Great breakdown, thank you.....Good point about the amount of lights needed for LED as opposed to Halide. How does T5 stack up to these two?
I also had t5 HO (high output) lighting on my reefing tank. T5 are nice but they have limited use. They don't pack as much of a punch as far as light output but they work well enough. I used them as supplement lighting over my reef. The MH did most of the growing and the T5 in good reflectors supplied the "color pop" for my corals. What you Reflectors are key to getting the most out of T5 HO lighting systems. T5 is actually the size of the bulbs. They are thinner than T8 bulbs. These are the ones you typically see in the ceilings of office buildings and such. Due to the smaller size, T5 you can fit more bulbs in the same space. Adding a good parabolic reflector greatly increases your lighting downward. Reflectors simply redirect light to where we can benefit from it. T5 bulbs are long and tubular. They are usually laid flat on a horizontal plane. The The light shines 360 degrees however, we generally only place plants on 1 side, usually under the light. Well, if we only place plants on 1 side of the 360 degree shining bulb, we will only use 180degrees of the light produced. By placing a good reflector above these bulbs, we are able to reflect this wasted top half (the other 180 degree of light) downward to be used.
A simple break down of light wave length is with ROYGBIV (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet). Colors on the left are easier to produce and require less energy to produce. Natural sun light is something like 5200k to 5700k IRRC. The lower the number the more you go left in color. Just take a look at the bulbs at the big box stores and see what I mean. You will notice that these bulbs of the same type will be cheaper and produce more candles/lumens for watt the more left you go. The opposite is true as you move right. The more violet (right) you go, the more energy (watt) is needed to produce the same amount of candles/lumens.
Thangbom
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Thank you, I don't see T5 as being worth it based on your info and other reading. The thought of high heat makes me nervous as I live alone aside from my Mother who has health challanges. God forbid a fire breaks out.