Viparspectra 165watt, Anyone using these?

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Nicholas Dushynsky

Nicholas Dushynsky

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I don’t have a great pic, but this is mine. Most of my corals are still smaller frags. I am running my lights at 60 blue, 1 white, at about 10” off the top of the water. I’m getting solid growth on SPS, less growth on LPS and softies (it’s pretty low nutrient, no algae issues no detectable N/P).

Thanks for keeping us updated. I do believe these lights are finicky because of how powerful they are. Not sure how they’d cause the SPS die off you had. Do you think the switch to 2-part from kalk would have done that?

Anyway, don’t give up, you still have a great looking tank and I’m sure you’ll learn what happened and how to prevent it in the future.

FF2A4DCA-E203-4372-8E5D-D77B489C1561.jpeg
Great looking tank you have ther and when it grows in, it will look amazing. The only change I had made to the tank was going from kalk to 2 part that I can think of. Obviously I have been mucking around with the light settings , thinking this was the issue of my sps fading. I haven't changed food or feeding habits. I still only have 2 clowns a yellow watchman and pistol shrimp. I do use natural sea water that I collect myself which I use on all 3 of my tanks. One is a fluval 13.5 gallon with 2 clowns and some btas and a 35l hammer tank with 2 clowns they are both fine so it's not the water I'm adding.
Screenshot_20190619-095236_Gallery.jpg
Screenshot_20190619-095531_Photos.jpg

So I'm going back to when things were great and growth was steady, I'll just monitor and see how it goes and if things pick up great, if not I'll deal with that then.
I'm not blaming the lighting for the issue of sps loss, it was just my first thought as growth had been slowing down, levels were steady not the fact that I changed to 2 part. It wasnt an overnight issue so I didn't know where to start to find the issues I was having. I have even checked for stray voltage as that could also be a cause. So now it's just going to be kalk in ato and biweekly water changes.
 

Jonathan Troutt

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I am running mine at 80 blue 45 white. But i am running a ramping schedule made possible with reef pi. Makes me wonder if my number are too high seeing what others are running
 

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The tanks still look great. You seem to be doing everything perfectly. I can’t speak to dosing with kalk vs. 2-part, since I’ve never done it personally, but I’m likely going to start in a couple months after I get home from a vacation.

Jonathan, I did see you did that and it seems interesting. A bit too complicated for me to try. With the whites on that high, do you think it is a bit overly white? They seemed to just wash all the color out of my tank when I had them up past 5.
 

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The tanks still look great. You seem to be doing everything perfectly. I can’t speak to dosing with kalk vs. 2-part, since I’ve never done it personally, but I’m likely going to start in a couple months after I get home from a vacation.

Jonathan, I did see you did that and it seems interesting. A bit too complicated for me to try. With the whites on that high, do you think it is a bit overly white? They seemed to just wash all the color out of my tank when I had them up past 5.


So when i first got these lights i thought the white was a bit too warm. So i switched all the white leds out with cold white leds.
 

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So when i first got these lights i thought the white was a bit too warm. So i switched all the white leds out with cold white leds.

That makes sense. I’m just not a fan of the spectrum on the whites. I don’t really want to dump any more money or effort into them though, since I plan to upgrade to Hydras within 6 or so months.
 
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Nicholas Dushynsky

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So when i first got these lights i thought the white was a bit too warm. So i switched all the white leds out with cold white leds.
What k leds did you use? I was thinking of changing the red and greens out for maybe 2 UV and 2 12k whites or maybe add a couple 10k or even some purples. I only have whites on 1 as it seems yellowish to me with too much.(maybe the water is yellow ?) It would be nice to know if anyone else has swapped out some leds and if so which ones and to what. As for the price of the leds it ain't very expensive and won't take long to do. I'm just waiting for the 3 year warranty to run out before I change them. I already had permission from them to go inside to clean the dust out not to void it.
 

icejam

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upgraded to larger aquarium two weeks ago. went from diy LED to 2x Vipar. Currently running 35 blue & 10 white for 9 & 7 hours respectively. I am slowly increasing brightness and time. No idea what my final numbers will be but so far happy with the lights. Fans are on a louder side but I am building a canopy so that should help. If not I will be upgrading fans to quieter ones.

here's a very temporary light setup [aquarium still being set up, bunch of gear lost in transit]

5kxghnkXSwyIXUtQZ9f8JQ.jpg

30lxVrXeSiOATeemIuf+rA.jpg
 
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upgraded to larger aquarium two weeks ago. went from diy LED to 2x Vipar. Currently running 35 blue & 10 white for 9 & 7 hours respectively. I am slowly increasing brightness and time. No idea what my final numbers will be but so far happy with the lights. Fans are on a louder side but I am building a canopy so that should help. If not I will be upgrading fans to quieter ones.

here's a very temporary light setup [aquarium still being set up, bunch of gear lost in transit]

5kxghnkXSwyIXUtQZ9f8JQ.jpg

30lxVrXeSiOATeemIuf+rA.jpg
Great start. I would be tempted to raise the lights to help spread the light a little better to give more coverage for the middle. It looks like you have a center brace so that will cast a shadow anyway.
Or if you would want to, you could go inside the lights and remove the lenses which is an easy job as they just press onto the leds and keep the lights at that height and the spread should spread under the brace. You would lose a little par around 20% I believe (not tested) . The lights are powerful enough at that distance to give you plenty of par on the sand. Just an option anyway, plus it's a reversible mod if it doesn't suit you layout.
 

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Great start. I would be tempted to raise the lights to help spread the light a little better to give more coverage for the middle. It looks like you have a center brace so that will cast a shadow anyway.
Or if you would want to, you could go inside the lights and remove the lenses which is an easy job as they just press onto the leds and keep the lights at that height and the spread should spread under the brace. You would lose a little par around 20% I believe (not tested) . The lights are powerful enough at that distance to give you plenty of par on the sand. Just an option anyway, plus it's a reversible mod if it doesn't suit you layout.

I used the same lenses on some of my diy projects and have spare extras left with various optics from 15 to 90 degrees so I might experiment a little.
Center brace casts some shadow but looks better in real life than pictures so I don't mind it.
I haven't decided what style of canopy to build yet and that would determine the hight for the lights.
PAR meter should arrive soon and I will post all the results here.
 
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Nicholas Dushynsky

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When you do I would love to know what the par is with all lenses removed if possible, I have seen what the par is over a 2ft cube with lenses on but that was 100% on blue and white.
Screenshot_20190620-231049_Gallery.jpg
It would be fantastic if someone had time to do certain par readings with blues and whites at different depths and percentages. As in blues at ?% and whites at ?% as so many people running these lights have them at a high blue to a really low white due to aesthetics to the eye not the needs of corals. I believe I'm am guilty of this. Please keep us up to date with any of your findings with your journey.
 

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What k leds did you use? I was thinking of changing the red and greens out for maybe 2 UV and 2 12k whites or maybe add a couple 10k or even some purples. I only have whites on 1 as it seems yellowish to me with too much.(maybe the water is yellow ?)
It would be nice to know if anyone else has swapped out some leds and if so which ones and to what. As for the price of the leds it ain't very expensive and won't take long to do. I'm just waiting for the 3 year warranty to run out before I change them. I already had permission from them to go inside to clean the dust out not to void it.

10k and 15k where what i used. Excuse the tank it was recently rebooted and is going through some issues.

Ok so one shot is with blues and whites on the other of just half the tank is is with blues off and whites on. Having ana issue with diatoms so keep that in mine.

3852E27D-DF98-4D63-88BB-33FEC2AD0CE8.jpeg


B51CEA57-2CA8-41B1-AEDF-D9374DF84474.jpeg
 

icejam

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When you do I would love to know what the par is with all lenses removed if possible, [...]
It would be fantastic if someone had time to do certain par readings with blues and whites at different depths and percentages. As in blues at ?% and whites at ?% as so many people running these lights have them at a high blue to a really low white due to aesthetics to the eye not the needs of corals. I believe I'm am guilty of this. Please keep us up to date with any of your findings with your journey.

Will do. I didn't but anything too scientific-y just seneye but that should do the job. It was cheaper than fixing and calibrating my skye meter (R.I.P.) Should take about 2 weeks to arrive. I will post results for various light settings for sure sure. My % settings are what they are now as the tank looks good and corals look happy enough but it's just a guess really.
 
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10k and 15k where what i used. Excuse the tank it was recently rebooted and is going through some issues.

Ok so one shot is with blues and whites on the other of just half the tank is is with blues off and whites on. Having ana issue with diatoms so keep that in mine.

3852E27D-DF98-4D63-88BB-33FEC2AD0CE8.jpeg


B51CEA57-2CA8-41B1-AEDF-D9374DF84474.jpeg
The whites on their own doesn't look to bad at all, the really yellow looks to be gone. I am definitely tempted to change some soon. Also you don't have to excuse your tank its totally fine as these things happen.
 

Jonathan Troutt

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The whites on their own doesn't look to bad at all, the really yellow looks to be gone. I am definitely tempted to change some soon. Also you don't have to excuse your tank its totally fine as these things happen.
Well thank you. I just want more in it. Looks really barren but in trying to be as patient as i can.
 
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Will do. I didn't but anything too scientific-y just seneye but that should do the job. It was cheaper than fixing and calibrating my skye meter (R.I.P.) Should take about 2 weeks to arrive. I will post results for various light settings for sure sure. My % settings are what they are now as the tank looks good and corals look happy enough but it's just a guess really.
that's the trouble with this type of light. There is a lot of guess work involved. People all have different tanks and mount them at different heights so no 2 tanks are the same and their settings might not work on your system, it's just great to find out some base numbers to work with. See I, like most people run just blues at some part of the day and we don't know what par just blues run at what percentage. So would be good to know. I also believe that a seneye is perfect as a par meter.
 

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Anyone notice these lights are pulled from amazon and eBay? I checked viparspectras eBay account and the lights are nowhere to be found. Nothing on amazon .ca or .com.

I have been googling settings and the numbers are all over the place.
 

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Anyone notice these lights are pulled from amazon and eBay? I checked viparspectras eBay account and the lights are nowhere to be found. Nothing on amazon .ca or .com.

I have been googling settings and the numbers are all over the place.

Noticed the same as I wanted to buy one more to play with. Strange thing is that grow lights are still there just aquarium ones disappeared.
 

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