What, blue versus white, lighting combo gives the best coral growth?

[minus9]

Aquablue special are way over looked by most, but the colors and coral response should not be overlooked. I feel these give as close to bright daylight on a reef look as can be had with any t5.

6500k freshwater T5 bulbs are overlooked as well.

 

[Ed olson]

Viparspectras 100% blue 1% white 10" off the surface.

 

[Bigfish10]

Fwiw here is old school halide lighting on a mixed 210. Radium 250w x3 and 2 diy led bars consisting of 18 hyper violets and 18 royal blue 3w diodes. Very neutral white with a hint of blue in person with decent coral color pop. No photo editing or filters Gives the fish and corals a natural look but still some color pop

 

[REM2021]

I recently upgraded some lousy stock tank lighting (20G hex) with a 100W Nicrew HyperReef LED. Slowly ramping it up since everything was used to, although not happy with, much lower light. I'm running the blue channel and white channel at equal intensity and love the look, and my LPS have never been happier. Just bought a Kessil X controller to try to play around with it a little because I'd like to back the white channel off juuuuust a little and the built in controls only allow 20% jumps. Pretty torn about it though because I am chronically guilty of tinker-itis and my tank is looking better right now that it (or any of its predecessor tanks!) has ever looked before.

 

[ReeferBri]

Back in the day we were always told that you needed the white light to make the corals grow and the blue was to make them pop. Today we know differently but what exactly is the BEST percentage combo to experience the best coral growth from a lighting aspect? Throw all the other variables out the door as if they were perfect. This is about Blue versus White! Let's talk about it!

What percentage of blue and white do you think makes the best coral growth combo?

image via @minus9 and their @Kessil and @Orphek lit reef tank!

 

[claudio wagner]

I have had the best results with running mostly blue with AI Hydra 26's

I use similar setup on my Hydra 16HD. Actually got elsewhere but the "jigsaw" was only on the violet and blues. would you share yours so I can try here and see if get better results here ? thanks in advance

 

[ReefHomieJon]

#BlueLightsMatter

(#AllLightsMatter)

 

[claudio wagner]

Viparspectras 100% blue 1% white 10" off the surface.

 

[jsker]

Could you share that lighting schedule file please?

How big is your tank?

72 gal DT 80 gal total system

Light schedule link

 

[jsker]

I use similar setup on my Hydra 16HD. Actually got elsewhere but the "jigsaw" was only on the violet and blues. would you share yours so I can try here and see if get better results here ? thanks in advance

Here you go

Link

 

[claudio wagner]

Viparspectras 100% blue 1% white 10" off the surface.

Back in the day we were always told that you needed the white light to make the corals grow and the blue was to make them pop. Today we know differently but what exactly is the BEST percentage combo to experience the best coral growth from a lighting aspect? Throw all the other variables out the door as if they were perfect. This is about Blue versus White! Let's talk about it!

What percentage of blue and white do you think makes the best coral growth combo?

image via @minus9 and their @Kessil and @Orphek lit reef tank!

This my setup on Hydra 16HD, till now my judgment I have good results. I go from softies up to Acros (more recently).

 

[Badboyan93l]

Back in the day we were always told that you needed the white light to make the corals grow and the blue was to make them pop. Today we know differently but what exactly is the BEST percentage combo to experience the best coral growth from a lighting aspect? Throw all the other variables out the door as if they were perfect. This is about Blue versus White! Let's talk about it!

What percentage of blue and white do you think makes the best coral growth combo?

image via @minus9 and their @Kessil and @Orphek lit reef tank!

How long you had them own, fast growth and what’s your schedule for your X360. This would help those of us who own Kessil X360 (me included!). Lol Thanks!

 

[Justin Swinney]

Currently running 8bulb t5. 2 coral+, 6 blue+ 2 actinic led strips. May switch out two blue+ for actinic this time. Haven’t made up my mind yet

 

[blasterman]

A cool white LED is a blue LED with secondary phosphors that emit some green and a trace of orange red.

They are white to our eyes ...not to coral, because white is not a spectrum.

Metal halides dont use secondary phosphors and PAR increases with lower color temp due to the addition of elements to produce additional emission lines. Otherwise, LEDs have nothing in common with halides.

 

[Bpb]

Any reputable led unit on the market I’d max every channel evenly and adjust height/overall intensity to get in the par range I want. Any t5 mixture would have at least half the bulbs as white bulbs. Metal halides I prefer 10,000k-14,000k.

I really think there’s more to the health of the livestock than JUST satisfying chlorophyll A. All the obsession in the past few years has been satisfying chlorophyll A. There are more light absorbing and reflecting pigments in a coral that make use of a full range of wavelengths.

A well balanced full spectrum is akin to eating a well balanced diet full of vitamins and minerals. Rather than just pure starch since glucose is one of the major main sources of cellular energy

 

[GuppyHJD]

Anybody running Noopsyche K2 Pro II lights ? What settings?
So far I seem to be starting green algae growth.

 

[Llyod276]

I expect kessil knows better than I as I can't fine tune it. So yeah.

 

[dvgyfresh]

Windex tank is my style , I do have two orphek reef day lights that are not on in picture

 

[Dana Riddle]

Might be species specific. I did some collaborative work with the old BuildMyLED (now Fluence Bioengineering) a few years ago. The coral was Porites (lobata?) maintained under sub-saturating light intensity. Statistically, there were no growth differences among the 4 lights used, although LEDs weighted towards the violet/blue end of the spectrum *seemed* to promote the highest growth rate (again, statistically non-significant and could have been attributed to other factors.)

 

[minus9]

How long you had them own, fast growth and what’s your schedule for your X360. This would help those of us who own Kessil X360 (me included!). Lol Thanks!

I've been using Kessil's since 2015 and I've always used a 12hr cycle. I initially started with a 3hr ramp up/down, but now I'm only ramping up/down for 2hrs with a 8hr peak. During peak hours I have violet set to 100% with 5% red a green. My current intensity starts at 85% (I think), then ramps up to 95%. Color starts at 0% and follows the ramp to 25%, then to 35%. I'll try and take screen shots of my controller for a more detailed schedule. I've always just used Kessil's quick set tuna blue program and modified it to my liking. It just makes it easier to program.