AI sol with zoa/paly dominated tank?

kalgra

kalgra

New member
Anyone one out there running an AI sol blue or sol nano over a zoa/paly dominated tank? I would love to know how you have your AI set up. Photo period, ramp times, intensities, etc

Thanks!
 
I have a 57g with 2 ai sol blues running over it. My zoas and palys do very well under them and I am a big fan. I have them ramp up over an hour to 45% they sit there for 8 hours and then ramp back down.
 
So you are ramping the blues, royal blues and whites all at equal intensities? How deep is your tank and how high above the water is the fixture mounted?

Thanks so much for your reply!
 
I have a 57g with 2 ai sol blues running over it. My zoas and palys do very well under them and I am a big fan. I have them ramp up over an hour to 45% they sit there for 8 hours and then ramp back down.
Click to expand...

Can you post FTS pics. I want to see how they look as I'm debating between the Blue Sols, Mazzarras and Ecotech Radion.
 
Will get pics up tonight.

I ramp everything all at once, I am not a big fan of the "windex" look with just blue and royal blue leds on. I know I am not using it to its full potential but this is what I am comfortable with right now. I had them going up to %60 for a while but I added a carbon and phosban reactor and burned a bunch of SPS (dropped the nutrient level too fast). I also have a glass lid on the tank right now (building a BRS lid when I have time). The lights are probably 12 inches off the water, I will post pictures when I get home.

The ironic thing is I have struggled with SPS under the LED lights (everything was coming over from T5s). Zoas, chalices and acans have done very well under the lights and I have had no problems with them from the lights (zoa eating asterinas on the other hand have been a pain).
 
Ha funny. I actually like the windex look. I have mine set up to ramp down the whites two hours before the blues so I get a short window to enjoy the crazy color pop.

Thanks again for your reply. I'm only ramping mine up to 60% right now as well but I don't have any sps left.

I testEd the par on my AI nano and at 100% my par was 90 at the sand bed and 370 just below the surface. This was with the fixture about 6" from the surface. I started. Noticing my zoos weren't opening as much and my palys were shrinking in size. I ended cutting the power way back cut the duration to 10 hours and raised the light to 12" above the water and things are starting to look much better. LEDs are so strange and I'm starting to wonder how accurate par meters really reflect the intensity of LEDs? I never would have guessed that I was getting too much light but it does appear to be the case. So many things just don't make sense to me about how my corals have responded to leds.

One things is for sure I have much better success with all corals that come from an led systems vs t5 or MH. Perhaps I just haven't perfected the acclimation process yet.
 
One day late but I did promise some updated FTS:
DSC_1429.jpg

DSC_1431.jpg

DSC_1432.jpg

DSC_1433.jpg


Some zoa pics in this tank:
DSC_1421.jpg

DSC_1423.jpg

DSC_1428.jpg

DSC_1446.jpg

DSC_0989.jpg
 
Just curious but aren't 2 of those units overkill on a 57G? I only have one over my 65G.
BTW the zoo's in the last pic a SIIICKKK! Plan on selling any? If so PM me.
 
I don't want to speak for M&N but many people I know with the AI often complain about even coverage an end up running multiple units at lower intensity.

M&N what lens do your units have?
 
The full tank shots are taken at 45%, the zoa pics might be from when I had it up at %60 or at %45 I don't remember.

I could not imagine running only one unit over the 57g. When raised, I have seen 1 unit over a 45g cube (2x2) but I don't think it would cover the full three feet with good PAR. The lens are the stock lenses, I have not changed them at all.
 
I am running 3 AI's on a 90gal (48") and am having a hard time getting some of my zoas to acclimate to the LED. I have played with the intensity between 20% up to 45% on all colors. I came from a 2x 250w mh fixture which was also too much light for most of the zoas but at least it looked "bright". Now, I am frying corals (or trying to recover from it anyway) at visibly much less light, but I believe there is so much more blue there that our eyes just don't recognize. I am currently running whites at 45%, but blues at 20% and RB at 15%. The colors don't pop as much as I want but it at least looks brighter and isn't burning anything.

I honestly think that the best overall light for zoas (in my opinion of course) would be a lower intensity MH with LED actinic supplementation. The color of LED fixtures are AMAZING when you play with the lights and have the intensity where you want, but the spectrum put out by them appears to have massive frying capability when the intensity is turned up enough to appeal to my eyes.
 
Yea I know what you mean about even light coverage. I had to move a few rocks to get the light in some areas but overall it shines and distributes light real well. I am very happy with the SOL unit, I opted for the white model and it looks really well.. I may make a small DIY LED unit to supplement the AI SOL after the new year.

I really like the zoa in the last pic. Do you plan on fragging or selling any?
 
heckeng said:
I am running 3 AI's on a 90gal (48") and am having a hard time getting some of my zoas to acclimate to the LED. I have played with the intensity between 20% up to 45% on all colors. I came from a 2x 250w mh fixture which was also too much light for most of the zoas but at least it looked "bright". Now, I am frying corals (or trying to recover from it anyway) at visibly much less light, but I believe there is so much more blue there that our eyes just don't recognize. I am currently running whites at 45%, but blues at 20% and RB at 15%. The colors don't pop as much as I want but it at least looks brighter and isn't burning anything.

I honestly think that the best overall light for zoas (in my opinion of course) would be a lower intensity MH with LED actinic supplementation. The color of LED fixtures are AMAZING when you play with the lights and have the intensity where you want, but the spectrum put out by them appears to have massive frying capability when the intensity is turned up enough to appeal to my eyes.
Click to expand...

I definitely know what you are saying. I was waiting for my controller to arrive so I actually took a white shirt and laid it over the top glass just reduce the lights power into the tank. My corals were still getting good light even through the shirt. These lights may not look as bright as MH but their PAR intensity is far superior than MH and T5's.
 
What is that yellow branch with white polyps?
By the way I just installed an AI nano on my 12G and I have it at 15% W, 20%B; probably will go up to 20% W but don't see myself going higher.
 
I have had an AI sol blue over my 20g for over two months now. I started it out pretty low (~25% B/RB, 20% W). Now I have it up to 65% B 60% RB and 60% W and will be ramping it up some more tonight. No issues at all.
I love the AI's and will be going mainly SPS in the next month or so but will be setting up 10g tank to do zoas/palys only and will be getting an AI nano for it.
 
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