I siliconed the two new glass braces in today to support the t5 fixtures. I’m running two blue plus, one actinic and one 10k bulb for now. It’s still a little white unless I really crank up the blue leds but the entire tank seems to be responding positvely.
That should round out your spectrum. I like that idea for the glass light supports across the tank.
So after seeing the third successful tank with pulled optics, courtesy of Matt, I opted to pull mine today.
First thing I noticed was less glimmer at the same intensity which actually makes sense. The tank definitely has more even coloration and less spotlighting. It looks like I’m going to be able to start increasing the intensity a bit which should bring back some of that glimmer.
Before…
After…
Bad ft shot with just blue leds on camera phone…
Made one more change to the lighting setup. The single 10k t5 bulb in my configuration was still too much white for my taste. The tank looked washed out. I’m back to 2 blue plus and 2 actinic. I’m probably going to swap a purple plus in there at some point. I highly recommend against a 10k bulb for supplementing leds.
Do you know what angle those optics were? Maybe you can replace them with better ones. I’d imagine the optics from a cree would fit on there.
How are your corals responding?
[quote=“icecool2, post:305, topic:7613”]
Do you know what angle those optics were? Maybe you can replace them with better ones. I’d imagine the optics from a cree would fit on there. [/quote]
They were 90 degree optics. I think that was too narrow based on my lights only being 6-7" off the water on a 24" deep tank. There were obvious dark triangles near the surface and I think I was having really uneven PAR distribution. I’m told that a naked lens is 120 so I don’t think I need to add any.
[quote=“bnelson, post:306, topic:7613”]
How are your corals responding?[/quote]
It’s hit and miss so far. Overall, they don’t look pleased but I have to imagine this shocked them back into an adjustment phase. My Green Star Polyps of all things closed completely within minutes of introducing the naked LEDs. It’s been two days since I last saw a polyp and this particular GSP hasn’t really missed a day in the last 4 or 5 months. One of my Frog spawns which was looking great a few days ago has also retreated quite a bit since the change. I double checked water parameters just now and aside from calcium a little low at 380, everything else looked perfect so I’m pretty confident it’s the new lights. I mean, I’ve changed the spectrum and intensity like 4 times in the past week, I guess I shouldn’t be too surprised that the corals are a little shy.
[quote=“ClownfishSushi, post:307, topic:7613”]
They were 90 degree optics. I think that was too narrow based on my lights only being 6-7" off the water on a 24" deep tank. There were obvious dark triangles near the surface and I think I was having really uneven PAR distribution. I’m told that a naked lens is 120 so I don’t think I need to add any.[/quote]
Hmm… I was expecting them to be narrower. I was going to offer some lenses I have laying around to try. I think have a 60 and 80, I’d have to double check though. Moot point now though! 
The GSP opened back up on the third day.
Ran out of my two part calcium/alkalinity solutions this week. I’m going to make the most out of the ATO and switch to Kalkwasser.
That should be fine for a while since you don’t have too many sps corals.
I made a decision today. I’m switching back to metal halides with t5 supplementation.
I can honestly say that I’ve given these leds every chance to work. The corals that have tolerated the lighting look great but aren’t growing. Everything else is struggling or just dead. I’m not sure what else could be this wrong with my system. Coraline algae is growing beautifully in the sump where it only gets indirect sunlight and the spillover from the algae scrubber.
I’m really going to miss the royal blue led look at night. In fact, I’m going to try and incorporate that back into the system.
For now, I’m breaking out my old 4’ halide system. I can set it down on the same braces that I installed for the t5’s. I imagine that the two, 250 watt halides will cover the 5’ tank adequately.
Finances permitting, I’m going to order some pheonix 14k’s today.
Welcome back tothe darks side! :
: ::hitsthefan:: let me know what your planning for the leds, i could use 1 for fragswaps. You could also get a rapid actinic kit to get the blue back at night, thats what i did to get the look. You can get a heatsink thats 1.5"wide by 60"long and takes up almost no space.
[quote=“beadlocked450r, post:314, topic:7613”]
Welcome back tothe darks side! :: ::hitsthefan:: let me know what your planning for the leds, i could use 1 for fragswaps. You could also get a rapid actinic kit to get the blue back at night, thats what i did to get the look. You can get a heatsink thats 1.5"wide by 60"long and takes up almost no space.[/quote]
Funny you ask.
So my plan is to keep all three LED units attached to the tank right where they are sitting. They will be used for night-time viewing only running maybe 25-30% blue from 6pm-10pm. That should be enough to make all the corals pop but not nearly enough to irritate or harm any coral.
I purchased two of those reflectors we were just looking at.
http://www.aquacave.com/250w-metal-halide-hqi-parabolic-reflector-with-lens.html
I might need help on the install in a week or so…
Nice! Tank needs more corals :-)###what camera did you use for that?
Nice tank and nice video, we might need you to give a presentation on shooting video and editing it at a meeting?
[quote=“beadlocked450r, post:317, topic:7613”]
Nice! Tank needs more corals :-)###what camera did you use for that?[/quote]
Slow and steady. Plus a new job would help with the stocking efforts. Haha
Camera is my Nikon D3100. No special lenses or anything.
[quote=“Hudzon, post:318, topic:7613”]
Nice tank and nice video, we might need you to give a presentation on shooting video and editing it at a meeting?[/quote]
Honestly, everything I do is about as rudimentary as it gets with Windows Live Moviemaker. But if you think it would be useful for folks I can share what I’ve come up with just messing around with the program.