Phoenix 14K 250W DE vs 20K 250DE

[cmcoker]

In the last chart, everything from 10-33k is blue to blue-white. The question I have is, why is it impossible to accurately measure the color temperature of a bulb that falls in between that range? It makes sense to me that they market everything that is bluer as 10k either 14 or 20k because these numbers are used to describe blue and bluer. But from a non-marketing perspective, I don't understand why it doesn't seem possible to determine the exact kelvin of a bulb.

Check out this blog post from Tullio, discusses color of light.
https://www.reefbrite.com/the-color-of-light/

 

[TheGreatWave]

Black body radiation, in simple terms, is that you can tell how hot something is by it's color.

It's used for stars and hot metals. Hot metal is the same color at the same temperature, whether it's aluminum or steel.

I guess the blue is not included because hot metal doesn't turn blue after red. For this reason we can't measure blue in "kelvin".

We need to use a different classification. Like a spectra-graph etc or good old blue, bluer and really blue.

 

[oreo54]

In the last chart, everything from 10-33k is blue to blue-white. The question I have is, why is it impossible to accurately measure the color temperature of a bulb that falls in between that range? It makes sense to me that they market everything that is bluer as 10k either 14 or 20k because these numbers are used to describe blue and bluer. But from a non-marketing perspective, I don't understand why it doesn't seem possible to determine the exact kelvin of a bulb.

Well for starters.. actual spectral output is dependent on drive current i.e ballast power/type so from the get go the number gets squishy...
Secondly, seem to be more of a "look" so even if the bulb specs at 18000K but looks like a 1400k "should" they sell it as 14000K..?
Since in a sense there is no "lighting standard" past 10-12000K whats the harm..

See you just need to look at the spectrum charts more than the K rating..


Third since this is CCT.. slight changes in halides will give a different look yet spec the same K.
Then sort of back to marketing.. say the bulb you designed is 18000K.. but looks like a 14000k and you are trying to "fit" common usage and not confuse the heck out of users.. so just call it 14000K if whitish or like 20000K if bluish
but leave out the "like".

Sadly this type of reason is all too common.. W/ LED's they may say 55 3W diodes yet run them at 500mA and a V(f) of 3.5V
= 1.75W
See it's really a 3W "class" diode (can output 3W w/ out self destructing.. if propery used).. but it means less than people "assume"..
A "1W class" diode wouldn't survive 500mA (well normally)

People make the mistake of as-u-ming things are
more concrete than they really are..thus people like Sanjay testing, literally, everything..

See it's not "impossible" but in a sense.. impractical..throw in manuf in-tolerances to boot..

 

[oreo54]

Black body radiation, in simple terms, is that you can tell how hot something is by it's color.

It's used for stars and hot metals. Hot metal is the same color at the same temperature, whether it's aluminum or steel.

I guess the blue is not included because hot metal doesn't turn blue after red. For this reason we can't measure blue in "kelvin".

We need to use a different classification. Like a spectra-graph etc or good old blue, bluer and really blue.

sort of did..Guess it never "took" here..though it's a bit messed up...Type A and B are messed up..
type A to C to D to Blue works..
or b to c to d sort of.. well sort of better.."blue" is err less blue than "d"..

Never mind..

 

[cwk84]

14k Phoenix are not nearly as blue as most 20k bulbs.

Let the bulbs break in and let your corals adapt to them, you can tweak colors with trace elements and nutrients, not by just blasting things with blue/uv leds

Well for starters.. actual spectral output is dependent on drive current i.e ballast power/type so from the get go the number gets squishy...
Secondly, seem to be more of a "look" so even if the bulb specs at 18000K but looks like a 1400k "should" they sell it as 14000K..?
Since in a sense there is no "lighting standard" past 10-12000K whats the harm..

See you just need to look at the spectrum charts more than the K rating..


Third since this is CCT.. slight changes in halides will give a different look yet spec the same K.
Then sort of back to marketing.. say the bulb you designed is 18000K.. but looks like a 14000k and you are trying to "fit" common usage and not confuse the heck out of users.. so just call it 14000K if whitish or like 20000K if bluish
but leave out the "like".

Sadly this type of reason is all too common.. W/ LED's they may say 55 3W diodes yet run them at 500mA and a V(f) of 3.5V
= 1.75W
See it's really a 3W "class" diode (can output 3W w/ out self destructing.. if propery used).. but it means less than people "assume"..
A "1W class" diode wouldn't survive 500mA (well normally)

People make the mistake of as-u-ming things are
more concrete than they really are..thus people like Sanjay testing, literally, everything..

See it's not "impossible" but in a sense.. impractical..throw in manuf in-tolerances to boot..

This is what I suspected! I knew about the LED classifications, though. So I've not been living under a big rock, just a tiny one

 

[oreo54]

Just for fun

6500k HiLux on right.. 20000k on left.

https://translate.googleusercontent...700265&usg=ALkJrhgjRGqxuRdBltH17VRVS00yAxRlRA

[/URL]

And this..hard to see but only 2 have a "real" CCT
and only one of them is right..

 

[cwk84]

Have you ever been scuba diving or snorkeling? The left one looks more like a natural reef IMO. Some of the reds and greens get the filtered out by the water and what you are left with is more of a blue/turquoise color underwater with some white in the mix. This is the baseline I'm looking for. The 14k Phoenix is closer to the one on the right on my ballasts. Not as yellow but yellow enough for me to notice. White is fine, but no yellow. White with a mix of blue and violet for a little pop would be awesome. I hope that's what I'm getting with the Ushios I ordered.

 

[oreo54]

Have you ever been scuba diving or snorkeling? The left one looks more like a natural reef IMO. Some of the reds and greens get the filtered out by the water and what you are left with is more of a blue/turquoise color underwater with some white in the mix. This is the baseline I'm looking for. The 14k Phoenix is closer to the one on the right on my ballasts. Not as yellow but yellow enough for me to notice. White is fine, but no yellow. White with a mix of blue and violet for a little pop would be awesome. I hope that's what I'm getting with the Ushios I ordered.

I know what you mean.. was as stated..for fun..
anyways another type of natural light at depth..available in Japan..

KYOCERA Develops World's First Full-Spectrum LED Aquarium Lighting; Innovative technology mimics sunlight at specific underwater depths; designed to optimize growth of corals and marine plants | News Releases | KYOCERA

Kyocera announced that the company developed the world’s first full-spectrum LED lighting for aquariums.

global.kyocera.com

Kyocera releases aquarium LED light in this summer | Reef Builders | The Reef and Saltwater Aquarium Blog

Kyocera is Japanese company that is well-known for copier machine and ceramic products, and more recently smartphones. I did not know that they have a business for LED light until recently.

reefbuilders.com

 

[TheGreatWave]

That has to be the most realistic color I've seen yet of any style of lighting.

 

[oreo54]

Was just going to ask you what you thought.. Thanks..
opps cwk.. but thanks also.
anyways .. no dimming. no channels..plug and play like "other" lighting..boatload of $'s/watt

 

[jda]

What they call stuff does not matter. Not all premium cuts of meat are really premium. What does an "ultra" clam or coral mean? The k rating on a reef bulb is just a swag, so don't pay too much attention to it... use it as a guide. When dealing with a single manufacturer, you can usually count on the bulbs going from yellow to white to blue... Hamilton 10k is whiter than 14k which is not as blue as 20k. It gets trickier with generic/unbranded Chinese bulbs.

MOST 14k MH bulbs are not as blue as MOST 20k. The 20k Radium is more like a 14k. All 10k that I can think of are whiter than 14k and a LOT whiter than 20k.

It is kinda like trying to figure out, on paper, what a 510 hp high torque engine will feel like with a certain rear end gear... sometimes you just gotta get in there and try it.

 

[Bpb]

All the links and studies can be somewhat helpful but JDA summarized it perfectly. 6500K-20000k is a gradual progression from yellow to blue. Lower output ballasts (for the same rating bulb) will run the bulb at a higher kelvin than higher output ballasts (think a radium on an electronic ballast versus an m80)

If your bulb is too warm colored, go higher kelvin first. If that doesn’t do it, get an electronic ballast. If a 22000k Giesemann on an e-ballast is still too white for you, and it’s intolerable, then you should probably either supplement with blue leds or 4 t5ho bulbs and just use your MH for 4-5 hours a day for the growth benefits when you won’t be home.

 

[cwk84]

I like the look of MH bulbs supplement with T5 for an individualized look. That’s why I mentioned I need a good baseline to build up on what I’d like to see. The 14k is too white which mean I’d need tons if supplementation to give it blue/violet look. So a 20k that is a tad lass white should give me a good baseline.

 

[shred5]

JDA is right in Kelvin.. It basically goes like this... This looks like 12,000k let call it that or this is a little more blue than our 10k bulb lets call it 14k...

Anyway I have not run halides in a little while and I am thinking of doing a reef with halides and all old school sps corals.

For long time I ran Iwasaki 6500k with vho actinics. I later went to Ushio 10,000k which I really liked and my favorite. I did run the XM10k bulb for a while because I got them at distributor cost. Never a fan of the radium.

I need to decide on a lamp and what do do about a fixture. I do want to run supplementation for a little pop and blue like I used to.. Not sure if it will be t-5 or led for supplementation.

Sticks because I had a Hamilton fixture I left behind when I moved. Just needed to be cleaned up some.

 

[Bpb]

Any of you old time MH guys have thoughts on the 6500k bulbs? I’ve asked a couple times but it never gets answered. I know old folklore is “nothing grows like 6500k iwasaki”. But curious if those who have used them versus a 10k or 14/20k can elaborate on how significant the difference is?

I know Hamilton still offers a 6500k bulb but I wonder how it compares to the iwasaki in terms of spectrum and output. Or how the EYE hortilux 6500k mh compares to the EYE/iwasaki 6500k reef bulb? Are they the same? For a grow our tank I am torn between trying either the
Hamilton 10k 400 watt
Hamilton 6500k 250 watt
EYE hortilux 6400k 250 watt.

This is not for a home display purpose, but purely for growth so I don’t care about the aesthetic as much.

Edit: please refrain from derailing the question LED people. I’m not asking for a 15 year old article on how iwasaki bulbs ages using pfo ballasts, or for links to various diode manufacturer details. That information is well represented in this thread already. I’m seeking advice/information from people who have actual experience with growing acropora among the light category I’m inquiring about. I mean no offense or disrespect.

 

[shred5]

Any of you old time MH guys have thoughts on the 6500k bulbs? I’ve asked a couple times but it never gets answered. I know old folklore is “nothing grows like 6500k iwasaki”. But curious if those who have used them versus a 10k or 14/20k can elaborate on how significant the difference is?

I know Hamilton still offers a 6500k bulb but I wonder how it compares to the iwasaki in terms of spectrum and output. Or how the EYE hortilux 6500k mh compares to the EYE/iwasaki 6500k reef bulb? Are they the same? For a grow our tank I am torn between trying either the
Hamilton 10k 400 watt
Hamilton 6500k 250 watt
EYE hortilux 6400k 250 watt.

This is not for a home display purpose, but purely for growth so I don’t care about the aesthetic as much.

Edit: please refrain from derailing the question LED people. I’m not asking for a 15 year old article on how iwasaki bulbs ages using pfo ballasts, or for links to various diode manufacturer details. That information is well represented in this thread already. I’m seeking advice/information from people who have actual experience with growing acropora among the light category I’m inquiring about. I mean no offense or disrespect.

Really hard to say on growth.. When the Iwasaki were used at their peak SPS keeping really had not hit its stride yet, allot of mixed tanks.
SPS really started hitting its stride when the 10k plus lights came out and even more when the radium hit. Allot of bulbs hit the market at this time too..
I think when the higher kelven bulbs hit the market we got better at keeping SPS too so yea it was hard for me to tell. I would say the Iwasaki did give a little better growth. Adam from BC used them latter than most and still does so he really could say.

I never ran any Hamilton Bulb.

I know Veture lighting had a 6500k bulb and it was felt they may have made some of the 6500k bulbs at the time. Just re-banded for the hobby.
That lamp is probably still made today and I bet they make a 10,000k lamps too..
Yea they do I just looked it up:

10K Lamps Selection Page

 

[oreo54]

Any of you old time MH guys have thoughts on the 6500k bulbs? I’ve asked a couple times but it never gets answered. I know old folklore is “nothing grows like 6500k iwasaki”. But curious if those who have used them versus a 10k or 14/20k can elaborate on how significant the difference is?

I know Hamilton still offers a 6500k bulb but I wonder how it compares to the iwasaki in terms of spectrum and output. Or how the EYE hortilux 6500k mh compares to the EYE/iwasaki 6500k reef bulb? Are they the same? For a grow our tank I am torn between trying either the
Hamilton 10k 400 watt
Hamilton 6500k 250 watt
EYE hortilux 6400k 250 watt.

There's a whole thread on it..

Why do people run 6500K bulbs?

I used to run a Tropic 6500K in my two bulb T5 setup to complement my hydra. Its more of a daylight spectrum and my corals including SPS were doing great in terms of growth and colours. I recently changed that with a ATI coral plus 2 weeks back just for experimenting. Nothing drastic yet but...

www.reef2reef.com

I think that if you had any kind of breath and depth of personal experience with these other lighting sources, you would not think that your point is all that relevant. While it is fun to talk about academically and wonder about, there is no practical experienced-based argument to be made - a 6.5K light will outperform nearly anything else on the market for growth and rendering color... they just do not illuminate the color very well at all and the tradeoff of having so much more wattage dedicated to blue is not worth it to many people.

Back in the dark ages (pun intended) we were pretty limited in lighting choices as far as metal halides went. The commercial coral farm I managed for a couple of years used only 6500K Iwasaki lamps and had great success. Many old timers to this day in the hobby still claim these lamps produced superior coral growth. I have some theories as to why and they are:
1. PAR meters don't measure the UV-A 365nm mercury spikes in these (or any) lamps. This energy is useful in photosynthesis. If we look at the pigments that protect against UV (the mycosporine-like amino acids, or MAAs) there are none that absorb UV energy at 365nm. There's a good reason for that.
2. The green light, what there is of it, borders on the absorption bandwidth of the accessory pigment peridinin. It's impact is positive, but probably minimal when compared to other bandwidths, but positive none the less.
3. The infrared energy relaxes pressure on Photosystem II by stimulating Photosystem I.
4. As far as coloration goes, we grew the Purple Monster Acropora successfully and it had magnificent color. Many of the other stony corals were quite colorful as well. Although not discussed much greenish-yellow/yellow light seems to induce non-fluorescent red coloration in those stony corals capable of producing this pigment.
In short, while PAR meters' estimations of PPFD are useful, it ignores the positive impacts of UV-A and far-red/infrared radiation.

 

[cwk84]

So does the mean corals in natural reefs will never be as colorful because the red and greens get filtered out for the most part? I’

 

[shred5]

So does the mean corals in natural reefs will never be as colorful because the red and greens get filtered out for the most part? I’

If you are talking SPS most come from very shallow water and are exposed to these colors and UV. There are some completely exposed at low tide to what ever the sun throws at them.

LPS and softies mostly see little to none. Probably the biggest challenge in this hobby is trying to keep corals from all different depths and zones.

Most corals collected for the hobby are collected from shallower depths just because it is easier so most probably get some. Depends on the coral .

I posted this picture in another thread:

Also look at the corals on this p[age exposed. There are pretty many colorful ones in both pictures:
The better ones would be cherry picked for the hobby. That is one reason we see so many colorful ones in the hobby. No one is collecting the brown ones.

A Response to ABC’s Media Watch’s “Shoot the Coral Messenger” Flimflam!

Guest essay by Jim Steele Director emeritus Sierra Nevada Field Campus, San Francisco State University and author of Landscapes & Cycles: An Environmentalist’s Journey to Climate Skepticism Gre…

wattsupwiththat.com

 

[biecacka]

I don’t know about the 6500k from Hamilton but I know a guy local to me that runs the 10k on his tank then after 18 months he switches those bulbs over to his grow out tanks and puts new bulbs on the display...his corals in the grow out tanks grow great!


Corey