New MH bulbs... need advise!

[djian]

My new MH bulbs are cooking my corals. I went from 14k to 20k and the coral response has been negative. I've lost one coral completely and am loosing others. I have moved them down to a lower part of the tank and turn off the MHs for now. I dont want to leave them off for two long. Supplimenting with 220w of VHO for 10 hours for now.

What can I do to help out my corals?

 

[MBX5]

Go to Home Depot and get some screen that they sell to block sun. I think I got the stuff that blocks 70% uv and cut 3 sheets to fit the top of the tank. Put all 3 sheets on and give it a week then remove 1 sheet. Keep removing sheets until it is open again. Maybe even more than a week before removing sheets. The other thing would be to cut down an light time and move the lights higher.

 

[bigfoot610]

yea i would move them higher and shade them

 

[Pescados]

14k to 20k... what bulb are they?

 

[messy1messmer]

dj I have some of that screen still. Plus are your bulbs still pretty high off tank

 

[Brandon Lovato]

14k to 20k should not of caused this to happen unless one your 14k bulbs were really old like 18 months old and the coral just got use to the par being way low.
what kind of bulbs are they hqi or screw if i remeber right you were thinking of upgrading to 20k xms.
i allways thougth par got higher as you you went lower 10k high 14k a little lower 20k even lower but i could be wrong.
i have also heard the xm bulb in general has higher par so this may be the cause.

well glad i cleared all that up sure that did not help one bit i am kind of confused myself. anyway good luck but i would check into some other things as well.\

 

[MBX5]

It depends on the bulb as to what par they have. Even some 14k has better par than some 20k or 10k from what I have seen on the web. So if you have a 14k with low par and then put a 20k it could have higher par. The other thing I have found is even at 10 months and then a change could do this to corals. The par brightness will change as the lights get older and then you throw a new bulb in running at 100%. Just my .02