmer effect and have to replace bulbs fairly often.

Yeah, I figured we might as well put the money we would spend on the T5s plus bulbs into an low-mid range LED unit. Just replacing bulbs every 12 months is something that is bothersome and can get expensive.