Lux meters to check Led????

[Dana Riddle]

IMHO

Dirty aka Unclear Water can be nutrient deficient as in sand/silt or nutrient rich as in river or coastal development runoff. Unclear nutrient rich water in our captive reefs is a recipe for nuisance algae that more often than not may not be kept at bay with cleanup critters or a huge skimmer. Strong lighting will only make this worse.

Some of the waters of the Kona Coast offer a huge amount of clean nutrients to corals from micro organisms. Sadly its very difficult to recreate this environment in our homes... The Monterey Bay Aquarium (one of the best in the world) has the luxury to feed its corals this nutrient rich (loaded with zooplankton) water to its corals with little algae promoting nutrients... Note that both Monterey and Kona have a lot of very deep water and currents....

For my Personal Reef, I know that I cannot provide this abundance to my corals so I choose a very clean water with a lighting intensity that has worked in the past... 400 watt MH Equivalent or 200+ PAR on the sand bed.

A lot of very popular LEDs only offer 100 PAR on the sand bed at best.

Yes others have seen growth with less but corals are very adaptable and if the light is not strong enough they rely on feeding.

For those of you that will accept a poor or adequate spectrum, know that most Chinese Imports have a variable spectrum. One box will provide plenty of the needed 420-460nm another will be very weak in the 410-430nm... Others will have a lot in the > than 500nm which nuisance algae use. They simply do not bin their LEDs...

T5 lighting is good but the Peak PAR on an 8 tube ATI after 6-9 months drops quicker than Harvey Weinstein's pants during a hollywood leading lady casting.... Everytime corals are subjected to change its added stress, especially with lights...

Hope this helps

Bill

If we look at the compensation points on many corals, we see it is well below 100 micromole/m2/sec, hence my general recommendation (and Sanjay Joshi's as well) to provide an intensity of 100 micromole/m2/sec. Of course, spectrum comes into play, but this intensity using many lighting sources will promote success.

 

[ReefLEDLights]

Back in the Day I used a LUX Meter to determine when it's time to change my MH/T5

If you are still using MH/T5 a lux meter is a valuable tool to indicate a drop in intensity and necessary bulb replacement...

Bill

 

[ReefLEDLights]

If we look at the compensation points on many corals, we see it is well below 100 micromole/m2/sec, hence my general recommendation (and Sanjay Joshi's as well) to provide an intensity of 100 micromole/m2/sec. Of course, spectrum comes into play, but this intensity using many lighting sources will promote success.

Did not Sanjay recommend this as a minimum?

 

[ReefLEDLights]

A side note on light intensity.

When I first got into this hobby before LEDs. I had great success growing Euphyllia under 400 watt MH in a 30" deep tank. I would also feed the fish over these.
The growth was so good I donated a 25+ head to the Chicago Shedd Aquarium as it outgrew my tank.... It barely fit in a 5 gal TM Salt bucket.

The guy at the Shedd did not believe me that this was from a home aquarium but hey what's the value per head as a charitable donation?

Some have had success with the minimum 100 PAR on the sand bed.

My philosophy is a buffet table with the caveat of not encouraging nuisance algae.

Strong Light say Natural Reef at 10-20 meters, Natural Sunrise and Sunset and controlled nutrient additions.

Bill

 

[Dana Riddle]

Did not Sanjay recommend this as a minimum?

Yes, Sanjay recommended a minimum of 100 micromole/m2/sec in an article in Advanced Aquarist. Coincidentally, I made the exact same recommendation in an article I wrote in that same edition.

 

[Dana Riddle]

A guy I know wrote some pretty good stuff on this too.

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2008/2/review

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2013/2/equipment

Old articles never die. They don't even fade away like an old T5 lamp.

 

[ReefLEDLights]

Old articles never die. They don't even fade away like an old T5 lamp.

Many Thanks

Your Research along with Sanjays MH Spectrum Analysis has been instrumental in our recommendation of LED Mix and the Development of our Sirius XTC LED Board.

I just hope more recognize the importance of Spectrum and the Life or lack there of T5s

Bill

 

[Cory]

Many you've mentioned it - but if you give me some numbers on your black box, I might have some suggestions. Need height above water level. tank depth, how many channels and if blue is on one channel and the rest on another, types of corals, and anything else you might feel important.

Its an odyssea 165 watt black box. I bought it from china 4 years ago. Each led is 3 watts. 55 leds total. Two channels. Dimmable by pot potentiometers. One chanel is white (7k?) Other channel is blue, not sure on the kelvin. I set blue at 80% intensity and white at about 30-60% intensity. , depending on the wife that day. Light is above the water 9" or so. Tank is 26" deep. 200 gallon. Tank iz ozonized and rox carbon is used. i also have a kessil a160 on the other end, which doesnt grow much either. I dose vodka too.

 

[Dana Riddle]

Many Thanks

Your Research along with Sanjays MH Spectrum Analysis has been instrumental in our recommendation of LED Mix and the Development of our Sirius XTC LED Board.

I just hope more recognize the importance of Spectrum and the Life or lack there of T5s

Bill

Thank you! Plenty of research to be done. I'll take a look at your site, always interested in broadening my horizons.

 

[Michael Montgomery]

A guy I know wrote some pretty good stuff on this too.

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2008/2/review

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2013/2/equipment

Didnt you say that guy was a whack-job... and used the naked eye to calculate PUR AND PAR levels??? LOL

BTW - STILL waiting for an update.

 

[Michael Montgomery]

^^^ I kid, I kid.....y'all calm down. LOL

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Didnt you say that guy was a whack-job... and used the naked eye to calculate PUR AND PAR levels??? LOL

BTW - STILL waiting for an update.

Noooo.
That was me I was talking about.