Metal Halides are the bomb

[A. grandis]

I'll have to give your post some thought but want to address the yellow Porites lobata. When I had a permit to collect Hawaiian corals for the display at the Natural Energy Lab in Kona, I had the opportunity to examine that pigment. The particular specimen I had contained a non-fluorescent chromoprotein. These proteins are usually produced in response to light intensity at a certain peak wavelength (although the bandwidth could be broad.) Some Porites contain a fluorescent protein although they weren't common off the Big Island (I could count those specimens on the fingers of one hand.) I saw those during night dives using a Light Cannon dive light fitted with Charlie Mazel's filters.

Thanks for the reply, Dana. If you wish please feel free to name the other Porites species and send me some images/specifics (specially lighting) of that system you had at the NEL in Kona through PM, on the side? I'm very interested in the subject.

All the other species of Hawaiian Porites I know of aren't yellow with the exception of some strains of Porites duerdeni, P. lichen. and P. compressa. These last corals aren't as bright as P. lobata in situ though. Thanks for letting me know the differences of the pigments you found.
Waiting on your next post in regards to your thoughts on lighting.
I really appreciate your help.

 

[A. grandis]

;Peeking

 

[naterealbig]

*edit - found answer to my question.

 

[pdxmonkeyboy]

Interesting that you had better color with the 12k..or was it 15k bulbs. I was running 20k radiums with coral blues and reef brites and had great colors.

I bought three 400 watt 20k hamiltons for the new build. Maybe with my t5 and reefbrites I can still keep some of that blue color I like.

Great thread. I LOVE my halides. LOVE them..but I live in Oregon and the average temperature year round comes out to like 51 degrees F. So..heat the tank with lights? Ok, cool.

Plus I'm running around 400 gallons so...

 

[Dana Riddle]

Thanks for the reply, Dana. If you wish please feel free to name the other Porites species and send me some images/specifics (specially lighting) of that system you had at the NEL in Kona through PM, on the side? I'm very interested in the subject.

All the other species of Hawaiian Porites I know of aren't yellow with the exception of some strains of Porites duerdeni, P. lichen. and P. compressa. These last corals aren't as bright as P. lobata in situ though. Thanks for letting me know the differences of the pigments you found.
Waiting on your next post in regards to your thoughts on lighting.
I really appreciate your help.

The systems at NELHA were outdoors and were illuminated with sunlight (though sometimes we used shade cloth to attenuate intensity.) In some cases, light intensity was greatly reduced in order to experiment with LEDs. Some photos of the 2002 experiments were published here:

Effects Of Narrow Bandwidth Light Sources On Coral Host And Zooxanthellae Pigments - Reefs.com

Effects Of Narrow Bandwidth Light Sources On Coral Host And Zooxanthellae Pigments - This article will examine the results of experiments designed to investigate the effects of light spectra on coral coloration, some of which were unexpected.

www.advancedaquarist.com

I have some full tank shots in a MACNA presentation, somewhere. I'll try to dig those up.

 

[oreo54]

The systems at NELHA were outdoors and were illuminated with sunlight (though sometimes we used shade cloth to attenuate intensity.) In some cases, light intensity was greatly reduced in order to experiment with LEDs. Some photos of the 2002 experiments were published here:

Effects Of Narrow Bandwidth Light Sources On Coral Host And Zooxanthellae Pigments - Reefs.com

Effects Of Narrow Bandwidth Light Sources On Coral Host And Zooxanthellae Pigments - This article will examine the results of experiments designed to investigate the effects of light spectra on coral coloration, some of which were unexpected.

www.advancedaquarist.com

I have some full tank shots in a MACNA presentation, somewhere. I'll try to dig those up.

I see image security issues still exist...

 

[Dana Riddle]

I see image security issues still exist...

Odd. I got there fine.

 

[oreo54]

Odd. I got there fine.

 

[themcnertney]

I ran three 400w MH above my 220 and I'll be honest, best my tank ever looked. I loved them. Grew this....was about 18" diameter, I lost it when I switched to leds.

 

[Dana Riddle]

I ran three 400w MH above my 220 and I'll be honest, best my tank ever looked. I loved them. Grew this....was about 18" diameter, I lost it when I switched to leds.

Why do you think you lost it? PAR higher or lower? Spectral quality? Do you any PAR numbers by chance?

 

[Dana Riddle]

Here's a pic of one of the NELHA coral tanks while LED experiments were in progress. Note the shade cloth atop the aquarium.

 

[themcnertney]

Why do you think you lost it? PAR higher or lower? Spectral quality? Do you any PAR numbers by chance?

I ramped up my hydras slowly over the coarse of a couple months knowing it would be a shock. Just didnt adjust well. I lost half my sps. No PAR numbers. FYI this was five years ago.

 

[Dana Riddle]

I ramped up my hydras slowly over the coarse of a couple months knowing it would be a shock. Just didnt adjust well. I lost half my sps. No PAR numbers. FYI this was five years ago.

Thanks for the reply. I used metal halides when I got into the hobby and have always liked them. But I switched to LEDs when PFO sent one of their beta units, and they worked well for me especially because I had heat issues to deal with. There's a lot of things we don't understand about narrow-bandwidth light sources. That quest for knowledge continues and maybe I have enough years left to scratch the surface.

 

[oreo54]

Thanks for the reply. I used metal halides when I got into the hobby and have always liked them. BNut I switched to LEDs when PFO sent one of their beta units, and they worked well for me especially because I had heat issues to deal with. There's a lot of things we don't understand about narrow-bandwidth light sources. That quest for knowledge continues and maybe I have enough years left to scratch the surface.

All I can see is one replaced 1200W of light w/ Hydras which might have been pushing 95W per unit..
would have taken 6 plus units to equal the old light environment (realistically more like 9).. and at reduced wattage for acclimation..

Point is w/ out PAR data most of this circumstantial evidence has little validity..

AI Hydra LED coming in hot at 95 watts & $399 | Reef Builders | The Reef and Saltwater Aquarium Blog

The AI Hydra LED light is a surprise from left field by AquaIllumination which is going to be available quite soon. It’s been great having AquaIllumination cranking out new product releases including…

reefbuilders.com

Just saying..

 

[jda]

It is a shame that people thought that they could save electricity in years past and it is a shame that people think that now too. I do not know if most people needed 400w Halides, but 250w are pretty reasonable with 2x in a standard 4' 120 gallon tank and you still need 3x of the new xr30s to cover that same area reasonably well and you will be right there at 500w all over again. I asked Santa to never have a "wattage savings" thread come up again, but I guess that I was on the naughty list.

 

[Magellan]

So..14k MH grows corals well. Great thread

love this bulb btw. Best combination of color and PAR...says so right there on the box!

 

[oreo54]

It is a shame that people thought that they could save electricity in years past and it is a shame that people think that now too. I do not know if most people needed 400w Halides, but 250w are pretty reasonable with 2x in a standard 4' 120 gallon tank and you still need 3x of the new xr30s to cover that same area reasonably well and you will be right there at 500w all over again. I asked Santa to never have a "wattage savings" thread come up again, but I guess that I was on the naughty list.

Won't get much of an argument from me .."except".

How many LED Watts does it take to replace a 400 watt metal halide?

The best advice we can give anyone is never buy a LED product based on watts. Buy it based on lumens and then figure out how little watts you can use to make those lumens.

Change that to "PAR" not lumens...
Physical geometry of each type of light that..given equal photon producing efficiency LEDs even at 120 degrees will create a watt savings..
Don't actually know any field where one can't save watts w/ LEDs.. fresh,reef,pot, lettuce..

Questions really how many and what it's really worth (savings)..at least nowadays..
Some old inefficient LED's excluded..

LED output is much more efficiently controlled.. As w/ anything. there are "complications"..
BTW that 40% is really worst case reflector.. and firmly admit some are MUCH better..

 

[Dana Riddle]

It is a shame that people thought that they could save electricity in years past and it is a shame that people think that now too. I do not know if most people needed 400w Halides, but 250w are pretty reasonable with 2x in a standard 4' 120 gallon tank and you still need 3x of the new xr30s to cover that same area reasonably well and you will be right there at 500w all over again. I asked Santa to never have a "wattage savings" thread come up again, but I guess that I was on the naughty list.

Here's a link to a comparison of metal halide and LEDs. When all was said and done, my power bill dropped from $400/month to $150. Less use of A/C definitely played a part. But the lower wattage LED array (compared to a metal halide) grew corals just fine. Fourteen years ago. How time flies.

Product Review: A New Horizon in Lighting: PFO's Solaris LED System - Reefs.com

Product Review: A New Horizon in Lighting: PFO's Solaris LED System - Dana reviews PFO's new Solaris LED lighting system. PFO makes some bold claims in their advertising. How well do these facts hold up under close scrutiny? Several testing protocols were used to evaluate lamp intensity, lamp...

www.advancedaquarist.com

 

[jda]

You could have almost certainly used lower wattage MH, then. I remember people dropping big cash on that Solaris when it came out and it ended up dying a quick death when multi-color stuff came out - don't remember it doing all that much better than "just fine." Don't recall people saying that it was an awesome light, or anything. Time does fly.

150w HQI might have been your jam... way less heat too.

 

[Dana Riddle]

You could have almost certainly used lower wattage MH, then. I remember people dropping big cash on that Solaris when it came out and it ended up dying a quick death when multi-color stuff came out - don't remember it doing all that much better than "just fine." Don't recall people saying that it was an awesome light, or anything. Time does fly.

150w HQI might have been your jam... way less heat too.

The first Solaris I got was only blue/white LEDs. Gen 2 included cyan. The real problem with Solaris luminaires was their power supplies. But their death knell was the patent infringement lawsuit that sunk them (I was called as an expert witness and flew to Honolulu to give testimony.) This was in a time when LEDs used for aquarium lighting was highly controversial (in fact, Patrick of PFO sent me an email lending sympathy for the attacks I was getting from the 'conventional lighting' crowd on Reef Central.) One o f the detractors' arguements was that LEDs in general (and Solaris in particular) did not generate enough light to grow SPS, which of course was nonsense.