Radion XR30W pros and forestfire digita help

[RSnodgrass]

I've got a bunch of radion XR30W pros with diffusers over my 300. I've had considerable trouble getting consistent coloration of coral with these lights over the past year and generally dislike them but holding on to hope in justifying their awesome price. Some corals look great and some look like garbage. Cannot compare to my razors, halides, or t5's for some reason.

My current benchmark coral is a large forestfire digita. Under t5's the green looked good and the polyps were a brilliant rusty red. Now it's simply pail regardless of placement.

Who has one of these, with these lights, without supplemental lighting AND is getting good coloration? What is your lighting scheme?

I'd prefer to not be distracted by parameters, bogus par readings, or conversation about flow until my lighting issue is solved.

 

[ndrwater]

Well, I have G3 Pro Radions and get great color in all my corals. Honestly, parameters and flow directly affect coral coloration, so leaving things like that out of the equation leaves you with a new incorrect answer.
There is no "magic setting" on any LED that solves 100% of coral color issues 100% of the time without the rest of the equation.
FWIW, I run the Coral Lab AB+ program on my 240 maxed out at 85% in my SPS dominated tank.

Oh, and Welcome to R2R!!!

 

[RSnodgrass]

Agreed, but it is the first and most fundamental part of the equation. I too have great color on many but specifically interested in the forestfire digita results (notable green base with nice red polyps).

Thanks for your input though.

 

[RSnodgrass]

I've had tanks continuously for 18yrs but in case there is another major flag I've overlooked my equipment is as such: two abyzz a200's w/eductors, 6 radions, skimmer, fuge, roller mat, ato, dosing etc.

-Wide- variety of flow available.

Variety of sps, LPS, softies, clam, and a anemone.

4 Rainford gobies, male Potteri, blond naso, vampire tang, copperband, white tale bristletooth, orange back wrasse, blood shrimp, scarlet shrimp, tux urchin, various snails, and no crabs.

Everything is growing and healthy.

 

[ndrwater]

My guess is that it just isn't happy where you have it. Don't blast it with flow, but not stagnant either. Try higher up the tank 1st. May solve the problem

 

[x2uranium]

Hopefully it’s in very indirect light for the radions it should thrive. Mine does better in my radion only tank (about as far from the spread as possible) than my all t5 +xho setup

 

[roberthu526]

What are the water parameters? Maybe they are just getting used to the new lights?

 

[RSnodgrass]

Well I've been adjusting the lights 5% every week to 10 days. This round of adjustments was the white channels and are now up to 30% with red and green at 0% since little is known about them other than red burns corals which was confirmed on a MACNA talk from this year.

Results so far is the digita's red and green have notably improved. Still not at their t5 colors but much better.

Only negatives are a couple corals aren't quite as vibrant such as my hot pink monti and neon green toadstool. Other coral in the red color spectrum have improved as well namely a few favia. Overall the trade offs have been worth it.

A couple of acro colonies seem to be coloring up and approving of the change as well. Particularly since loosing the red leds.

 

[Oshengems]

I switched from Maxspect Razor to Radions G4 non pro, felt the same way you did I switched to get the “pop” they brag so much about it took a while to get colors I wanted I noticed the first 3 months everything looked so dull I was very disappointed I kept tinkering the lights Intensity brightness even messing with the spectrum a bit adding more whites etc... what worked ? Once I gave up and left things as they are AB+ program at 70% with time everything came back the color spectrum switch I feel was messing with my colors

 

[Smite]

Glad to hear you're having improvements. The controllability of radions is a double edged sword. Stability is key and that includes spectrum and intensity. I struggled with g3 pros and sold them for t5 a couple years ago. Looking back i was constantly adjusting them.

After seeing so many successful sps tanks with them I'm running them again and with success. I chose the AB+ program set intensity at 50% over my frag/temp tank, tweaked it to be visually appealing and left it alone. Couldn't be happier with the lights now. Going to run 4 over my 180g when it's built

 

[Dana Riddle]

Montipora spp. can contain fluorescent proteins found in Clades B and C3, which makes pinning things down very difficult. With that said, yellow wavelengths can excite orange/red proteins, which are often missing in LED luminaires. I tried to induce coloration in green-orange/red Montis with UV, blue, and green LEDs - and failed miserably.

 

[jda]

Have you seen this particular strain look good under other lighting? When I still allowed montis in my tanks, I had a forest fire that I could never get good color out of and I was just baffled... until I got a real forest fire and then it looked great with ease. In my area, there is a lot of knock-off forest fire getting sold and it does not look as good.

Of course, if this same exact piece looked good under different lights, then forget what I posted.

 

[Oshengems]

Have you seen this particular strain look good under other lighting? When I still allowed montis in my tanks, I had a forest fire that I could never get good color out of and I was just baffled... until I got a real forest fire and then it looked great with ease. In my area, there is a lot of knock-off forest fire getting sold and it does not look as good.

Of course, if this same exact piece looked good under different lights, then forget what I posted.

That’s another good point the first “forest fire” I was sold was completely! Different from the 2nd I bought a few weeks after loved the coral so bought another just because it was cheap and mini colony then saw a 3rd that looked different turned out that piece was actually bubble gum digi completely different corals lol

 

[Gregg @ ADP]

Montipora spp. can contain fluorescent proteins found in Clades B and C3, which makes pinning things down very difficult. With that said, yellow wavelengths can excite orange/red proteins, which are often missing in LED luminaires. I tried to induce coloration in green-orange/red Montis with UV, blue, and green LEDs - and failed miserably.

But aren’t we de facto getting the yellow wavelengths when using the white lighting in LEDs? At least some?