Acan Lovers - What Lights Are You Using?

[seafansar]

Mine are under AI sol whites right now and doing great, but they did great under the LED's in our JBJ nanos and the 250W MH's in our old tank. I didn't have an issue with them turning orange under the LED's. Reds still red, orange still orange, green still green, and purples still purple! They are near the bottom of the tank.

 

[thewackyreefer]

Let's see if there is any more input out there!

I switched from Radion's to T5's over my acans and couldn't be more pleased!! (Although I miss the shimmer!!)

 

[EcoFrags]

i've been using LED's for a while and actually since going from Acan Lighting LED's (name of company lol) to Radions my acans have gained all of their colors back. The Acan Lighting LED's are 1 watt and only blue and white at a 2/1 ratio while the radions are i believe 3 watts each and cover a much broader spectrum. I'd guess the Acan Lighting fixture being LED's but of a smaller spectrum and less powerful helped my corals adjust and are the reason for my success. I'd say you just need even more acclimation of lighting intensity and it may even be that after T5's LED's can't compete with spectrum diversity and require almost a dumbing down of light quality as much as bringing the intensity back up again afterwards. just my random thoughts at 430am lol

 

[rayviv]

Had mine under metal halide for the last 5 years and added royal blue LEDs to suppliment a month ago.

I have been running t5s but not pleased.

Would you mind letting me know what kind of bulbs and where to find them. I have 180g and two MH to set up.
Sorry about jumping in.

 

[sjnovakovich]

I've had my acans under a Radion for six months now and they look great, and they are multiplying nicely.

 

[Tabasco1]

Thanks for the bump up Luv! Just thinking about this. I am really torn. I REALLY want to go LED, but REALLY scared of orange acans! :xd: What are thoughts about how some of the newly released LEDs with a full color spectrum will perform with acans? It seems some people think the color shift is due to intensity and some think it is a spectrum issue.

For those using LED/T5 combo, what fixtures are you using?

 

[reef life]

I just switched to T-5's 2 wks ago and could'nt be happier. I have had 3 acans for years that just survived under MH's. Color was so nice it Made me go out and buy a chunk of rainbow acan yesterday. Its placed right next to my Rainbow Crush and I look back and forth on witch one I like more. Lol.

 

[Isoprene]

I went from a full T5 to a much more powerful LED fixture built by a LFS employee. I went from 2 bulb T5 on a 55 bowfront (not enough light for good growth), one blue, one white to 24 bubl cree royal blue / blue / white on two drivers white/blue. I currently have 3 different acans in there and they have all colored up bigtime under my LED's, I started to burn one of them and stuck him in the shade, hes has come back better than ever and now im seeing intense growth in all 3 of my acans. I could not be happier with my LED's.

 

[barbianj]

This is an interesting thread. A friend of mine was commenting on how nice my orange Acan Lords looked. After thinking about it, I realized that I had never bought ANY orange Acans! My Bleeding Apple Bowerbanki also has an orange color to it. Some of the Lords also have a greenish tint to them. I have two of the Tao Tronics Led's. A couple of weeks ago, I taped off two strips of white LED's on each fixture because the light was too bright, and the overall colors were off. Much better colors and results now, and in addition, some of the Acans are regaining their original red color. I thought it was just me.

 

[Isoprene]

whoops

 

[Jpurpz831]

i run 2 radions over mine dont have too many acans but i gotta say you defenttly gotta play with the intensity at first mine turned from rainbow to orange but started doing little adjustments and im starting to get colors i never saw i had a chalice completely red too and that slowly got a green rim and some pink and now it seems like there is some yellow coming out im happy with my ecotech radions leds cant wait for the upgrade to add uv leds to it i think that would help a lot oh and defenitly leds are far more stronger than what they say to put out in my opinion i was told to run 3 ecothech radions for my 60"24"30 but that would have been overkill im runing 2 and my lights at 50% and still feel like it might be too much light for my set up
and to add i think if you dont have control over your intensity and spectrum you wont be happy nor will your corals in my opinion

 

[Snprhed]

Well I guess from reading through this that im am the only one with this thought. Im sure I'll get boooed out of the forum, but here goes...

I actually think the best is VHO Actinics..........T-12 VHO that is

The do a much better job at putting that 420nm light down into the tank. T5 has some great colored bulbs but the true actinics look like a night light with T5s
I am planning a 12 hour actinic and 3 hours of mixed.(I did this with my leds and the colors were great mod growth)

As a side note I do have a 400w Giessman 22k bulb and it does add some color (for MH)

 

[TulsaTye]

Bowerbanki and acan under LEDs

 

[TulsaTye]

Bowerbanki was solid red when i bought it, now it has picked up pink rings on each head!

 

[engine_24]

Radions all the way!

 

[screefer]

I run T5's and my acans have always done great! Especially the rainbows.

 

[ictguy78]

I'm using Steve's LEDs Biocube 14 retrofit kit which includes 9 Royal Blue Luxeon ES 3 watt and 5 5k Neutral White Luxeon ES 3 watt LEDs. I'm returning to saltwater after a 6 year hiatus. First time for LEDs and first time for acans. I quickly learned that a macro lens and a higher ratio of blue to white light create "for sale" photos that look much different than the acan looks in my tank to the naked eye. My blue and white LEDs are on a separate dimmer. I don't have either running at full blast but I do like the look of the corals when the blue is brighter than the white. I have the blues running at about 80 and the whites at 60%. The acan colors pop much more with a stronger blue light, but the balance of blue/white keeps the tank from looking like Smurfville.

 

[Rikerbear]

thats why we need a "like" button hehe

+1000

 

[All Delight]

Tulsa,

That's really cool that it developed those pink rings. Looks very nice!

 

[Snprhed]

So I put together my T12 actinic setup. I did a 3 bulb setup. 2 actinics and 1 75/25 bulb. The look was good, but I really thought it should be brighter. So I mounted 2 reefbrite Leds between the bulbs. That brought the brightness up nicely. We'll see how it grows but the look of the stuff in the tank is encouraging.