Wrong LED spectrum, intensity or nutrients ?

[monkeyboy321]

Hi from UK.

Having issues with some SPS. Can't work out if it's nutrients or lighting. I'm thinking maybe lighting.

Have 2 mitras 6100hv over a 4x2. The lights have so many variables it's hard to know which way is right or wrong with them. It's not like turning MH or T5's on and off.

Have seen very good results with these lamps. Without a PAR meter I'm not sure on spectrum and intensity. Even in the GHL mitras club there seems to be to many opinions.

From these pics does it look like to intense light, on the red monti digi and pink hystrix is that tip burn or growth ?

I run Triton and my last ICP was pretty good. Params are -

KH - 8
No3 - hovers around undetectable
PO4 - just over 0
CA - 440
Mag - 1370
Temp - 26
1.026

Most of my old SPS are not the colour they should be, not sure what to describe them like, they are not pale, deep in colour but not vivid The new frags I have put in recent are holding their colour but there has been so many changes to the tank last year I'm not sure what change was for the better.

Open to questions and more pics. They were taken under 14k spectrum, allegedly.

 

[lynchmob3000]

With leds I try to mimic halides. So I run the Royals for an hour ramping up to full strength and hold for 6 to 8 hours then ramp back down to royal blues. Get too fancy and the corals don't seem to grow or color ime.

 

[monkeyboy321]

Which lamp do you use ?

The thing with the mitras is that it has 2 power settings. High output and effeciency, then you can control the overall power to the 9 channels from 10 - 100% and then individually control each channel with its own brightness.

From the photos would anyone like to hazard a guess if that looks like wrong intensity ?

 

[lynchmob3000]

Radions

 

[lynchmob3000]

I run 14k ish settings for my 8 hour period

 

[monkeyboy321]

Cheers.

Doesnt really answer my question though.

Any1 ?

 

[Scorpius]

Do you do water changes? How many fish/biolaod do you have? Myself, water chemistry is usually the culprit when my sps don't do well. I religiously do a 10% water change on my system every week to keep my trace elements in spec.


You're correct with the many variables that most LED units have. How is one supposed to know how to set each color? I'm not a programmer. :lol:

 

[monkeyboy321]

I do water changes when things aren't going right !

TheTriton (natural) method sells it sell on not doing water changes. Everything the tank needs is in 3 balking solutions (apparantly).

If something isn't right on the lab ICP test then you correct that individual element. BUT it only really tests for the main ones, not all of the 70 traces

I did 4 x 15% changes early December as I wanted to get my nitrates back in check due to change of bulb setup over the chaeto bed and it didn't like it. Chaetos growing good again and params are good.

Things did perk up a bit during the water changes !

I have 2 clowns, 3 anthias, 5 blue stars, peacock wrasse, orchid dotty, scarlet hawk, so 13 in total. Slowly increasing load and looking at getting 3 or 4 more.

Tank is 400ltr total

The main problems I have colour with is hystrix and pocci.

Maybe I'm missing something in the chemistry then

 

[monkeyboy321]

I do water changes when things aren't going right !

TheTriton (natural) method sells it self on not doing water changes. Everything the tank needs is in 3 balling solutions (apparantly).

If something isn't right on the lab ICP test then you correct that individual element. BUT it only really tests for the main ones, not all of the 70 traces

I did 4 x 15% changes early December as I wanted to get my nitrates back in check due to change of bulb setup over the chaeto bed and it didn't like it. Chaetos growing good again and params are good.

Things did perk up a bit during the water changes !

I have 2 clowns, 3 anthias, 5 blue stars, peacock wrasse, orchid dotty, scarlet hawk, so 13 in total. Slowly increasing load and looking at getting 3 or 4 more.

Tank is 400ltr total

The main problems I have colour with is hystrix and pocci.

Maybe I'm missing something in the chemistry then

 

[lynchmob3000]

Not possible for me to tell you over a photo if your intensity is too low for sps

 

[lynchmob3000]

What are you led settings?

 

[A1t2o]

If things perked up during water changes then that should give you the answer right there. Keep up with approx. 10% changes weekly of bi-weekly. I personally prefer the little bit every day route where you replace around 10% every week, but since you are only doing a little bit at a time it does not shock the system nearly as much. I have a 46 gallon tank so I do 1 gallon a day (I do miss quite a few days, but I'm not too worried about that.)

As far as intensity goes, if things are browning then you have too little light, if they are bleaching then you have too much. This is assuming that everything else is on spec and that you are up to date on your water changes. I would start a regular routine of doing water changes and then try changing the intensity of the lights. If you think your lights are too dim and don't want to wait, then just increase them slightly, maybe 5%. Other than that it just takes time and consistency to make SPS happy.

 

[monkeyboy321]

I got a seneye reef today just to use the light meter. If it gave me a very rough idea then I would be happy for the sake of hundred bucks.

My PAR was way under according to the meter. what I thought was 20k the meter was giving me 150 at the surface. Tank looked ok but the eye is deceiving !!!

I lowered the lights and whacked the channels back up just to do some tests.

Found the PAR I needed, spectrum looks crap but its a step in the right direction.

Will gradually ramp everything up a little each day.