I have nothing against triphosphor tubes, in fact I actually like them, especially the colour /840.
I have nothing against mixing different tube colours, in fact I actually like it, especially mixture of cool white and warm white.

But I absolutely HATE it when triphosphor tubes and halophosphate tubes are mixed in multiple lamp fixtures

The worst example of this I saw just yesterday, a four-tube F18T8 fixture in which two of the original halophosphate tubes had been replaced with triphosphor ones - and it looked disgusting even though the new tubes were the same 'colour' (3500k) as the old ones.

Unfortunately this will become more common now as the T8 halo tubes are banned. Maintenance departments which use spot-replacement schedules will be installing triphosphor tubes in place of dead halo tubes while leaving other still functioning tubes in the fixture to run alongside them.

I wish the bureacrats who order these bans would at least provide grants to businesses to enable them to replace all of their tubes in one go, and avoid the horrible transition period of mixed halo/triphosphor lamps.

Yes i agree it does look crap. When i change lamps i always use philips 840 apart from the 8' fittings where i use sylvania 840 not by choice! A halo and tri col 853 and 353 lamps look nothing alike when installed next to each other, You can tell them a mile apart!

I think 840 (tri-) and 640 (halo-phosphor cool white's) are possible to combine well (only the brightness difference), on other color temperatures it look, indeed, weird, but i would say mainly on account of the very poor color quality of halophosphates (the only usable is the CW).
I think what is the main cause of the effect you describe is the 500K difference (it should be kept below 100K), not the fact, then one tube is tri- and second halo-phosphor.

had a 4 tube troffer in my electronic repair shop over my main bench with 2 /cwx and a /ww and a /cw.weird color distortions when reading resistors.finally installed 4 /c50 and fixed that issue.i expected all the different peaks in these tubes spd's would compliment but it drove me nuts trying to discern colors.

speaking of spd's this is nice!
http://www.gelighting.com/na/business_lighting/education_resources/learn_about_light/distribution_curves.htm

...weird color distortions when reading resistors...

I would guess in this case the cause were "color shades": from each direction originated light of different color, so if something cast only a little shade (your fingers, resistor body itself,...), the light color changed to something else then your eyes were settled (the "average").

This is the reason, why lighting color temperature has to be the same in one area, somewhere i read, then maximum acceptable difference is 100K in color temperature.

a building where im learing welding and other things uses SLI/terra lux lamps in the hallways they are F32T8 741 color but are junk and are really 641 they look blue and dimmer than the new triphosphor sylvanias
also SLI is sylvania lighting international (cheap version) they do have cathode guards
occasionally they mix them in with the nice sylvania 3,500K lamps used in work areas
they are run on PS ballasts so most lamps are full mercury

I have nothing against mismatched colors. Infact, many multilamp fixtures I have has unmatched lamps. In secondary areas like storage rooms Im using away all those still wrking lamps that I have obtained when replacing old fixtures. Ofcourse all interesting lamps has been store to my collection but all the "standart" lamps that works are used that way. also, when using lamps with different color temps, you can easely change the mood of the room by simply turning off/on some fixtures(I use very much indirect lighting).

Me neither, but on proper places.

When you want to enjoy mood lighting in your living room, you will likely not do electronic repair work at the same time and on the same place.

Or in some corridor, where you want to only see stairs or other obstacles, you will not care about the color at all, so why not to use the mix of "remains" there, what are useless in other places.

In other hand, in the shop lighting (or e.g. kitchen work place as well) i would not allow mixing colors at all, as there you will likely need undisturbed color vision (i guess you won't like to have the steak prepared from greenish meat)...

I have nothing against triphosphor tubes, in fact I actually like them, especially the colour /840.
I have nothing against mixing different tube colours, in fact I actually like it, especially mixture of cool white and warm white.

But I absolutely HATE it when triphosphor tubes and halophosphate tubes are mixed in multiple lamp fixtures

The worst example of this I saw just yesterday, a four-tube F18T8 fixture in which two of the original halophosphate tubes had been replaced with triphosphor ones - and it looked disgusting even though the new tubes were the same 'colour' (3500k) as the old ones.

Unfortunately this will become more common now as the T8 halo tubes are banned. Maintenance departments which use spot-replacement schedules will be installing triphosphor tubes in place of dead halo tubes while leaving other still functioning tubes in the fixture to run alongside them.

I wish the bureacrats who order these bans would at least provide grants to businesses to enable them to replace all of their tubes in one go, and avoid the horrible transition period of mixed halo/triphosphor lamps.

@sparkie: Btw, i also encountered a blending of halo and triphosphors 6500K T8 of 36W in 2 lamps fixtures in "Super Pharm" shop in "Hotzot Hamifratz" center.
The triphosphors ones were much more whiter then the halophosphors ones, but barely more brighter.

I like mixing colour temperature as long as they're in some sort of order for example a row of 6 battens alternating between warm and cool white. I've seen this done before to improve colour rendering and I quite like it. Of course it's not necessary any more with triphosphors.

I don't like mixing tri and halo, I've noticed how terrible the halophosphates look when they're mixed with triphosphors, almost a pinky grey colour. Lots of places still seems to be selling halos so the mixed look will probably stay for a while.

a building where im learing welding and other things uses SLI/terra lux lamps in the hallways they are F32T8 741 color but are junk and are really 641 they look blue and dimmer than the new triphosphor sylvanias
also SLI is sylvania lighting international (cheap version) they do have cathode guards
occasionally they mix them in with the nice sylvania 3,500K lamps used in work areas
they are run on PS ballasts so most lamps are full mercury

It's owned by an Indian company named Havells.  The company name is now Havells-SLI and have the exclusive right to SYLVANIA branding in lighting except in Australia, Canada, Mexico, New Zealand, Puerto Rico and US.  In these countries, they sell as SLI.

I think 840 (tri-) and 640 (halo-phosphor cool white's) are possible to combine well (only the brightness difference), on other color temperatures it look, indeed, weird, but i would say mainly on account of the very poor color quality of halophosphates (the only usable is the CW).

I agree. In trainsets often a mixture of 3000 K halophosphate and triphosphor lamps can be found, and in this mixture it becomes really apparent how bad the 530 light colour in fact is, turning out as an awful, dirty orange.