Settings

[Matthew Cautero]

so currently I have the hydra 26 and my corals aren’t looking to good. Can you guys give me advise on what to put my settings to. It’s going to be soft and some sps in time but right now it’s mostly soft

 

[nautical_nathaniel]

I would look to water parameters first before trying to adjust your lighting but what size tank do you have and what are your current light settings? Do you know what your parameters are like right now and have any major changes occurred in the past few days?

 

[Matthew Cautero]

did a water change yesterday its a red reefer 170 max its a 50 gallon tank and i am currently in acclamation mode the lettings are UV10 V40 R40 B40 G5 DR5 CW20

 

[nautical_nathaniel]

They might be stressed out if the new water had different salinity and temperature than the tank water.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Is it just the single hydra?
Are those numbers the acclimation mode numbers?

How high above the tank is the light ?

 

[Matthew Cautero]

it is a single hydra
those number are acclimation mode
and i think its 8-10 inches above the tank

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

it is a single hydra
those number are acclimation mode
and i think its 8-10 inches above the tank

If the rest of your parameters are in line , or close then yes, let’s look at Light and live stock.

The hydra is really pretty powerful , and also a bit spotty the closer you get to the tank. So it’s possible you have a major hot spot and then dead spots to the sides. That can be problematic if your corals are Lower Light lovers, a lot of lps are for example, and zoas might not like really low pars.

Without a meter it’s actu pretty hard to tell what your giving the tank and is you have hot spots.
If a par meter is unavailable you can use a $15 lux meter btw.

Not 100% sure of your spread, but this is an example of a way of calculating spread on a tank.

 

[John3]

I run the AB+ schedule at 70% on my Radion, I think you can run the same schedule on the Hydra. It’s tilted towards a lot of blue light so that is something to consider. It’s a proven schedule. I believe when you hear of guys frying corals with led lights it’s brcsuse the white channel is way up and that color seems to have a huge affect. I have no proof except seeing how my corals react but 100% white seems a lot more powerful than 100% blue/violet.

I run this on a tank with mostly zoas, shrooms, acans, blastos, monti caps, and some other odd balls.

If you start with a proven schedule you can at least eliminate one of the variables. Think water parameters, light, flow, and nutrients and not specifically in that order. They are all important and that is part of the fun doing this is finding the right balance between them all.

I’m sure if you post s full tank shot and all your water parameters you will get some more specific opinions.