Actinic Bulb Problem on New Coralife T5 Unit

[Zenoah1439]

Hey All,

I've had a Coralife T-5 light unit (with lunar) for about 3 months now. Its been great, but i seem to be having a problem with the actinic bulbs. I'm not sure if its the bulbs or the ballast though, looking for thoughts on what may be the cause. The Actinic light come on when the light unit first turns on, but then they turn off after maybe an hour or so now. If i shut the whole unit off for a little bit and then turn it on, the actinic comes back on for a little bit, then shuts off again. Does this sound like a problem with the ballast or the bulbs?

My thoughts were to replace the bulbs and see if it fixes the problem (since that's cheaper) and then if they still exhibit the same behavior i would replace the ballast. Does this seem like a reasonable plan or would a blown ballast end up killing my 2 new bulbs?

Im just about to migrate my entire tank and equipment setup to a new stand which will incorporate a sump now, so any help getting my light fixture running at 100% is much appreciated.

 

[pandora32]

Have you checked for loose connections? I have PCs for my actinics in my coralvue light and I was having the same issue. Did exactly what you are talking about but after I replaced my bulb as well as my ballast, it kept coming on for a bit, then off it went. I was dinking around with it one night and noticed that the plug wasnt "engaging" the bulb all the way. So I tweaked it a lil and I havent had a problem with it since. Hope this helps.

 

[BigAl07]

Can you just swap the non-actinic bulbs out with the actinic and see if that helps at all?

If the unit is only 3-months old I'd be contacting CL if it's not just a bulb issue. I've had good success with them in the past once I contacted them directly (the retailer refused to help and even lied about the transaction... grrr)