# Juwel T5 bulb type help



## Saffa (25 Apr 2018)

I’m busy setting up a very low tech tank juwel rio 400 and am keeping basic plants anubias, java fern, moss etc with some stalsbergi cichlids (green and brown in colour). The t5 bulbs are very old and am going to replace them. Can someone suggest the best juwel bulb types to go for please I was looking at possibly the “nature” bulb but haven’t used them before. I want them to be good for plant growth and enhancing the colours on my fish. Thanks in advance for any feedback


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## ceg4048 (25 Apr 2018)

Saffa said:


> I want them to be good for plant growth and enhancing the colours on my fish.



All bulbs are good for plant growth. This is the last thing you should ever worry about. Get whatever bulb is compatible with your ballast and which color the tank the most pleasing to you. Please review the sticky at the top of this Lighting section for the various colors and their visual appeal.

If you fish are red then get a bulb which has a lot of red. If some are blue then get bulbs that are blue.

Also, it's your money, but one never has to replace bulbs unless they stop working. There is no point replacing bulbs just because they are old - unless you don't like their color.

Cheers,


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## Konsa (25 Apr 2018)

Hi 
As far as I remember the jewel bulbs were different sizes so not sure if a standart one will fit.Arcadia has a jewel size range.Used the plant pro and the original tropical t5s in the past and was very pleased with the colours 
Regards Konsa


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## ian_m (26 Apr 2018)

I use two Juwel HiLite Day and two equivalent to Juwel HiLite Colour on my Vision 180. The colour tube (6400K) by itself is too "red/pink" for my liking, makes plants look too dark but when mixed with the HiLite Day (8000K) I think the plants & tank looks OK. 8000K by itself can make the plants (& tank) look "washed out" & too white.

T5 tubes last for years (compared to T8 tubes), especially with Juwel electronic starters that don't use the heaters in end of the tubes. Ye Olde fluorescent tube starters used heaters either end to start the current flow, which is why you used to get blackened ends of tubes during their life (heater metal evaporating), 99.99% of tube failures was heater failure. Juwel electronic starter applies a 2000V pulse across the tube and does not use the heaters, thus T5 tubes will have a long long lifetime.

Here is graph of light output vs time for a T5 HO tube. So down to 90% level after over 15,000 hours, @ 8 hours per day is 5 years. 




Here is my experience with Juwel HiLite Day T5 tubes,
Tube on right is 30 months old and one on left is 6 months old. Possible slight differences in brightness, but hardly significant.


 
This was Sept 2015 and these tubes are still going.

Actually not quite true, my plants grew and populated the reinforcing bar on my Juwel tank, I get nice carpet growing there. Unfortunately I let the growth touch a T5 tube (the new one ) and after a while the tube failed due to crazing of the glass where plants touched it. I now push/trim the plants away at each water change now.


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