Hello everyone, I'm Townes. After 3 years without coral and a fish only with base rock, the bug found me again.

[Townes_Van_Camp]

I shut down a 100g mixed reef peninsula three years ago. I sold or gave away everything except for a watchman goby and a black and white misbar clown. They lived in a IM 14 peninsula on my desk. Like the Jeffersons, those two are movin' on up. I bought them a IM 25 lagoon and a 24" photon V2+. I am going to try and keep it simple with LPS only unless I have one of those terrible hot spots that will grow a little bit of SPS. Any way, I am in Jacksonville Fl and would love to know if anyone knows of local clubs. I have never had a faceborg or twittergram account and prefer to keep it that way.

Long road ahead that I may slow roll a build thread for. I have to get (see build) a stand that looks good in a mid century modern home full of terrazzo and black walnut wood work. If any of you are locals that enjoy a good glass of bourbon or three while using power tools, say hello.

 

[Peace River]

Welcome to Reef2Reef!!!

 

[Jekyl]

Welcome to R2R

 

[jtp7004ft]

Welcome!

 

[TriggerFinger]

Hello @Townes_Van_Camp welcome to R2R!

 

[Billldg]

Welcome to R2R!!!

 

[SaltyT]

Welcome to R2R! We’re glad you joined us!

 

[fishguy242]

hi welcome to the reef going to love it here!!
lots of fun/info/fun/help/fun....

 

[Auquanut]

Welcome to the family! You should fit in fine. Booze and power tools. What could possibly go wrong?

 

[JL15219]

Welcome to R2R!!

 

[Townes_Van_Camp]

Welcome to the family! You should fit in fine. Booze and power tools. What could possibly go wrong?

Safety first. Power tools and booze or power tools and grass, never all three.

 

[coralfishreef]

Welcome!

 

[zukihara]

 

[Townes_Van_Camp]

That's part of the joke.

GreatestMusicianEver.jpg

That's half of the joke. Here is the juvenile part:

 

[KWT]

Welcome to R2R, come in sit down and relax, enjoy

 

[Kiwi reefer]

Welcome! looking forward to seeing your reef!

 

[kutcha]

welcome also you may want to fill the tank up with water and see what that PAR is then at the bottom give you a better idea of what the PAR that light gives off is going to be.

 

[SPR1968]

Hi and welcome to Reef2Reef!

 

[WIReefer]

Welcome to R2R!!!

 

[Townes_Van_Camp]

welcome also you may want to fill the tank up with water and see what that PAR is then at the bottom give you a better idea of what the PAR that light gives off is going to be.

TLDR version: I am anal retentive and I understand very well that par changes with the presence of water. The point here is to find the mounting height at which the par readings homogenize with an acceptable amount of light spill.

This is how I have always set up LED's. I use a par meter on an empty tank (I don't get wet), I set my height to get full coverage. Then adjust the channels as needed (This time I stole the numbers from BRS) then put the part meter on it and raise the light inch by inch while checking the corners and middle. The par reading doesn't matter other than when I no longer have hot spots and readings are as uniform as possible across the empty bottom of the tank. At this point I do the same thing with a rack I made out of light diffuser, On this tank it was 8 inches above the bottom. This helps me find the perfect mounting height for that tank and light, completely negates discoballing, and gets rid of those nasty hot spots that you see in the top middle of a tank.

Once there is water in it and it is aquascaped I will measure the points that still exist (IE not covered up), average the loss from those points then increase the intensity on each channel in that amount. works really well. I will sacrifice a little light spill because on this tank my light will be almost 17 inches off the water surface. But what I get is a footprint that can handle whichever I choose, lps or sps anywhere in the tank. I chose LPS on this one because I love pink octospawn.