A little help or advice with these LEDs??

[jabo]

I am about to pull my hair out with these LED. I will post some before and after pictures of what they are doing to corals. It is weird though, Bam Bam zoas, Tubbs, and kryptonites seem to be fine. Sps frags dont even try it. Other zoas and palys are just awful as the pictures show. I recently adjusted my light cycles on the AI Nano.

9 AM RB 25% B 25% W 0
11 AM RB 35% B 35% W 20%
2 PM Rb 40% B45% w 40%
5pm RB 20% b 50% W 60%
7PM RB 20% B 45% W 30%
9PM RB 10% B15% W 0
10 PM off

Any ideas on what I can do or adjust to start enjoying this great light and tank. It has been driving me crazy ever since I set it up. I had dreams of moving all of my high end zoas to it and making my big tank SPS only but as you can see this is not an option right now. Help and ideas appreciated!


Picture is a frag of pink and golds from my big tank ( not the exact frag that was placed in the nano)

This is same coral different frag exactly 30 days after I put it in this tank. It is in the lower part of the tank about 2 inches from the sand bed.

 

[RtReef]

1st off how long have you had them and what did you have before? You seem to be way too high if you just switched to LEDs

 

[PensFan05]

I have really been wanting to upgrade to LEDs. I hope you can figure it out!

 

[SaltH2OLover]

My zoas seem to be doing pretty good. As far as coral in my tank right now I have, duncans, 2 different muti heads of frogspawn, a leather, birdsnest, 2 grapes of wrath, acan with 7 or 8 heads, 2 clams, galaxea (sp) that actually came from you, some kinda chalice or something similar, a 4 head candy cane that I got from you to at the Memphis swap (how long ago has that been btw, it was only one head then), wellso, muralina (sp), blue milli, ORA blue voodoo, 3 pieces of pink and green pocillopora, 3 different pink and gold frags about 6 heads each, a big rock covered with zoas I got from my brother, and misc zoas one of them is the BRIGHT green palys I can't remember the name of them but anyway,, the ONLY thing I can see I've had a problem with is the muralina, it's still doing pretty good after I moved it. Trying to figure out if it wants more light or not as much. Here are my timers and what I've been going on with for a week yesterday:

@12 blue and royals come on and ramp to 20% intensity in 1 hr
@1 white comes on and ramps to 20% in 1 hr
@8 whites decrease back to 0% in 1 hr
@10 blue and royal decrease to 0% in 1 hr

Like I said SO FAR everything seems to b doing GREAT, the bright green palys are in center of tank and get a lot of light. After reading ur post I moved 1 of my frags of pink and golds up under light directly beside palys to see how they do. I will keep you updated. Sorry for all the useless info about corals but just wanted to give u general idea of how things are with what I have and how everything is doing. Hope your able to find out what is going on and het it straight!!

 

[gflat65]

I had mine over the frag tank for nearly a year now and have had pretty good results. I'm spreading few over a large area, so that may be part of it. I've always run RB's at 100% and CW's dialed down to around 60% on the softies/LPS/zoas and ~70% on SPS (SPS might need a little more, but it is so yellow/white when i turn it up more). I don't run optics except on the SPS side, which can make a huge difference. The tank is only 14" deep (11" or slightly less effective water depth). I've got (4) 6"x8.5" heat sinks along a 72"x36" footprint (8.5 along the 36" dim and 6" spaced at 10" between over the 72" dim). Some dim areas, but for the most part, it gets enough coverage to make everything happy.

My pink and golds never have any color (not like what Chris gets), even under MH and VHO, so they are also brown under LED's. My SPS went through a transition in color, but most settled out with okay coloration (pearlberry and a few others look really good). I think I could use more LED's in that area, though (spacing allows for overlapping of lighting angle, but with 10" open, there must be some lack of coverage on the higher light loving corals).

 

[jabo]

Rt i started this tank with this light so I have played with the intensity a lot and nothing seems to work.

Gary thanks for the reply. I dont know how Chris gets those to look so good. I got my pink and golds from him and they have never look anything like his. I am not sure what I can do to keep everything from bleaching. I am just looking for input. I just have the AI nano over the 27 gllon Cardiff I won at the swap so I cant mess with optics or anything like that. I love the light and tank just wish the corals did.

 

[OneReef]

How high over the waterline is it?

 

[jabo]

It is about 7 inches above the water...Wonder if that glass lid is reflecting them crazy or something. Last time I was at Memfish they had theirs off.

 

[OneReef]

So many variables in a nano tank it's hard to say. I would think that it would be hard to keep palys/zoas at the same rack with SPS. I would think they would need different lighting intensity.


Edit: I think I read it wrong, I guess the rack is in your big tank.

 

[OneReef]

Glass lids usually block light, and trap heat. But with LEDs there may be no heat buildup. if you are getting too much light, the glass should not hurt, I would think that the glass can't magnify, but I'm no expert...lol. Maybe you are changing the lighting too often and causing stress. Dial it down and leave it for a few months and see where things stabilize. Maybe you've tried that. It's a tough one....

 

[nam2212]

I had a similar problem with my LEDs initially. I am still unhappy with them but things seem to have settled down in my tank. I never had any problems with any of my zoas or palys. All my LPS melted away in the week following me moving them up onto the rockwork. I lost about 5 acans and 3 chalices. I have zoas directly under the LEDs at 100% intensity and have no problems with them. They are growing slower than I would like but they look fine. I did have some close up for weeks when I put them under the LEDs but they finally opened back up and are now doing well.

 

[SaltH2OLover]

I wish I could post video from phone on here. Everything in my tank is doing GREAT! The only thing I've had a problem with is the muralina, it seems to be doing better though. Everything else seems fine. Zoas range from sandbed to directly under LEDs. LPS is directly under LEDs along with acan all of those are opened up big as ever. The acan is actually starting to grow onto rock that I added onto plug.

 

[jabo]

I had them low for about a month or month in half nothing above 50% and it is still bleaching. I think I may lower everything below 30% and see how that does. Kind of sux having to start over this far into it.

I had thought about building some kind of bracket and moving the light up. The nano comes with a mounting bracket and that is what I am using. Maybe I should just get the clubs par meter and see where I am exactly. If nothing else I will cut someone a great deal on a nice tank and light and they can deal with it!!!!

 

[SaltH2OLover]

Screw it,, just give up and give it to me and I'll take over and send pics once a month showing updates. Lol. Jk

 

[jabo]

I would have to come back and get it next month cause you will be out. About three months later I could bring it back and so on!

 

[SaltH2OLover]

Ohhh noooo I'm fully back now!! No worries there!!