How to successfully keep SPS Corals!
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tonyespinoza1
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nebraska dreamin
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im curious with that high of par what are your water parameters? You must go through DKH like crazy
Squamosa
Well-Known Member
My parameters are:
Alk-~7.7 dKH
Ca-410-420 ppm
Mg-1300-1320 ppm
Temp=25-25.5 C
1.025 SG
K-400 ppm
Sr-10 ppm
B-4-6 ppm
NO3=0
PO4=0
I will go through roughly 1.5 dKH from morning to night and decided to move to a calcium reactor in February to keep up the demand in a more balanced way and see if there would be any difference in growth.
FWIW, I think the reactor is a PITA :mad:
I use the Seneye Reef Monitor.
mcarroll
10K Club member
It does not, but PAR is a simple multiplication conversion factor of lux once you have it.
To get the conversion factor, you can either look up the lists of conversion factors that others have already made and use one similar to your lights (if nobody has rated your specific light/light combo) OR borrow a PAR meter from someone for a day. Once you have both measurements for your fixture, you can make a conversion factor and do all your measuring with a lux meter, converting to PAR when needed.
FWIW, the only practical use of having PAR measurements that I can see so far is to compare with others who are measuring in PAR instead of lux.
My main use of a meter is when setting up a new fixture or making a change to an existing one. For example...
When we are dialing in a light fixture to a particular range - i.e. between full daylight and direct sun - PAR as a unit is no more useful than lux in and of itself. Comparing PAR measurements is probably fun, but since virtually all of us are setting up the same lighting environment (sub-surface reef) we share more or less the the same lighting target too (again, between full daylight and direct sun, or between 20,000-80,000 lux). Seems like this should make comparing PAR readings a little predictable/boring, but I dunno.
$0.02
To get the conversion factor, you can either look up the lists of conversion factors that others have already made and use one similar to your lights (if nobody has rated your specific light/light combo) OR borrow a PAR meter from someone for a day. Once you have both measurements for your fixture, you can make a conversion factor and do all your measuring with a lux meter, converting to PAR when needed.
FWIW, the only practical use of having PAR measurements that I can see so far is to compare with others who are measuring in PAR instead of lux.
My main use of a meter is when setting up a new fixture or making a change to an existing one. For example...
When we are dialing in a light fixture to a particular range - i.e. between full daylight and direct sun - PAR as a unit is no more useful than lux in and of itself. Comparing PAR measurements is probably fun, but since virtually all of us are setting up the same lighting environment (sub-surface reef) we share more or less the the same lighting target too (again, between full daylight and direct sun, or between 20,000-80,000 lux). Seems like this should make comparing PAR readings a little predictable/boring, but I dunno.
$0.02
This is an excellent thread with some amazing tanks. Would any of you SPS big wigs mind taking a look at some of my color threads to try to help me in achieving better color from my SPS?
This is my most recent one with links to my older ones: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/just-another-sps-color-thread.218506/
Thanks in advance!
This is my most recent one with links to my older ones: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/just-another-sps-color-thread.218506/
Thanks in advance!
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This one was 30.00 on Amazon and it will read up to 200k LUX vs the cheaper ones 15-20.00 which stop at 100K I believe.
Can you get PAR Meters for 30.00?
All the Ones that I have see are like 300-400
Why is the LUX Meter so Cheap?
Can you convert it to PAR with some Calculations?
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How much is that?
Is it a LUX Meter?
I have never heard of these LUX Meters.
Everyone I know uses a PAR Meter.
What is the Difference?
mcarroll
10K Club member
Lux meters are in far wider usage than par meters, so there are economies of scale.
You should not need to convert to par for a lux meter to be useful. But if you are in a position where you have a lux meter and a person you want to compare with has a par meter then simply use both meters on one light and compare the measurements to create a conversion factor for that light.
Advanced Aquarist posted a list a few years ago of some conversion factors to give you an idea.
For our purposes not much difference-mostly the price.
Technically they do sample light differently, and if you were going to use these numbers for further calculations they are not 100% accurate. (PAR is technically more accurate, but also not 100%. Particularly not the "low end" $300 meters most have in the hobby.)
That said, we are not doing any calculations.
We are merely compare the meter's readings from one setting on our light to the next so we can gauge how much we've increased or decreased the brightness.
So for our purposes lux is fine because it is accurate enough, but more importantly it will give you a consistently repeatable reading, which your eyeballs are incapable of doing.
I guess it could be worth adding that lux meters are in far wider distribution because they have more utility than just measuring your reef lights. The $15 cost is an insignificant amount of money in the scope of our hubby plus the additional uses. Get one!
(If you feel like it you can do a search on the forum using my username and the search term lux to find at least several additional discussions among folks here.)
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WHAT CORAL IS THIS? i need it in my tank so badly
I'm definitely a lightweight in this discussion, but I've had my 180g up for just over a year and it was first real attempt at keeping SPS. I've been successfully keeping saltwater tanks for over a decade, but previous reef tanks were LPS & Zoa dominated. Over the first year, my growth and coloration has been good and my tank is quickly filling in.
mcarroll
10K Club member
Typically that gives you pastels not brown colors.
That said you generally do not want to have zero nitrates and zero phosphates as both are required nutrients for most critters - corals too.
Is it possible your nutrients are actually higher than that but being masked by a growth of algae?
That said you generally do not want to have zero nitrates and zero phosphates as both are required nutrients for most critters - corals too.
Is it possible your nutrients are actually higher than that but being masked by a growth of algae?
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