# Researching T5 Fixtures



## PinchHarmonic (Mar 30, 2007)

I've decided that a T5 fixture is what I will use for my 55 gallon tank (4ft).

I did some searching at marinedepot.com and google and came up with these three fixtures:


48 inch Current USA Nova Extreme 4x54W T5HO with 4 Lunar Lights
price 255.99

Teklight T5 Lighting Fixture 
Size: 48"L x 11"W x 2.5"H 
Lamps: 4 
Watts: 54 
Weight: 65 lb 
$244.00

PFO 51 inch PolypLight 8 x T5 HO
price 339.99 no bulbs

PFO 51 Inch PolypLight 6 x T5 HO
price $339.99 no bulbs

I'm not sure why the PFO is the same price for the 8xT5 and 6xT5, maybe cuz both don't come wtih bulbs. I'm assumming the 51" is basically the same as 48", good for my 55 gallon. Also it did not specify the wattage on the PFOs so i'm assumming all t5 bulbs are 54 watt?

I'm leaning towards teh Current USA because it has the moonlight LEDs which I think will be rather spiffy when I want to see the tank at night. Moreover, the current USA comes wtih legs so no installing strings to hang the fixture.

ANy other suggestions greatly appreciated.


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## David Hui (Dec 10, 2004)

I am using 36" Nova Extreme it came with bulbs and mounting legs. The light coverage is good, but the fan is really loud. Overall I am happy with the purchase. HTH


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## ezeke1 (May 1, 2007)

I don't have experience with the PFO but I just received my 36" Nova Extreme T5 today from 
Dr. Fosters and Smith. They have the best price for this particular lighting system.

Your 48" actually costs $199.99
http://www.drsfostersmith.com/Produ...t I'll post my satisfaction/disatisfaction :)


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## ianmoede (Jan 17, 2005)

Id look into the tek light. Its really the best engineered of them all.


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## ezeke1 (May 1, 2007)

ianmoede said:


> Id look into the tek light. Its really the best engineered of them all.


I agree, Tek Light appears to have rave reviews, but it costs alot more too. You get what you pay for I suppose


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## boink (Nov 29, 2006)

i have the 4ft 4 lamp tek and its made very well, and doesnt get too hot. i havent opened it so not sure what it looks like inside.


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## PinchHarmonic (Mar 30, 2007)

boink said:


> i have the 4ft 4 lamp tek and its made very well, and doesnt get too hot. i havent opened it so not sure what it looks like inside.


Do you have your tech light hanging over your tank? My guess is you had to build something to attach the strings to. Do the sell legs for the Tek?

Also, seems like the Tek doesn't have the moonlight, while it's not incredibly important, it is kinda cool =).


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## PinchHarmonic (Mar 30, 2007)

ezeke1 said:


> I don't have experience with the PFO but I just received my 36" Nova Extreme T5 today from
> Dr. Fosters and Smith. They have the best price for this particular lighting system.
> 
> Your 48" actually costs $199.99
> ...


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## ianmoede (Jan 17, 2005)

I have both the legs and the sunlight supply hangers. THe hangers are cheaper, but both are really nice options. I have NOTHING negative to say about the tek. Its really perfection.


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## boink (Nov 29, 2006)

i made a hanger with electrical conduit


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## PinchHarmonic (Mar 30, 2007)

ianmoede said:


> Id look into the tek light. Its really the best engineered of them all.


What kinds of things can I expect to be better for example? I am looking at different sites for tek t5 stuff and it doesn't really mention anything different than any other 54 watt t5. I can only guess maybe....

-Less noise
-Better durability

As far as lights are concerned, as long as both are t5 and 54 watt, the plants can't tell the difference and the viewer can't either right? I'm a total noobie so that's my assumption.


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## boink (Nov 29, 2006)

the tek has a solid build and doesnt feel cheap. there is no noise since there are no fans. cooling isnt an issue as it has vents and doesnt get hot, only warm.


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## PinchHarmonic (Mar 30, 2007)

boink said:


> the tek has a solid build and doesnt feel cheap. there is no noise since there are no fans. cooling isnt an issue as it has vents and doesnt get hot, only warm.


yea i'm really starting to see why everyone is raving about the tek. I just realized the legs for the unit are $60. Moreover, they sell an acrylic shield for about $30. Do any of you use the acyrlic shield, or having it lifted high enough prevents any splash onto the bulbs?


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## boink (Nov 29, 2006)

i bought neither the legs nor the acrylic shield. i find having the emt conduit hangers more versatile as i can raise and lower the lights with a wider range the the legs would allow


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## PinchHarmonic (Mar 30, 2007)

boink said:


> i bought neither the legs nor the acrylic shield. i find having the emt conduit hangers more versatile as i can raise and lower the lights with a wider range the the legs would allow


Yea a much cheaper route indeed. Though i still would have to create something on the wall to hang it from.

Also, what bulb setup do you guys use? Most places only give the option of 6500k and 3000k bulbs. I've been reading great things about the 9325k and the 10,000k in combination with the 6500k. Maybe I should just buy a unit without bulbs so I can get the other bulbs?


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## goalcreas (Nov 20, 2006)

Tek is the best built for the money and it is not very expensive if you get it from the right place. It is not a super fancy fixture, but it is really well built and the reflectors are close to the best. The newer reflectors are said to be better then 98% efficient.
I have mine hung over a 75 gallon. I think I linked you to a thread with photos, but if you did not see it, here it is again.
http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/...ojects/38593-hanging-my-tek-over-my-75-a.html
and with maybe some more pics on my AAPE forum
http://aape.naturalaquariums.com/forum/index.php?topic=1128.0

It took me like 2 hours to do this and 1 hour was paint drying. It is super easy and if you don't want to bend the pipe (a pipe bender is required) then Home Depot and Lowe's' have pre bent pipe and / or 90 deg elbows and other hardware that make it possible to do.

About the Current Nova. Biggest drawback I see to that fixture is that it (from what I understand and this is main reason I did not get it) has a single reflector for all 4 or 8 light bulbs and that is just not going to get you 98% or even 75% effiency. Drawback #2 is that they are sold with 50/50 bulbs, they come with two (4 for the 8 lamp one) 10,000k or maybe 12,000k bulbs and 2 (4) actinic bulbs, so right away you have to do a lamp swap. Right, the Tek doesn't come with bulbs, but you know off the bat you have to get two bulbs anyway with the NOVA.

1 Very cool point about the NOVA is the moon lights. I know they are not needed, but I like them and have them on most of my tanks for the "COOLNESS" of it. Also,2, the legs, makes it easy to set up. But when you hang the Tek like I did and leave yourself some extra chain and make the hanger a little higher, the light moves right out of the way for water changes, planting, maint, etc. and in the long run, I think it just works out better.

Now I got my 4 foot 4 lamp Tek off of E-bay for $220 shipped. I think that was the absolute cheapest I found and if you want me to try to find the guy I got it from (it was drop shipped from Sunlight Supply) PM me and I will try to find you the link. When I got it, I think he was giving a special introductory price and might have gone up to $240 or $250, but If I e-mail him, as a repeat customer, I might be able to get him to drop back to that $220 price.


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## goalcreas (Nov 20, 2006)

Sorry, your questions about bulbs, I got three 6500k GE bulbs off of an online bulb store for about $9.95 each and I run one of the Aquamedic Planta bulbs, the pink one. I might swap out one of the 6500k bulbs for a 10,000k Aquamedic or a Giesmann mid day bulb in the future.
I run the planta and one 6500k for 8.5 hours and turn on the other two bulbs for a 2.5 hour BLAST.
Let me tell you about light, that tek is bright. You will find that if your tank is in your living room that you won't need another light and you might find that it is too much light for you to enjoy watching TV by with all 4 on all the time.

Also, I did not hang my light from the wall, I used the brackets made for mounting the EMT and fixed it to the back of the stand, so it moves whereever the stand goes.
That Tek light is not very heavy as many light fixtures are, as a matter of fact it is pretty darn light and I won't pull those legs off my stand unless I try to swing on it.


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## PAINKILLER1009 (Jan 3, 2007)

I run the tek 4x54 over my 55g and love it. I had a 4x65 compact florecent fixture that I sold and dont miss it one bit. The difference in plant growth is crazy.
As for bulbs I run 2 6500k GE Star and 2 6000k Giesemann Midday bulbs. I got the bulbs for free with the fixture.
I did hang mine from the cealing on adjustiable yoyos. Would have it any other way, much easier tank cleaning.
As for the shield, I went to lowes had them cut a piece of plexiglass to fit and it works with minimal bowing. Much cheaper this way.

Here is where I purchused my light. Call him up there is a phone number on his ebay page. He will deal better then.
http://cgi.ebay.com/TEK-LIGHT-T5-HO...6967182QQihZ003QQcategoryZ46314QQcmdZViewItem


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## ianmoede (Jan 17, 2005)

As far as bulbage i run 6500k and 10k mix. Go with the tek. You will never hear "Damn, i hate my tek."


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## ezeke1 (May 1, 2007)

I got my Nova Extreme 36" light system last night so here is a quick update. Unfortunately I don't have the time to take any pictures but I can try to post some later.

Buying the Extreme versus getting a Tek T5 is like someone deciding between a Mercedes and a Honda. I really have no complaints about the Extreme because straight out of the box it was neatly packed and the design is somewhat sleek. I liked that you get a acrylic shield to protect the lights. The leg (approx. 2" high) bracket that comes with it are a little flimsy and look like toothpicks holding up the hood, but its free so I can't really complain. I should add that it was very simple to install the brackets as you just simply remove the acrylic lens, slide the legs into the precut grooves of the hood and replace the lens.

There are about four different power cords for this system. Two 3-prong cords control the 4 lights, and there are two 2-prong adapters that control the LEDs and the fan. After placing the light over my 65gal aquarium and plugging in the cords, I turned the baby on and I was happy to see everything working as expected.

The light output was a huge upgrade from the PC dual strip light that I got from the LFS. The system comes by default with 2 actinics and 2 daytime lights but I ended up replacing one actinic with a 6500k planta grow bulb. The color of the light was white with a tint of blue but I like the look. You don't get a ocean blue look like you see in reef aquariums but I'm sure if I hadn't replaced the 2nd actinic then that would be the case.

One of the reasons I bought this system was for the Moonlight LEDS. I believe there are three of them and they provide just enough light to see the fish and plant with the main lights turned off. In fact, I think the LEDs provide too much light as you can see just about everything in the tank.

As someone pointed out in a previous post, the biggest drawback would be that the system uses one large reflector instead of multiple ones in the Tek T5. I don't know how this effects the lighting efficiency, but unless you're looking for optimal performance from your lights, then I think this is enough for most fish and plants. The light is already bright enough to the human eye.

Another drawback to this system is the fan noise. To be fair, I can't say its noisy because I have the tank sitting in my living room and it doesn't really bother me. The noise level is probably only a small fraction of the sound you hear when running a blow dryer so although it's not loud, there's enough to be perceptible.

Overall, I'm happy with the Nova Extreme. If I had to make the purchase again I would try the Tek T5 because of the light reflector and maybe the cleaner design. No fan noise would be a factor as well, but the price point on the Nova Extreme is hard to beat. It's very affordable and it gets the job done. 

Hope that helps.


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## ianmoede (Jan 17, 2005)

They both have their positive points. But the honda mercedes comparison is very true.


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## goalcreas (Nov 20, 2006)

EZEKE1, great review.
Thanks for confirming my thoughts, as I had said, I never have had a NOVA, but was pretty sure about the points that I was making.t
Those PLanta bulbs that you got, aren't they nice. I really like mine and it tones down the BRITE a bit.

What are the "WHITE" bulbs that came with the NOVA? are they 10,000k, or are they higher like 12,000k or 14,000k.
That would be why it still looks BLUE even after you took out the Actinic bulbs.

If you ever don't like it, or if your plants don't seem to be thriving under those lights, you could always replace them with some 6700k and or 10,000k, maybe one of each.

Sorry to hear about the Fan noise. Does the fixture get that hot?
If not, you could turn it off. I know other people who turn their fan off in other T5 fixtures because of noise and they don't have any problems.


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