Looks real good John. I need to get down to see that in person. Well there’s proo LEDs work. I really think when people fail with LEDs it would have to be something else right maybe lack of patience? John when you first switched from mh to led was there a time when things didn’t look as good? Did you think I switching back?
Jon tank looks great! To comment on LEDs: I had MHs as well over my 180. It has been 6 weeks since i switched to leds and the corals already look better than they did under my MHs. I know I need to give it a full 3-4 months but the fact that they already are looking better after 6 weeks to me says something good. The fixtures are the 120 watt multicolor bridglux w/o optics. I did have the same LEDs over a smaller tank and some of the same corals did not look as good. So dunk I’m wondering if it may have to also do with water quality/stability. So far I’m happy with them will post again maybe in a few months with an update. Dunk you have PM.
Thanks dunk & mortyn02
Tim, in the beginning, when first using the leds, the tank and corals looked great. After sometime there was a period when some corals were not adjusting that well. I think I may have had the leds cranked up too high, they are very strong. After trying different settings and watching everything going on in the tank, things started to look good again. the larger colonies at the top of my tank did bleach out some, but are making a comeback now.
The thought of switching back had crossed my mind, but then I remembered the reasons for changing to LEDs in the first place.
Jon I experimented with LEDs about a year ago before switching again 6 weeks ago. I think I did the same thing as far as cranking them up too high and had some bleaching. This time I have them cranked down and will slowly ramp them up. I think my mistake was to match the brightness from my MHs when dialing in the LEDs. IMO the LEDs are very intense so trying to match the look of the halides burns the corals. That is why dimmable LEDs are good because you can slowly increase them as needed.
I switched to leds about 4 weeks ago and followed the recommendations on the homepage. Since I was only running 2yr old 175w halides over my 180 i started the leds at 10% and increased the power by 10% or the light cycle 1hr. So far no bleaching and everything is coloring up.
Cool I think I’m going to add another tank and this one will be pure led for the Lps corals. I may pipe it in or separate it from the Main tank to run it a bit dirtier than my sps to get them to grow better.