Hey, i still undecided on to which bulb to order, Im soon to be getting my 2 250 watt ballasts, so im going to order a set of coralvue bulbs off of inreef. But i think im going to need a little help making my decision. Right now i just keep lps's and polyps, but i probably am going to start buying some sps's once i get my halides. Ive heard though that most sps's like 10k light the best. But i really hate the look of pure daylight from reason, but if its really much in growth from 12 or 15k's i would be willing to go with 10's though. Which do you think has gives best growth?
Help with deciding between 10k, 12k, or 15k halide bulbs.
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I have a friend the bought the 10k coralvue bulbs and had a bunch of corals beach from the bulbs swicthed. he put a post on reefcenteral and many others had the same problem. he then call the people who made the bulbs and told them about his problem and they said that they were working on a new bulb design. they thought the bulbs where letting too much UV though and needed thicker glass. this happen about a month ago and the post sould still be on RC. so be careful
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I recently(4wks) switched to XM 250watt 10K's and my sps's are loving it. I was running ushio 10k's before. Good color and really good growth. I got them from Justin at diyreef.com good price and service.
Bob
Bob
On my 100 i use 3 250w Aqualine 10000 rated at 13k.. I get good sps growth.. On my 85 i use 2 400w 20k and get better growth??? There are many great 10k crisp white bulbs out there.... Sps just like light the rest is up to you on the the tone and amount of that light. For sps light and more important good water make them grow... Ed
Well, forgot to tell everyone but last week i ordered my bulbs. I went with the xm 10k's i really close to getting the coralvue 12ks, but i was looking on rc, and saw the thread about the guy who compared all the bulbs, and the par was soo much higher on the xm 10's every ballast it read either high 5's or low 6's, while the coralvues, and the xm 20ks ran in the 2 or 3's. So i think i was sold even though im not really a fan of the white look. Im hoping the vho actinic will help me out.
Sean
I went with 10K xm for the same reason the par output is amazing. Im waiting for mine to arrive and I have to finish up the canopy this weekend. I do have to say I seen some xm 20K and thought they looked pretty good too, I like the blue look.
Chi has 14K hamiltons and those are really nice as well. I went over and took a peek at some different MH bulbs last month and still voted on xm.
My only concern with upgrading my lighting was the acclimation. I first thought of getting a lower par bulb for MH acclimation this would give less light and not burn the corals as bad. After a few months of running this lower par bulb I could then upgrade a better par bulb with out all the stress on the corals. But I guess that idea is out the window since my bulb is on the way.
Have you decided on your acclimation process yet? I was orginally thinking of doing the 1 hour on 1 hour off until someome told me that this method has a good chance at bleaching my corals and I should use the screen method.
I was hoping I could just pin up some screening around the MH with some thumb tacks and pull off layers every week or so.
I went with 10K xm for the same reason the par output is amazing. Im waiting for mine to arrive and I have to finish up the canopy this weekend. I do have to say I seen some xm 20K and thought they looked pretty good too, I like the blue look.
Chi has 14K hamiltons and those are really nice as well. I went over and took a peek at some different MH bulbs last month and still voted on xm.
My only concern with upgrading my lighting was the acclimation. I first thought of getting a lower par bulb for MH acclimation this would give less light and not burn the corals as bad. After a few months of running this lower par bulb I could then upgrade a better par bulb with out all the stress on the corals. But I guess that idea is out the window since my bulb is on the way.
Have you decided on your acclimation process yet? I was orginally thinking of doing the 1 hour on 1 hour off until someome told me that this method has a good chance at bleaching my corals and I should use the screen method.
I was hoping I could just pin up some screening around the MH with some thumb tacks and pull off layers every week or so.
CoralVue bulbs(Single Ended) does not give out as much as UV compared to other bulbs in the market. Resulte are in ReefCentral
Here
Whenever you change/upgrade to MH, intensity acclimation is the KEY not duration acclimation, some of people switching bulbs by turn of the MH ballast, replace the new bulbs and turn it back on (or sometime some people switch the bulbs after the light was off at night). Coral bleached, die and start flaming ...
The problem with the old design CV bulbs was they did not have the build in igitor, thus it is harder to fire on magnetic ballast.
All -
When you replace new bulbs/upgrading, you acclimating agains the new intensity of the new bulb not so much with the "how many hours a day" and slowly increase it.
Some hobyists acclimation by start it with 4-5 hours and slowly increase it. Your corals still get shock from the intensity different within those 4-5 hours. And some of hobyist switching the bulbs as I stated above.
The different in intensity in a short period of time will shock your coral, when SPS corals shocked, they are stress out, slimmy, bleach, STN, RTN, die anything can happen.
How about a little experiment with MH(I have done this with 5 different SPS frags). Let's move one of the SPS from the BOTTOM of your tank up to the highest point in the tank and/or move one of the frag from the highest point to the bottom of your tank, let them seat there for couple days. Your SPS WILL bleach. Why, because of intensity different shock.
In the past I have used
Ushio, Venture, Hamilton, CoralVue etc. SE and DE bulbs I do not experience any corals bleaching.
It's took me about 2.5 month (yes, about 8 weeks) to complete 100% acclimation to the new light. I used window screens (6 screens), acrylic/glass top. My photo period do not change. After I switch bulb/upgrading, I add the screens and acrylic and glass top on the tank. I remove 1 screen per week, remove acrylic 2 weeks later after the last screen and finally remove the glass 2 weeks later. I have open top tank and 95% SPS dominated.
I have SPS bleached, STN'd, RTN'd and died in my tank. I'm the one should be blame at because of my poor husbandry, irresponsible or just simply slacking off.
I don't tend to offend any one, just an informational post.
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My 2 cents is: I ran all 20k for about 2 months them I switched to one 400w 10k and 2 250w 20k above the 180. Wow what a difference a 10k makes in sps growth. Plus the all 20k was way to blue. Good luck.
Well my problem for acclimation, is my canopy only has so much room under there im only going to have room for 2 vho bulbs, and 2 metal halide bulbs since it is a 75. So at the moment i am kinda of clueless to what i should do, my other problem is that i had some sps at someones houses because they were alittle nicer and they were wanting me to pick them up the about the same time the bulbs came. Luckily they are already under 250 watt haildes so there wont be a problem there.
But the corals in the 75 have never been over anything higher than vho, right now they are under 440 watts, which is practically nothing compared to the 500 watts of halide and the 220 watts of vho. I was orginally thinking of adding a 1 hr each day of halide, but from what every else has said im probably in for big trouble. I was thinking of adding a lot of the corals or what i could fit near the bottom, but i have a lot of corals so there wouldnt be that much room. I also have a tub in the back (refugium) lit by 2 65 watt pcs, so i could always throw some stuff in there. I have read though a lot about people taking 2 months to fully acclimate the halides. My other option i was thinking of is taking up my canopy totally and somehow attaching the reflectors with the halides on them to the roof, and putting the bulbs about 2 to 2 1/2 feets from the water level, and each day lowering the bulb. But in order to do this i would probably have to run the bulb the full time. Unless some does have any thoughts to modify this. Or possibly point me in the directiong of a place the i can easily tint my bulbs with.
But the corals in the 75 have never been over anything higher than vho, right now they are under 440 watts, which is practically nothing compared to the 500 watts of halide and the 220 watts of vho. I was orginally thinking of adding a 1 hr each day of halide, but from what every else has said im probably in for big trouble. I was thinking of adding a lot of the corals or what i could fit near the bottom, but i have a lot of corals so there wouldnt be that much room. I also have a tub in the back (refugium) lit by 2 65 watt pcs, so i could always throw some stuff in there. I have read though a lot about people taking 2 months to fully acclimate the halides. My other option i was thinking of is taking up my canopy totally and somehow attaching the reflectors with the halides on them to the roof, and putting the bulbs about 2 to 2 1/2 feets from the water level, and each day lowering the bulb. But in order to do this i would probably have to run the bulb the full time. Unless some does have any thoughts to modify this. Or possibly point me in the directiong of a place the i can easily tint my bulbs with.
Sean that might work if you have a light meter. Just raise the canopy up with the new lighting until it reaches the same par as before then slowly drop it back down. I wouldn't try it without a light meter.
Well I wonder if you could cover the MH with tin foil and just poke holes in it every few days. You might get beams of light shooting out but if you directed most of them towards the reflector you might be ok. I would worry about the heat of the bulb at that point, it might trap too much heat and burn out.
I plan on rasing mine with some 2x4 and using the screens.
Does anyone have a light meter?
Well I wonder if you could cover the MH with tin foil and just poke holes in it every few days. You might get beams of light shooting out but if you directed most of them towards the reflector you might be ok. I would worry about the heat of the bulb at that point, it might trap too much heat and burn out.
I plan on rasing mine with some 2x4 and using the screens.
Does anyone have a light meter?
Yea, raisng your canopy with 2 by 4's sounds like a possibilty instead of connecting my reflector to the roof, i think i may give one of those a try. But from 2 to 2 1/2 feet away, i doubt the corals will be getting that much intensity. I dont think putting anything around the bulb would be such a good idea, though. But no light meter.
In case anyone was wondering i went with the xm 10ks because their par was so high. I started the lights up about 30 inches to 3ft. At first i was having to take my vho canopy on in the morning and have to turn the halides on mid day, and putting and putting the canopy back on with the vhos but after a week, i just was too much of a pain so now i just leave the halides on the whole time, and everyday i lower them about a inch. Everything seems to love it except my fungia, but he may be unhappy for other reasons.
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