Making a decent ATI T5 fixture at less than half the cost of a name brand T5

[Triggreef]

I'm no electrician and hey maybe its not safe (I think it is just fine but I take no liability if you read farther, try it, and burn down your house, not my fault).

That said I think I found a great way to make a great reef light for very little $$$ comparably. I'm running 3 of these now, and have been running 2 of them for about a year.

Parts needed and total cost:

$54.90 -- yescom 4 bulb 24" T5 fixture with LED moonlights (Single plug BTW). On Ebay

$24.50 (On Amazon) Fulham Workhorse ballast (Only need one for this).

$80 for 4 ATI T5 bulbs, Which I believe are 19.99 each from marinedepot. I like 2 blue+ one coral+ and one actinic+

Thats all you need for a total of $160~

The ballast that come with the yescom fixture suck and will cause your GFCI to trip. Also you always should be using GFCI outlets for anything with your tank. This Fulham ballast will do the work of both of the cheap ballasts that come with the fixture. So lets start.

Step 1. Remove the 2 little screws on the side of the fixture and slide out the acrylic shield/cover.

Step 2. Remove all 4 generic garbage bulbs and toss them or save for emergency spares. Be aware they give almost no usable par compared to ATI bulbs.

Step 3. Remove the reflector by simply bending one side out of the crevice that holds it and lift it out.

Step 4. Take note of the wires that feed the ballasts that are in there. One black wire and one white wire go into each of the ballast. Note the wires that leave the ballast and feed the T5 ends.

Step 5. Unscrew one screw from one of the ballast and pull it in that direction. It will slide away from the screw on the opposite end.

 

[Triggreef]

Step 6. Connect the black wire from the switch to the black wire on the ballast. I use solder and heat shrink tube but a twist on wire cap will also work.

Step 7. Connect the white wires from the light to the white wire in the ballast.

Step 8. The yellow wire from the ballast will go to all end caps on one side of the light just like the other old ballast. The 4 red wires on the new ballast will each feed one end cap on the opposite side of the light. If you look close you can see the reflection showing all the end caps are now shunted.

Step 9. One thing should be noted is the new ballast is an "Instant start ballast" which will require shunted end caps, and the unit comes with non-shunted. All this means is one side of the each end cap is not connected to the other side, but you can just do that manually. You just take about a 1 inch piece of scrap wire, strip the ends and feed each end into the end cap.

So basically do this as pictured to each end cap. Then connect the end caps to the new ballast feeds just like it was before only now one ballast will control all 4 bulbs.

Hmm that may have been out of order a little, I'll fix it later.

Now just install the reflector, new bulbs, acrylic cover, and your done.

 

[gus6464]

Hate to burst your bubble but what you made is nothing like an ATI fixture. For starters fulham workhose is a horrible ballast. Low ballast factor and it's instant start which will kill bulbs twice as fast. ATI units come with programmed start ballasts and have almost 1.0 ballast factor.

Second is ATI has individual quasi-parabolic reflectors. That makes a massive difference.

Third ATI units are actively cooled by fans. Now while this is not an issue if you can keep the temp surrounding the bulb at 35C, it becomes an issue when you have a splash guard.

 

[Diesel]

IMO it's a pretty cool light but it ain't a ATI light, not even close.
By using ATI bulbs it's still a regular fixture.
Cooling makes all the difference in the life of the bulb and can shorten it up to 50% if they get to hot.
You said single plug, that means your LED's and bulbs come on the same time?

 

[Tank2379]

Nice fixture either way. As long as the T-5 do the job. I am not sure changing anything will make a difference.

 

[Velcro]

Hate to burst your bubble but what you made is nothing like an ATI fixture. For starters fulham workhose is a horrible ballast. Low ballast factor and it's instant start which will kill bulbs twice as fast. ATI units come with programmed start ballasts and have almost 1.0 ballast factor.

Second is ATI has individual quasi-parabolic reflectors. That makes a massive difference.

Third ATI units are actively cooled by fans. Now while this is not an issue if you can keep the temp surrounding the bulb at 35C, it becomes an issue when you have a splash guard.

Thanks for beating me to it, word for word.

 

[Triggreef]

Hate to burst your bubble but what you made is nothing like an ATI fixture. For starters fulham workhose is a horrible ballast. Low ballast factor and it's instant start which will kill bulbs twice as fast. ATI units come with programmed start ballasts and have almost 1.0 ballast factor.

Second is ATI has individual quasi-parabolic reflectors. That makes a massive difference.

Third ATI units are actively cooled by fans. Now while this is not an issue if you can keep the temp surrounding the bulb at 35C, it becomes an issue when you have a splash guard.

I edited the title a little so it doesn't sound like I'm comparing to ati as much as just making a decent fixture.

The point is it still a good light at a fraction of the cost. Not everyone wants to put it 600 for one light.

I've had zero bulb failures since i learned about the shunted end caps needed for this ballast, i did have a few before i shunted them.

I get pretty good par out of these so I'm happy, no bubble busted. Its a little old fashioned as it does have manual switches so as someone else said yes it's all on or all off. That doesn't bother me but it would be easy to wire a second plug to control leds. I like all lights including moon light to be off for at least 6 hours or so at night.

So if anyone has a better recommendation for a ballast I'm all ears. I'm sure these won't last forever.

As for cooling fans they can be had for $10 and simple enough to cut a hole and mount one but so far i don't think it's needed.

 

[nitro]

Nice job, at least a lot of diyers have an option. You can always tweet things a little to make it better, but it is another route for one to consider.
Nitro

 

[Velcro]

I edited the title a little so it doesn't sound like I'm comparing to ati as much as just making a decent fixture.



I've had zero bulb failures since i learned about the shunted end caps needed for this ballast, i did have a few before i shunted them.


So if anyone has a better recommendation for a ballast I'm all ears. I'm sure these won't last forever.

The effect of the instant start ballast isn't going to be bulb failures early on. It's going to be much faster aging of the bulbs and early spectrum shifts.

As far as a better ballast, just use the ATI replacements from BRS.

 

[ngvu1]

Thanks for the DIY write up. At one point I was thinking what makes the ATI fixtures so expensive....and is there a way to cut the cost down with the same performance!

ATI sells ballast, bulbs, reflectors.... They claim their fixture body was designed to help release heat from the fixture, but I think that can be done with having good fans blowing across the bulbs. They do not sell the fixture bodies by themselves...I think.

If I had a hooded tank, I might just build the "ATI" fixture to the hood of the tank ; However, if I remember correctly, buying all the ballast, bulbs, reflectors...and the components to have a fixture without the body will be close to the ATI fixture already.....

 

[Velcro]

The LET kits have amazing reflectors if you are doing a retrofit install.

 

[Triggreef]

Thanks for the DIY write up. At one point I was thinking what makes the ATI fixtures so expensive....and is there a way to cut the cost down with the same performance!

ATI sells ballast, bulbs, reflectors.... They claim their fixture body was designed to help release heat from the fixture, but I think that can be done with having good fans blowing across the bulbs. They do not sell the fixture bodies by themselves...I think.

If I had a hooded tank, I might just build the "ATI" fixture to the hood of the tank ; However, if I remember correctly, buying all the ballast, bulbs, reflectors...and the components to have a fixture without the body will be close to the ATI fixture already.....

thanks, and now it's a better thread!

I would think just the ballast would make it that much better. I don't see the reflectors making that much difference. Definitely not enough to make it worth the cost. The reflectors this cheap fixture comes with will reflect just fine, for me at least.

 

[Triggreef]

So just looking quickly at the replacement ati ballast, you would need 2 for the 4 lights, but it would only cost 20$ extra.

 

[Sm51498]

You would be surprised what a difference good reflectors make. now whether better reflectors are necessary is super debatable. however the difference can be measured in hundreds of PAR.

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2012/5/equipment

 

[Triggreef]

You would be surprised what a difference good reflectors make. now whether better reflectors are necessary is super debatable. however the difference can be measured in hundreds of PAR.

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2012/5/equipment

Good article. But based on their testing it looks like one single reflector outperforms the individual reflectors. Which is the opposite of what guys said here. The fixture on the cheap yescom fixture is a single reflector.

 

[Velcro]

Read the article... They only used three bulbs on the individual reflector test.

 

[Triggreef]

Read the article... They only used three bulbs on the individual reflector test.

Yeah I see that now. But I also see they used 2 different brands of lights. Doesn't even mention what type of bulbs. That kind of makes the whole comparison a waste. Their main intent was to compare with reflector v. without which is just kind of dumb. It's obvious with reflector will be much better. Had they used the same light, same bulbs, different reflectors, it would have been much better.

 

[Sm51498]

The point I was making was about the variation in par you get with different reflectors. I can't find it now but there is test data out there that I've seen on the ati reflectors versus others and the par differences were pretty enormous.

 

[Triggreef]

I actually like how even the spread is with the single reflector and that exactly what I found to be the case in my frag tank. Its just exactly what I was looking for. It was a win for me posting this because I wouldn't have found those ati ballasts on BRS otherwise. So I'll be swapping to those when I have the time.

 

[FLAdaboy]

Good job. Just remember, haters gonna hate. Lol, there are some geeks on here that probably got their milk money taken when they were younger. Good for you finding what works for you.