The inwall 380 starfire reborn

[Sparkss]

Before I go any further I wanted to post that the packaging, etc from IRISSERVICE was top notch. That box could have landed center ice during a hockey match and the bulbs would have still come out unscathed.

I swapped ballasts this morning before they fired up, just to make sure it was the bulbs and not the ballast for some funky reason. And the left side still looks yellow while the right is distinctly blue. I think that I read that the average burn in time is around 20 - 30 hours ? (but I also thought I recalled reading that it can be upwards of 100 hours for some bulbs). Does anyone have any data/information on that ? So for now we will leave it to run as-is into next week to see how (if) the colors even out or not. We had an XM ages ago that burnt in yellow and were able to get it swapped out. I don't see having that option currently, which makes the extra $15 per bulb from Premium Aquatics look that much more appealing (since I could return it to them if it turns out to be defective).

 

[IRISSERVICE]

YGPM

 

[Sparkss]

ok, so time for an update and a couple of pictures to illustrate my lighting description.

I spoke with IRISSERVICE and he clued me in that the German bulbs had a specific orientation to achieve the desired color output. Based on his information I ended up having to take the mogul apart, rotate and reinstall it into the LA III bracket. With this I now have both bulbs oriented the exact same with relation to the base and relfector. With this new orientation I let the bulbs run for an hour but I can see no change or difference in the output.

Here is a picture taken before I changed the second bulb's orientation (yes, the difference is just that distinct and no, I have not edited or modified the picture in any way). Oh, and yes, I do need to clean the second reflector .

and here they are after I adjusted the bulbs orientation, as directed :

I will let it burn in tomorrow to see if there is any improvement, but for now I am not seeing any at all

 

[spazz]

im not sure what ballasts you are using but you might want to look at your voltages across the plugings. if one ballast is on one side of the 220 volt leg and the other ballast is on the other 220 leg you might be drawing harder on the one leg than the other. this may or may not give you a vlotage drop to one of the ballasts. if this were to happen you might have a difference in color between the 2 bulbs. if the 2 ballasts are on the same leg of 220 and the ballasts are the same brand and model i would say you have a problem with the bulb then. i have use alot of 20k xm bulbs and they all seam to burn in the same. im not sure why yours wouldnt burn in the same. the only thing i can think of is that 2 bulbs of different k ratings were mixed up in the packaging area or something. its really hard to say what is going on. good luck with this tom.

 

[Sparkss]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=10848025#post10848025 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Sparkss
I swapped ballasts this morning before they fired up, just to make sure it was the bulbs and not the ballast for some funky reason. And the left side still looks yellow while the right is distinctly blue.

So it isn't one ballast pulling/pushing harder than the other. . I am not sure what the issue is Scott, but thanks for your suggestions and well wishes

EDIT : Since I have matched the orientation of the bulbs to each other (and to what I was told they needed to be) we are now waiting for them to "burn back in", which I was told can take up to 12 hours before any difference is noticed. It apparently has to do with the salts inside of the arc chamber needed to "re-pool" onto a differet side of the chamber to get the desired color spectrum. If this bears out then we should see some color shift in the second bulb by tomorow afternoon. I will keep updating this as things progress. And since it is obvious from the pictures I will continue to photo-document our progress.

 

[Sparkss]

Ok, so this picture was taken after the bulbs had burned for 16 hours in the "new" orientation. That is 4 hours after we were supposed to see a change/difference.

I think that the first bulb is less blue now (I did expect it to burn in a bit on the whiter side and it still has a nice blue tint/hue to it), but the second one still looks white w/ any hint of blue.

Hopefully by this time next week we will have our new skimmer body and be able to adjust our flow rates to where they should be (to match our new plumbing).

 

[Sparkss]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=10852019#post10852019 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Sparkss
and here they are after I adjusted the bulbs orientation, as directed :

I will let it burn in tomorrow to see if there is any improvement, but for now I am not seeing any at all

Quoting my orig post so that both pictures are on the same page for easier comparison.

 

[IRISSERVICE]

maybe the bluer on was off ... i will snap a pic of mine later to see them... i have 3 250w

 

[Sparkss]

I don't know... from what I have read in the forums and the spectral plots on Sanjay's site the blue one was the "correct" one, at least for a 400W running off of an IC ballast. I cannot speak to any other ballasts or wattages, but the blue was the specific reason that I bought the AC bulbs in the first place (you can see the spectral plots back just before the split). I will see aoubt checking the plots for the 250W ones later, but they really aren't relevant to our setup . I also do know that several "blue" bulb will burn in to a more "white" color (IE: The Radiums will burn in to a white after a couple of weeks, from what I have seen and been told by others). I guess we will just see how these work out. But right now they look no different from the Ushios that we replaced them with (at least the white/yellow bulb doesn't look any different), and from the spectral plot comparison that I posted there should be a pretty distinct difference

 

[Sparkss]

I checked the ACs off of different ballasts and the 400w IC vs the 400w HQI had pretty much the same spectral plot, but the 250w (either IC of HQI) both had a much more yellow plot than the 400w did

The IC driven 250w is only a bit more blue than the HQI shown above.

I didn't check the DE bulbs, just the SEs.

This is likely would explain your comment about the color from your ACs, knowing that they are the 250w version.

Over 20 hours burn in now and still no change in the color from these bulbs. I am starting to look at other bulb options. How do we go about returning these to AC ?

 

[jnarowe]

what was wrong with the Ushios in the first place Tom? Maybe I missed that part.

 

[Sparkss]

nothing really, we just wanted more blue without having to add full blown actinic supplementation. The more or less 20K output from the ACs coupled with their reported PAR seemed like a good choice. I have the Ushios on a shelf ready to go back in if needed. They only have 6 months use (if that much), and that on the IC ballast, so they have plenty of life left in them. But we are still looking to get a more blue bulb (or to be specific, more of an actinic pop out of our corals), which the one AC bulb does quite nicely. The second one however is extremely dissappointing. I really want to talk to IRISSERVICE first before we do anything, but I am looking at all of our options (not to mention that these bulbs were $125 each )

 

[mcurl98]

I thought Sanjay tested bulbs at 100 hours but I could be wrong. At least I saw him request a 100 hour bulb from a dealer in order to test. As you know, they usually don't get more blue but who knows? I've heard the new Iwasakis are getting more blue with more hours.

 

[Sparkss]

yea, they normally get less blue as they burn in. You can see the first bulb turning a little whiter (but still with a very nice blue tint to it). That one looks to be just perfect for us. If only both had been like that

 

[jnarowe]

I got to tell you, I could not be happier with my Ushio 20Ks. I have not seen any reason to switch them out.

 

[Sparkss]

ours were Ushio 14K's (and only 400W, not 1kW like some people ). The Ushio 20k doesn't even show as being fired by the IC ballast on Sanjay's site . And the AC has a much bluer spectral plot (at least for the 400w versions) than the Ushio 20k. *sigh* . The Ushio 20k does show to be alot bluer than the 14k, but the PAR is almost a 30% decrease, so it isn't going to be for us (even if we knew our ballast would fire them)

 

[jnarowe]

How about using blue LED spots like invincible?

 

[Sparkss]

I was thinking of supplemeting with LED and/or spot lights. The biggest thing for us isn't so much the initial equipment expense (within reason), but the daily/monthly/yearly operating cost for that additional lighting. I have a source for LEDs but have not yet tried to get any to test out, mainly because we are looking to exhaust our MH only options first . I am actually reading up on Invincible's thread currently, specifically for lighting ideas, since you mentioned it

 

[jnarowe]

He picked up a blue LED spot with 500 PAR from eBay...I would definitely discuss your situation with him to get his perspective.

 

[Sparkss]

Ok, time for another update.

I just ordered another AC bulb, this time from Premium Aquatics. According to their shipping notification and tracking it should be here this Wednesday. I will post the results once the bulb arrives and we get it installed. The current bulb has not changed color at all since it was first installed.

On other good news it looks like our new skimmer body will be shipping today as well. From general FedEx transit estimates we should have it by the end of the week (which is good since that is a 3 day weekend ).

So between the new bulb and skimmer body I should be able to tweak the flow, skimmate and lighting over the weekdn, which nothing would please me more than to knock down 2 of our 4 upgrade plans by the end of this coming weekend !!!!

I may also get everything run for the ozone addition since all I really lack is an ozone resistant/proof hose barb (I have everything else, including ozone generator, orp controller, ozone tubing, sweetwater air pump, etc). I just need to add an ozone injection site to our skimmer recirc pump plumbing (much like others have done before me ). And having the skimmer drained would be a great time to do that too

ok, that's it for updates. Hopefully by this time next week I will have lots of beautiful pictures to share (yea, I am optimistic, what's it to ya ?!?! ).