New Bulbs question

[Neoz]

I just received 4 New 175W XM 10,000K bulbs. I have 4 of them over my 6ft 180Gallon tank. I'm running them with 2 super Actinic Bulbs.

4 175W Plusrite 20000K bulbs came out. They were about 19 months old I was told.

Couple of questions as these are my first new bulbs. I know they will be whiter then my old bulbs which is fine. But I put them in and running them now. They look a little on the yellow side. Will this be the normal color or is there a burn in? If there is a burn in how many hours roughly? And last question how long should I run these bulbs just starting out if my tank was used to 20000K Bulbs? Thanks for any help...

One more note they are all being ran by new Electronic Ballasts from Icecap.

 

[GMaquarium]

New lamps take upto 100 hours of light time to burn in. Normally they will not gain new color after burning in, so if they look yellowish the lights will not shift to bluer color. Although it can happen I guess, but I have never seen it with most lamps, XM 10k included. They are good par lights. I would decrease the on time to 3-4 hours a day and work up from there.

By the way, there is nothing wrong with a little yellow. I have been playing around with 65k.

 

[pimpinitup6969]

In my experience most 10k bulbs are on the yellow side..... i currently have 10k ushios that are pretty blue tho

 

[Neoz]

Thanks for the info guys. I'm currently not to crazy about the yellow hue. Maybe if I had 2 more VHO bulbs.

pimp I almost bought those bulbs because when I was reading about them it said they were more blue then Xm's.

 

[nwrogers]

It will take time for your eyes to adjust to the bulbs. Replacing 20K bulbs with 10K bulbs is never easy at first. Once you get used to it though you won't go back IMO...

 

[gregod]

You'll get used to it, when I switched from 10,000k to 20,000k everything looked too blue but I have gotten used to it since.

 

[pimpinitup6969]

Maybe try a 12k bulb. i have heard alot of good things about reeflux 12k

 

[Neoz]

Going to give it a little while and see if I can learn to live with it. So the color I'm seeing now will not change regardless how long the bulbs burn correct?

 

[pimpinitup6969]

they change a little but its not very noticeable... if the bulbs are burning yellow the most likely wont be blue

 

[becon776]

I've got two hammy 10k's just put in yesterday. One is burning nice crisp white one is a tad on the yellower side still white. Not liking the sitch very much. they are both brand new same make same model. weird. I don't get it.
my ballasts is a dinosaur, old corallife mag. prolly 8 years old. Now, from what I thought.. if there is a problem with the ballast the bulbs just won't light. so either they light and there is no problem or they don't and need a new ballast. is that correct? or is it possible that they would half work??

ideas?? thoughts??

 

[becon776]

whoa sorry for double posting.. thought i was in the lighting forum.. tryin to figure this out as I need a few major purchases and the wallet is only so fat. just wanna get this issue diagnosed before dropping two hundo on a new ballast.