Metal Halides are the bomb

A. grandis · Mar 28, 2021

infinite0180 said:
Another question for you guys. Do you think this wire hanger for the Radion rail kit is equivalent to the one that came with my Giesemann kit? Im pretty sure the Giesemann fixture is about 25 pounds. The radion rail kit has rails that are 90” and can hold multiple radions. It will make the switch much faster if i dont need to switch them out...

Ecotech:

Giesemann:

I wasn't going to get involved in this one because I don't have that Radion hardware... but I think you basically need to know how many pounds the hardware was designed for. One thing to keep in mind: German hardware should be stronger than chinese ones. I'm not sure about the quality of the Radion hardware, but they were made with light weighted Radions in mind. I know I can swap the ATI fixture with the Giesemann using the same mounting on the ceiling. I had to change the gauge of the wire though. The spectra was heavier than the Sunpower.

Oh... I clean the glasses for halides when I change bulbs simply with running tap water with paper towels or a drop of mild dishwash soap and never had any issues. I put a drop and clean with my bare hands or paper towel under running tap water. I also cleaned halide glasses in the past both for SE and DE with windex... no problem. Gotta be dry to use, of course. I've never tried to remove water spots from those glasses yet. During my normal maintenance I just use wet paper towels and dry right after with a dry paper towel, lights off, to keep it nice.

A. grandis · Mar 28, 2021

Vette67 said:
Center and right are 250. 175 is left side. Even without the oversarurarion of a cheap cell phone camera, in person it’s difficult to tell the difference. Even I’m surprised its that difficult to tell. Thanks for the compliment!

LOL! The way I can tell here is looking at the bottom of my tank and the back glass shadows close to the bottom. And when I had the 175W running for many months the zoas on the bottom weren't as vivid as they were under 250W. The top had amazing colors with both bulbs. The difference is minor, yes! Also, my yellow zoas didn't show the natural strong yellow pigmentation and they are at the water surface!!! So... My tank has also tall rocks and the 250w bulbs keep the zoas closer to the rocks.
Very nice tank! Please post more pics of the Acro colonies and their names. Cheers!

Bpb · Mar 29, 2021

Vette67 said:
Center and right are 250. 175 is left side. Even without the oversarurarion of a cheap cell phone camera, in person it’s difficult to tell the difference. Even I’m surprised its that difficult to tell. Thanks for the compliment!

I was going to guess that simply
Because the sticker on the pendant lol

infinite0180 · Mar 29, 2021

Does anybody with T5/MH turn off T5 while running the MH? Or is it better to leave them on?

Breadman03 · Mar 29, 2021

infinite0180 said:
Another question for you guys. Do you think this wire hanger for the Radion rail kit is equivalent to the one that came with my Giesemann kit? Im pretty sure the Giesemann fixture is about 25 pounds. The radion rail kit has rails that are 90” and can hold multiple radions. It will make the switch much faster if i dont need to switch them out...

Ecotech:

Giesemann:

I'm confident they'll be fine. I only ever hung Radions from them, but I put a decent amount of weight on them with my hands to see if they were strong enough to trust. I usually put a piece of plywood over my tank when making such changes so that a woops stays a woops and nothing more.

Vette67 · Mar 29, 2021

infinite0180 said:
Does anybody with T5/MH turn off T5 while running the MH? Or is it better to leave them on?

I'll tell you what I did. For 20 years, I ran my VHO (or T5, they are both fluorescent bulbs) and my metal halides at the same time. A few months back, I replaced my reflectors and the new halides put a LOT more light down to the sand, noticeably more . So for fun, a few days after I put in the new MH bulbs, I turned off my VHO's. And I couldn't tell a difference between the VHO's on or off when the MH bulbs are running. So now I set the timer to turn off my VHO bulbs 15 minutes after the halides turn on and they turn on 15 minutes before the halides turn off. So even though I got bigger halide bulbs using more wattage, when I factor in turning off my VHO bulbs (2 x 160 watt bulbs), I am essentially saving electricity with this halide upgrade. Was not my intention starting out, but that's what happened.

So I would try that test. Or if you have a PAR meter (which I don't), and there isn't much difference in PAR when both lights are on, then you can turn off the T5's. But I would say it also boils down to preference. If you like the color better when both lights are on, then that can help make your decision too. There is no absolute right or wrong choice.

infinite0180 · Mar 29, 2021

Vette67 said:
I'll tell you what I did. For 20 years, I ran my VHO (or T5, they are both fluorescent bulbs) and my metal halides at the same time. A few months back, I replaced my reflectors and the new halides put a LOT more light down to the sand, noticeably more . So for fun, a few days after I put in the new MH bulbs, I turned off my VHO's. And I couldn't tell a difference between the VHO's on or off when the MH bulbs are running. So now I set the timer to turn off my VHO bulbs 15 minutes after the halides turn on and they turn on 15 minutes before the halides turn off. So even though I got bigger halide bulbs using more wattage, when I factor in turning off my VHO bulbs (2 x 160 watt bulbs), I am essentially saving electricity with this halide upgrade. Was not my intention starting out, but that's what happened.

So I would try that test. Or if you have a PAR meter (which I don't), and there isn't much difference in PAR when both lights are on, then you can turn off the T5's. But I would say it also boils down to preference. If you like the color better when both lights are on, then that can help make your decision too. There is no absolute right or wrong choice.

Thanks. I actually just picked up a par meter so ill see how it goes. I also figure because the Infiniti does not have active t5 cooling it might save the bulbs to not run them at the same time as the halide... it would have been cool if giesemann added some fans and vents for the t5 like ATI does!

infinite0180 · Mar 29, 2021

another one for you halide guys! Last night i test fired the Infiniti. Im running a broken in Phoenix with the Icecap e ballast set to super. I plugged into my Kill a watt and it was pulling about 265 from the wall. I thought the super setting was closer to 300? Or was it 275? Maybe i didnt leave it running long enough...

oreo54 · Mar 29, 2021

infinite0180 said:
another one for you halide guys! Last night i test fired the Infiniti. Im running a broken in Phoenix with the Icecap e ballast set to super. I plugged into my Kill a watt and it was pulling about 265 from the wall. I thought the super setting was closer to 300? Or was it 275? Maybe i didnt leave it running long enough...

..... it will get 250 watts and if it is one of the newer e-ballasts with the "HQI" or "Super Lumen" settings then it will put out closer to 270 watts if that option is selected.....

xtian · Mar 29, 2021

infinite0180 said:
another one for you halide guys! Last night i test fired the Infiniti. Im running a broken in Phoenix with the Icecap e ballast set to super. I plugged into my Kill a watt and it was pulling about 265 from the wall. I thought the super setting was closer to 300? Or was it 275? Maybe i didnt leave it running long enough...

I think you'll pull in the 300ish range with the lumatek and galaxy ballasts on the super setting.

oreo54 · Mar 29, 2021

xtian said:
I think you'll pull in the 300ish range with the lumatek and galaxy ballasts on the super setting.

Galaxy Select-A-Watt VS Lumatek Dimmable Ballast - Reef Central Online Community

Galaxy Select-A-Watt VS Lumatek Dimmable Ballast Lighting, Filtration & Other Equipment

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infinite0180 · Mar 29, 2021

oreo5457 said:
Galaxy Select-A-Watt VS Lumatek Dimmable Ballast - Reef Central Online Community

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Thanks for the info! I will read.

Ef4life · Mar 30, 2021

I am still running a 70w current sunpod. I bought it used almost 8 years ago now with an old 24g aio aquapod. Sadly bulb selection is almost zero now. I do miss the old ushio 14k. I found a seller on amazon selling new bulbs - 6.5k, 10k, 14k, and 20k. So I bought 1 of each.

20k was just blah
I just swapped in a 14k last week and I like it a lot better, I’ll give it a few weeks before I try out the 10k and then the 65k

infinite0180 · Apr 4, 2021

Infiniti... In all her glory. I decided to forgo the wire hanging kit entirely and came up with something a bit more robust...

infinite0180 · Apr 5, 2021

Well, twice now the halide has tripped my brand new gfci... is it my ballast? Its a brand new icecap plugged into a eb4 which is plugged into a tripp lite surge bar and into my dedicated 20 amp i just put in for my tank...

bobnicaragua · Apr 6, 2021

infinite0180 said:
Well, twice now the halide has tripped my brand new gfci... is it my ballast? Its a brand new icecap plugged into a eb4 which is plugged into a tripp lite surge bar and into my dedicated 20 amp i just put in for my tank...

I had a similar problem with my lights tripping the gfci. I converted the gfci to a regular circuit.

infinite0180 · Apr 6, 2021

bobnicaragua said:
I had a similar problem with my lights tripping the gfci. I converted the gfci to a regular circuit.

Trying to avoid that. I suppose i could move the gfci outlet to an upstream spot in the circuit and partially unprotect part of it for my lights but would rather not. The odd thing was i could switch them on with Apex at a random time and it would not trip but i had it on a timer for 6pm to come on and it would trip. Other things were also coming on at 6, like my fleece roller and my DOS for awc. I put the MH to come on at 5:55 instead today and it came on without a problem. Maybe i just need to be sure to completely isolate the on time from anything else drawing power, even my DOS. Im going to watch it this week and see how it goes. I do have another circuit nearby but it is also gfci. I did email premium aquatics today and they said to reach out to coralvue so i opened a ticket. I will see what they say. Im going to see if they will let me pay the difference and switch to the 400w version as i found some older posts that say people have had better luck with that one. Meanwhile the tank looks great when that Phoenix fires up and i cant wait to get it going for 6 hours a day!

infinite0180 · Apr 10, 2021

I just have to say that im am totally blown away by this MH setup! Being newer to the hobby i really haven't been exposed to them very much. In the past year i went from a Radion to a Radion with Reefbrite strips to a 6 bulb Sunpower and now the Infiniti. Its been a long road with my new tank but i think i just found the secret! My tank looks like its lit by the sun and my corals are already starting to appreciate it! I picked up a few frags from the lfs this weekend and they were under Radions, they look pretty bad under the MH but i just know in a month they are going to look awesome. I can just tell by how my other coral has responded. This is soo exciting for me, im soo happy i switched!

A. grandis · Apr 11, 2021

infinite0180 said:
I just have to say that im am totally blown away by this MH setup! Being newer to the hobby i really haven't been exposed to them very much. In the past year i went from a Radion to a Radion with Reefbrite strips to a 6 bulb Sunpower and now the Infiniti. Its been a long road with my new tank but i think i just found the secret! My tank looks like its lit by the sun and my corals are already starting to appreciate it! I picked up a few frags from the lfs this weekend and they were under Radions, they look pretty bad under the MH but i just know in a month they are going to look awesome. I can just tell by how my other coral has responded. This is soo exciting for me, im soo happy i switched!

Those corals you got from the store under Radions were struggling. Now, as you have noticed, halides emits light in a very similar way the sun does. That's why metal halides are the best if we want to simulate natural conditions! Yes, those corals will develop amazingly and they will show their signs of better health, true pigment production and a more natural look, with their nice colony formation. If every one here believed in your words they would also come here and testify, after changing to halides. Problem is that most people today want to set their minds in saving electricity and other excuses. Yet, they spend tons of money buying expensive LED fixtures and cartoon named corals, just to struggle.
I do hope they love the results they are getting though.