Mobius Question around intensity

hllb · Jan 1, 2022

Hi - recently set up a new tank and am running two Radion XR15 pro gen5 lights. I started from the radiant preset and modified it a bit. I was looking at the intensity and had questions.

mom the dashboard, it’s showing my current intensities for some of the channels at 100% but the schedule as a whole is set to 50%.

Are my blue/purple channels at 100%, or 50%? I set the point intensity to 70% and the dashboard showed 70%. So not sure why it’s not showing the 50%. The corals seem happy (except my hammer and I suspect that is flow related) so I’m guessing it’s not actually at 100%. The tank is 36x24x18, so not a deep tank and lights are about 9” from water

T-J · Jan 2, 2022

The dashed line on your chart is the max (The schedule) it could run with how you've programmed it. The solid line is what you're running (50% of the schedule).
So, looking at your chart, it looks like your lights are peaking out at about 40% power, since the max you've set them to is around 80%, and 50% of 80% is 40%.

Lavey29 · Jan 2, 2022

Agree with above, if you change schedule to 100% you would fill in that whole graph with solid.

hllb · Jan 2, 2022

That’s what I thought too, but any idea why the current intensities chart shows 100% for the blues? I played with it yesterday setting the schedule to 100% and the lights didn’t seem any different. I do have a Seneye but haven’t got it out to test PAR yet.

T-J · Jan 2, 2022

Because the current program is only maxed out at 80%. So the most light you could currently put out on your 100% blue channel is 80%, but you're really maxing at 50% of that 80%, so 40%.
There's three layers of potential intensity: The individual channel (absolute max), program schedule, schedule intensity.

Lavey29 · Jan 2, 2022

I have a similar size tank and the same light system. I run the AB plus program at 60% schedule for 10 hours a day.

hllb · Jan 2, 2022

Lavey29 said:
I have a similar size tank and the same light system. I run the AB plus program at 60% schedule for 10 hours a day.

Curious - have you measured the PAR on it? I'll get to it eventually on mine LOL.

PeterC99 · Jan 2, 2022

T-J said:
Because the current program is only maxed out at 80%. So the most light you could currently put out on your 100% blue channel is 80%, but you're really maxing at 50% of that 80%, so 40%.
There's three layers of potential intensity: The individual channel (absolute max), program schedule, schedule intensity.

Very well said about the 3 layers of potential intensity! Mobius should lead with this when explaining light settings & output.

Lavey29 · Jan 2, 2022

hllb said:
Curious - have you measured the PAR on it? I'll get to it eventually on mine LOL.

No, I can not find a par meter to rent anywhere. Just basing off other par numbers posted on the internet for same lights and tank size and of course coral response. I'm running diffusers to. I went up to 80% schedule but the corals hated it.

hllb · Jan 2, 2022

Lavey29 said:
No, I can not find a par meter to rent anywhere. Just basing off other par numbers posted on the internet for same lights and tank size and of course coral response. I'm running diffusers to. I went up to 80% schedule but the corals hated it.

I have an acrylic top on my tank so didn't get the diffusers. So that is likely blocking some par too. I'll get out the Seneye in the next few days to test it.

PeterC99 · Jan 2, 2022

Lavey29 said:
No, I can not find a par meter to rent anywhere. Just basing off other par numbers posted on the internet for same lights and tank size and of course coral response. I'm running diffusers to. I went up to 80% schedule but the corals hated it.

Where are you located? You can borrow mine.

Lavey29 · Jan 2, 2022

PeterC99 said:
Where are you located? You can borrow mine.

So cali. Thank you for the offer

Lavey29 · Jan 15, 2022

hllb said:
I have an acrylic top on my tank so didn't get the diffusers. So that is likely blocking some par too. I'll get out the Seneye in the next few days to test it.

Did you ever get par numbers?

hllb · Jan 15, 2022

Lavey29 said:
Did you ever get par numbers?

No, I did not. Forgot all about it!

hllb · Jan 27, 2022

Ok, I just did a quick par measurement on my tank. A couple of things to note: this was at 60% intensity of my schedule. I also have an acrylic top on my tank and while it wasn’t laying flat during this test, I did leave it in place. Removing that did definitely increase par but I didn’t do a formal tracking of how much. I also checked what happened when I removed the 60% setting and it definitely bumped the par way up.

settings (this doesn’t account for the 60% max):

Par measurements. One thing to keep in mind, due to how my hood is configured, my lights aren’t centered on my tank front to back. As expected, par is higher in the back half of the tank than the front half. Hard to tell in the picture, but the big monti up high is in the front half, measuring at 177. Just a few inches behind it at the same level, it was 226.

hllb · Jan 27, 2022

Lavey29 said:
Did you ever get par numbers?

Wanted to make sure you saw this @Lavey29

Lavey29 · Jan 27, 2022

hllb said:
Wanted to make sure you saw this @Lavey29

Thanks. So that was at 60% schedule?

hllb · Jan 27, 2022

Lavey29 said:
Thanks. So that was at 60% schedule?

Yes, and schedule max is 80%, so that’s like 48% on the blues at peak.

Lavey29 · Jan 27, 2022

hllb said:
Yes, and schedule max is 80%, so that’s like 48% on the blues at peak.

Pretty low numbers huh? I have diffusers to. I'm guessing my 60% isn't enough at all.

hllb · Jan 27, 2022

Lavey29 said:
Pretty low numbers huh? I have diffusers to. I'm guessing my 60% isn't enough at all.

Well, they are low, but I don’t have diffusers specifically but 1/4” acrylic. And they are good for my corals as I don’t have any acros. Everything is happy and growing. At 80% at the top middle without the acrylic lid it was somewhere around 420.