How do you run your LEDs for LPS and softies?

hart24601 · Apr 22, 2015

ryleary said:
Yeah it's kind of a mystery to me. Everything seems to be doing Allright until one of my sps looked like it was bleaching at the base after it showed some growth, and then I had 3 polyps of zoas that weren't looking good and not opening that I moved to the top of the tank and now looks great where my other zoas are doing OK at the bottom of the tank.

I saw one guys running the same light at me doing 100% whites for 5 hours during the day and getting good results where others are running at 30%.

Seems like a crap shoot to me. I just wanted to see some led schedules that had had great success.

When LEDs first hit the reefing community and became widespread many were DIY and people ran them full out and bleached corals, I feel like the pendulum has swung the other way now and based off those experiences many people now run their LEDs far too low and they lose coral and don't understand why. Unless someone really goes full out with lighting you can look at the coral everyday and tell if they are starting to bleach out or not from too much lighting. FWIW I was running 2 value fixtures at 100% over a 65g and there were only a few corals that didn't like it. But corals are really adaptable to different light levels!

There is no need to run whites more than 4hr/day unless you like it.

glb · Apr 22, 2015

hart24601 said:
When LEDs first hit the reefing community and became widespread many were DIY and people ran them full out and bleached corals, I feel like the pendulum has swung the other way now and based off those experiences many people now run their LEDs far too low and they lose coral and don't understand why. Unless someone really goes full out with lighting you can look at the coral everyday and tell if they are starting to bleach out or not from too much lighting. FWIW I was running 2 value fixtures at 100% over a 65g and there were only a few corals that didn't like it. But corals are really adaptable to different light levels!

There is no need to run whites more than 4hr/day unless you like it.

Thanks. I'm running them at 15% now. Would increasing the intensity increase the growth of my corals?

ryleary · Apr 22, 2015

hart24601 said:
When LEDs first hit the reefing community and became widespread many were DIY and people ran them full out and bleached corals, I feel like the pendulum has swung the other way now and based off those experiences many people now run their LEDs far too low and they lose coral and don't understand why. Unless someone really goes full out with lighting you can look at the coral everyday and tell if they are starting to bleach out or not from too much lighting. FWIW I was running 2 value fixtures at 100% over a 65g and there were only a few corals that didn't like it. But corals are really adaptable to different light levels!

There is no need to run whites more than 4hr/day unless you like it.

Good to know, thanks for the response. I am running my reef radiance 165p about 10" off the water with about 20" in depth to the sand bed. Currently running my whites and blues at 30/50%, I guess I'll try ramping it up and see what happens.

hart24601 · Apr 22, 2015

glb said:
Thanks. I'm running them at 15% now. Would increasing the intensity increase the growth of my corals?

There is a good chance that it will increase growth. Just depends on the daily amount of light and the coral species/variety. 15% power might be plenty in a shallow tank where the lights are right above the water - so it's hard to say and be 100% sure. At some point coral reaches photoinhibition where more light isn't good. Having higher flow also allows more light as it dissipates heat the coral generates when over-illuminated.

I also am a big fan of feeding more for the most rapid growth.

That being said I think higher light would be better in your situation, but just keep an eye on the coral at the end of the day before lights off. If they don't look happy (washed out colors, shrunken) back off the light either photoperiod or intensity. LPS and softies are pretty easy to tell when they are getting too much light. I have found (most of my) zoas can take crazy amounts of light, when I had other softies they varied dramatically with how much light they could handle, but they all gave clear signals when it was too much.

glb · Apr 23, 2015

hart24601 said:
There is a good chance that it will increase growth. Just depends on the daily amount of light and the coral species/variety. 15% power might be plenty in a shallow tank where the lights are right above the water - so it's hard to say and be 100% sure. At some point coral reaches photoinhibition where more light isn't good. Having higher flow also allows more light as it dissipates heat the coral generates when over-illuminated.

I also am a big fan of feeding more for the most rapid growth.

That being said I think higher light would be better in your situation, but just keep an eye on the coral at the end of the day before lights off. If they don't look happy (washed out colors, shrunken) back off the light either photoperiod or intensity. LPS and softies are pretty easy to tell when they are getting too much light. I have found (most of my) zoas can take crazy amounts of light, when I had other softies they varied dramatically with how much light they could handle, but they all gave clear signals when it was too much.

Thanks. Good advice. I added more white time and raised in 1% to 16% and the favia seemed to shrink back. I'm lowering it back down. Everything's a balance!

pickupman66 · Apr 23, 2015

FWIW on the conversation, I have a Lumentek Pro 240. it is mounted 18" from my water surface on a 20 inch deep tank. with eh On board controller I had it set to 70% blue and 40% white over a 12 hour photo period, however it only achieved this intensity for about 2 hours max as it ramped up and down. I have since changed this over to programming that runs on my Archon controller and now I am still on teh same 12 hour photo period but with shorter ramps and longer peak times. Now, I have a 3 hour ramp to 60/30 and 6 hours at this intensity, then ramping back down. I keep LPS and Zoas. with a handful of shrooms and some leather that i pull out regularly.

Before the control change, I had 400 part at 6" below the surface and 180-200 at the bottom glass.

glb · Apr 23, 2015

pickupman66 said:
FWIW on the conversation, I have a Lumentek Pro 240. it is mounted 18" from my water surface on a 20 inch deep tank. with eh On board controller I had it set to 70% blue and 40% white over a 12 hour photo period, however it only achieved this intensity for about 2 hours max as it ramped up and down. I have since changed this over to programming that runs on my Archon controller and now I am still on teh same 12 hour photo period but with shorter ramps and longer peak times. Now, I have a 3 hour ramp to 60/30 and 6 hours at this intensity, then ramping back down. I keep LPS and Zoas. with a handful of shrooms and some leather that i pull out regularly.

Before the control change, I had 400 part at 6" below the surface and 180-200 at the bottom glass.

Thanks for the info. I guess I need to borrow a par meter to check things out

glb · Apr 23, 2015

NanaReefer said:
My Reef Radiance LumenTek Pro 180 is 10 1/2" from water surface. Whites at 13% max, blues at 60% max. LPS/SPS dominant, 5 frags of Zoas-lol.

Nana I think your tank runs the closest to what I'm looking for. My lights are 6 inches above the water. How long do you leave yours on? And where in the tank do you keep your LPS? They seem to be sensitive to the white lights.