Anyone Thinking of Dumping LEDS and going back to Halides
- Thread starter Goldcoastreefs
- Start date
Bulbs are designed to work with a specific ballast, so the best performance, longevity and color are achieved with the ballast the bulb was designed for. In the case of the DE 150, that is the magnetic M81. A 150 watt electronic ballast will fire the bulb but will not drive it properly. The DE bulb expects to see somewhere around 160-165 watts IIRC. The M81 will provide this and the electronic will not.
^ 100% on all of this. Well done 150W DE Phoenix on M81 is a very good combo that will grow coral quite nicely without too much electricity.
A lot of cheap fixtures butchered HQI and gave them a bad name - Coralife was one of them along with Odyssea (way worse) and a few more. Aquamedic, Giesmann and some others are high quality 150W fixtures.
A lot of cheap fixtures butchered HQI and gave them a bad name - Coralife was one of them along with Odyssea (way worse) and a few more. Aquamedic, Giesmann and some others are high quality 150W fixtures.
It will be more light, but better is up to you. I used 3x150W HQI on m81 over a standard 180 (6x2x2) and just kept the higher light SPS in the top half (Purple Monster, Pearlberry, etc.) and it was enough light for almost anything if you placed the coral smartly. I feared keeping a maxima or crocea clam in this setup, but I had a beautiful 10" blue-rim deresa that grew from a ORA mini and also a gigas that grew well too.
It was about 540W in total... which is not all that bad for a 180G. I would do it again.
It was about 540W in total... which is not all that bad for a 180G. I would do it again.
BTW - you won't need any of the LED in a 60G cube with a 150W HQI Phoenix on m81. You might want them for dusk/dawn or some cool blacklight/disco effect, but none of your coral will need them.
Maxima or Crocea clam might be the only thing that you might not be able to keep on the sand, but you can keep them in the rockwork - get them to attach to a flat rock and then slowly move them up.
Maxima or Crocea clam might be the only thing that you might not be able to keep on the sand, but you can keep them in the rockwork - get them to attach to a flat rock and then slowly move them up.
Johnseye
Reef Addict
Thought I'd share some pics of my Spectra now that it's finally up on my new tank. I bought this on Black Friday so it's been about 5 months in the waiting. I'm looking forward to getting some coral under it. My coral has been under Radions and T5s for about 2 years. It will be interesting to see the impact of MH.
Still waiting on another 100 lbs of rock and the tank to cycle.
Here's a quick cell phone shot of my 120g. I'll take some macro shots before I tear it down and move the corals to the 260g.
Still waiting on another 100 lbs of rock and the tank to cycle.
Here's a quick cell phone shot of my 120g. I'll take some macro shots before I tear it down and move the corals to the 260g.
shred5
Premium Member
Sure is.....
karimwassef
Active member
Not showing up on my iPhone?
ComforablyNumb
New member
Hi guys! I am currently running an experiment myself....after dunking one of my Kessils in the tank a couple of months ago, I switched that half of my 55g reef to my old Current USA mH 250w with a 20k bulb (fixture also has 48w of HO actinics + 48w of 10,000k) and left the other end on my Kessil a360we. (all bulbs in the mH fixture were replaced 2 months ago)
To avoid the spillover effect from one light's area to the other's (in the center of the tank), I placed two similar sized frags from the same piece of SPS Blue Digitata at opposite ends of the tank and at similar elevation.
Pic of aquarium (note stronger blue effect on the left with the Kessil)
Its only been 2 months, but some things seems to be emerging. Here is a pic of the digitata frag that is under the Kessil:
Now, I don't have a closeup pic of the digitata under the mH on hand right now (I will take a couple tonight) ...but I don't know if its because the Kessil is stronger in the blue or UV spectrum or what, but the frag under the mH is nowhere near as blue now. Its growing and the polyps extend the same, but the blue has faded (or appears to have) under the mH. I will post side by side pics tonight to illustrate the point.
Pics of blue/purple Stylo in the center of the tank growing towards the Kessil:
What I CAN say for certainty at this point is my SPS love the Kessil. Here's two pics illustrating SPS growth of frags under the Kessil over a 6 month period:
Sept, 2015
same frag (plus 2 others) March 2016:
I will post more pics as things develop further. Cheers, Tim
To avoid the spillover effect from one light's area to the other's (in the center of the tank), I placed two similar sized frags from the same piece of SPS Blue Digitata at opposite ends of the tank and at similar elevation.
Pic of aquarium (note stronger blue effect on the left with the Kessil)
Its only been 2 months, but some things seems to be emerging. Here is a pic of the digitata frag that is under the Kessil:
Now, I don't have a closeup pic of the digitata under the mH on hand right now (I will take a couple tonight) ...but I don't know if its because the Kessil is stronger in the blue or UV spectrum or what, but the frag under the mH is nowhere near as blue now. Its growing and the polyps extend the same, but the blue has faded (or appears to have) under the mH. I will post side by side pics tonight to illustrate the point.
Pics of blue/purple Stylo in the center of the tank growing towards the Kessil:
What I CAN say for certainty at this point is my SPS love the Kessil. Here's two pics illustrating SPS growth of frags under the Kessil over a 6 month period:
Sept, 2015
same frag (plus 2 others) March 2016:
I will post more pics as things develop further. Cheers, Tim
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Aqualund
New member
ComforablyNumb, It's very cool of you that you are taking such time and effort to get into the nuts and bolts of differentiating lighting sources! I have a couple of things to clarify though.
Although technically the corals you are testing with are SPS, they dont generally fall under the spectrum of SPS that most in this thread debate between light sources. Most of the time, coloration and growth between lights is debated with acroporas, because that is where you see the most difference. Hands down, most everyone agrees that seriatoporas and digitatas grow and color well under both LED and MH.
The second part is that no matter what you will get light pollution from the MH side to the LED side that you cannot say the LED side is not receiving incidental light in the ranges (LEDs do not have) from the MH.
I will still be curious to see the growth differences though! And also what the measured par is at both locations.
Although technically the corals you are testing with are SPS, they dont generally fall under the spectrum of SPS that most in this thread debate between light sources. Most of the time, coloration and growth between lights is debated with acroporas, because that is where you see the most difference. Hands down, most everyone agrees that seriatoporas and digitatas grow and color well under both LED and MH.
The second part is that no matter what you will get light pollution from the MH side to the LED side that you cannot say the LED side is not receiving incidental light in the ranges (LEDs do not have) from the MH.
I will still be curious to see the growth differences though! And also what the measured par is at both locations.
biecacka
Active member
I recently switched back to Hamilton 20k 250 watt bulb with a radium on the way. I might add a few led strip bars to supplement the halide, but I already appreciate the "brighter" tank already. I had the rapidled Aurora pucks. Sand diode set up as radion, me personally I appreciate the plug n play of halide. Too many choices had me second guessing the spectrum. Had I chose kessil, I might not have switched, but this far I'm glad I did. It's only been 10 days or so tho.
Corey
Corey
ComforablyNumb
New member
Hi Aqualund!
Thx for your comments! I currently have no acro's in my tank to do a comparison with....all I know for sure is the stylo's in the center of the tank, that get light from both sources about equally, are growing towards the Kessil. I was also advised one should use PUR values (versus PAR) when measuring LED's true output, but PUR instruments are rarer and much more expensive... so those measurements are unlikely to be done by me.
"not receiving incidental light in the ranges (LEDs do not have) from the MH"....I'm curious, what ranges of the spectrum are the Kessils missing? They are fully adjustable from 10,000k up to 20,000k and I was told they produce very good UV (30%)... but I have no way to confirm that personally.
*edit* And this is not really an on-going test ..I was sort of forced into it when I dunked one of the Kessils (lots of VERY colorful language, followed by self-loathing and shame
) that was on the right hand side of my tank, so I pulled out my Current USA mH fixture, replaced the bulbs and mounted it in the drowned Kessil's place a few months ago. I plan to replace the mH when the summer months arrive (I had some heat problems before with the mH) with another Kessil, which runs considerably cooler. Cheers, Tim
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That growth preference could also be because of water flow. Flow has a big effect on coral growth form and direction.
Salty150
New member
For those of you thinking about dropping LED and going back to Halides - I suggest you read this white paper.
http://ecotechmarine.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Ecotech_CoralLab_WP1.pdf
http://ecotechmarine.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Ecotech_CoralLab_WP1.pdf
Johnseye
Reef Addict
It's been discussed in this thread already.
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