Lights too Intense?

[Nate5154]

Hello, in the morning when the lights first turn on and at night when they are dimming, my corals look amazing, but during the daytime they don’t look good and their polyps look dull and closed off. Would this mean my daytime lights are too intense? I have 2 blue and 1 white light fixtures and they all run at 30% with a 4 hour ramp up and ramp down. Any help is appreciated!

 

[Reef Jedi]

This is a tough one to answer. It really depends on spectrum and PAR. With out a PAR meter it will be hard to determine what your light is putting out. I know they are costly so if you don’t want to buy one you can always ask your LFS or a local reefing club to borrow one. You can rent them on BRS website as well.

 

[Nate5154]

This is a tough one to answer. It really depends on spectrum and PAR. With out a PAR meter it will be hard to determine what your light is putting out. I know they are costly so if you don’t want to buy one you can always ask your LFS or a local reefing club to borrow one. You can rent them on BRS website as well.

I also am running a 13 hour light schedule, 4 hour ramp up and then 5 hour full intensity then 4 hour down. Maybe 4 hours full intensity instead might help? Like bring it down to 12 hours?

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

What kind of light do you have, how many watts, over what size tank.... 5 hours peak with 30% intensity sounds low to me. I have 10 hour peaks on my tanks.

We need more info to make an educated guess, and it is just a guess without a par meter.

 

[Nate5154]

What kind of light do you have, how many watts, over what size tank.... 5 hours peak with 30% intensity sounds low to me. I have 10 hour peaks on my tanks.

We need more info to make an educated guess, and it is just a guess without a par meter.

I have a cheap par meter from amazon which i’m averaging 150 par middle 70 bottom and 200 top. I’m using 3 orphek lights. I believe they are 30 watts each. My tank is a 15 gallon cube