[kimoyo]

Quote: Originally Posted by gnatp2 Also I would like to say that I agree that there are MANY other important factors (nutrient levels, spectrum, etc...) that are extremely vital as well for good coral growth and coloration, but it seems that an obvious and simple factor has got to be a reasonable amount of PAR hitting the corals. Many times the basics get overlooked.

Nate,

If you blast corals with light you can cause oxidative stress which leads to zoox breakdown and loss. About a year ago it was pointed out to me by ebby and solbby that this isn't a good thing or a healthy state for any living organism. There is a line but blasting corals with light to make up for an increased zoox population is not a good idea.

Going back, sunlight produces white light, basically a whole bunch of different wavelengths of light. But when sunlight hits water, the water molecules actually absorb the energy converting it into heat, except for the bluer spectrum. Why is this important?? well most corals seem to like blue light, probably because its what they get. Its also why you see a lot of people using 20K bulbs.

So what is that you see when your looking at the colors of corals? It's either reflected or fluoresced light, either the coral took in the light and spit it back out or it took in the light, took a little of its energy and spit it back out at a different color and its a quantum process. So why is this important?? there's two topics your talking about here. One is what the coral needs to survive and what the coral needs to have great color. You don't need a bunch of par to have great colors, its the opposite, blasting corals with a huge amout of par can be bad for them. Whats important is that you have a low nutrient system where the zoox don't eat a lot and the corals get fat and turn brown. Then you don't have to blast them with light so they become bulimic throwing up the zoox. And at the same time you need the right spectrum of light hitting the corals so they flouresce these beautiful colors. Even more than that, when you get to a certain par, corals shut down and stop doing photosynthesis. Any of the light the coral is not using is just heating up your tank.

Ask yourself, why are you using 400W 10K bulbs to get so-so colors when others can use 150W 14K bulbs and get amazing colors?

[gnatp2]

I got rid of my dual 400W PFO ballast, spider reflectors and EVC bulbs. I switched it over to 2 400W coralvue ballast with lumenarcs using reeflux bulbs. The tank looks a bit darker to me overall. BUT when testing with my light meter, the par in the tank is at least double what it was before. While re-doing my hood, I broke one of my t5 bulbs, so I'll be waiting a couple days before putting those back in there. I'm hoping that the newly added par will improve the coral coloration. I'll hopefully post in a week or two with any results.

If anything, I at least upgraded to pretty pink ballasts.

Nate

[kimoyo]

Good stuff on the lumenarcs!

The reason the tank seems darker is because light diverges/spreads and the lumenarcs focus the light better than most other reflectors in the hobby. What color bulbs you using?

If you keep working at it and hopefully get your nutrients low, your corals will start to fade and you'll need to raise your reflectors, which is why I suggested 250's. It will just be too much light and raising the light will help to spread the light outside the tank into the room and let the light react more with the air. It happened to a lot of people on this board when they switch over to barebottom and got low nutrient systems. They wound up cutting their lighting cycles down (with 250's) because their corals were getting pale.

Goodluck with it though!

[gnatp2]

Thanks Paul. Strange thing is that I've had a low nutrient system for at least 2 months now. (nitrates have always been <1 for at least 6 months and phosphates have been <.03 for 2 months. around .06-.1 the 3 months before that).

Anyway, we'll see how it goes!
Nate

[kimoyo]

Quote: Originally Posted by gnatp2 Thanks Paul. Strange thing is that I've had a low nutrient system for at least 2 months now. (nitrates have always been <1 for at least 6 months and phosphates have been <.03 for 2 months. around .06-.1 the 3 months before that).

That is not a low nutrient system!

If you get a zero reading on your phosphates test you still have phosphates in your tank.

Ask jackson6475 what a low nutrient system is or do a search on the forum and you'll find tons of info. There were a bunch of threads about this last year.

[gnatp2]

i use a hanna meter. i read 0 on the salifert piece of crap.

i don't know of anyone who consistantly gets <.03 in the hanna besides chris.

[kimoyo]

Quote: Originally Posted by gnatp2 i use a hanna meter. i read 0 on the salifert piece of crap. i don't know of anyone who consistantly gets <.03 in the hanna besides chris.

Having a low nutrient system isn't a necessary thing, I just know you have mentioned you wanted your nutrients lower before. There are many different ways to do things. That being said, there are a lot of reefers who get 0 on the hanna meter but that doesn't matter. The only thing a hanna meter or salifert phosphate test can do is give you a starting point. They tell you nothing about organic phosphates which is what ultimately matters and varies with every tank regardless if you get a zero on a test. Also, nitrates play a role and those need to at least be zero on the hobby test also.

Seriously, there are a lot of good threads from last year in this forum that go over this stuff if your interested in it. Just do a search.

[kimoyo]

Quote: Originally Posted by Deanos How much light? Water flow is more important for corals than light, Part V Water flow is more important for corals than light, Part IV Water flow is more important for corals than light, Part III Water flow is more important for corals than light, Part II Water flow is more important for corals than light, Part I

Nate have you read these article yet? Here's a quote from part III,

"Having a better knowledge of the environmental factors that make corals healthier can help aquarists grow corals faster and it might help us to understand the care requirements of still difficult species such as Goniopora and Dendronepthya. More importantly, a better understanding of the synergy between water flow speed and lighting intensity can help aquarists make better informed decisions about the equipment they should employ for their aquariums. Coming back to one of the first things I discussed in this article series, aquarists often put much more effort into considerations for lighting than water flow. As you can see from figure 7, if an aquarists provides very high light intensities but fails to deliver an equivalent water flow speed, instead of benefiting it is more likely that their corals will suffer from photoinhibition stress. The excessive lighting equipment will not yield the desired increase in growth rate but instead it will likely cause an increased heat input to the aquarium, increased algae growth and a considerable waste of money and energy. If you take nothing else from this article series just remember that:
The more light a coral receives, the more flow it will need"

What's your flow in your tank like now? Have you increased it as your increasing lighting?

[jackson6745]

Quote: Originally Posted by gnatp2 So I've been on a quest to get better colors out of my corals and had moderate success, but I do have a ways to go. My current focus of improvement is the lighting of my tank. I recently went with a new sump as well as a new 150W MH Icecap pendant for it. I have placed a couple frags down in my frag grow out area and have noticed that they "lighten up" significantly (it appears to me that much of the brown zooxanthaellae go away and either the coral is bleaching or starting to show better colors). On my main tank I am using a 400W dual PFO ballast with 2 EVC 10K bulbs hooked into spider reflectors. I also have 2 T5 actinic bulbs as well. My question is...... How much PAR or PPFD should my sps corals be getting? In my sump it seemed to me that they were getting significantly MORE lighting than my main tank. Well, I went out and bought a light meter to confirm this suspicion. My sump light is producing 1200 PPFD (reading taken 4" under the water) while my main tank lighting is only producing 300 PPFD (also taken under 4" of water). I've read that during the summer at noon, the sun produces around 2000 PPFD and 1500 PPFD during the winter. I've also read from Sanjay's website that most bulbs produce 90 PPFD or so.... Yes, no typos in these numbers which is why I'm confused. I've searched around but found no answers so far on what the ideal PPFD is that should be hitting corals. Obviously the answer will be different coral by coral, but I'd like to get a general idea. Can anyone educate me? Nate

Nate, I have no idea on the best PPFD levels, IMO this makes very little difference in color as long as you have decent lighting. If this an issue about coral colors I can tell you that the overly yellow 400w EVC 10ks is not helping your situation. 2 actinics is not enough to offset these bulbs. With lighting that strong you will have a lot of coral acclimating to do, and as you know not all corals will respond the same way. This lighting will kind of wash away your colors.

My advice to you would be to copy what works. These are undisputed "best" lighting systems of great tanks. Why reinvent the wheel? Copy what works.

250w 10kXM Icecap ballasts + 2-4 T5 or VHO actinics i.e. Pecan2phat, JBNY, Calireef, lousimustdie etc..(I used BLV's insted of the XM'S)

400w Reeflux 10k Icecap or coralvue ballast + 2-4 actinics. i.e. Tony Acropora, Stan Mucha, MR's current TOTS Twinreef ( I used this lighting for 4 months)

400W Radiums HQI ballast + actinics. There are MANY MANY tanks using this lighting and I never heard one bad thing besides the expense of bulb replacements.

If you can't get color using these lighting systems then lighting is not the issue.

HTH FWIW

	Manhattan Reefs Manhattan Reefs, the best aquarium community on Planet Earth!

	MH Metal Halide Lighting, typically used for high intensity light demanding corals such as SPS. Bulbs come in varieties of spectrums (7k, 10k,20k), and intensity (175W, 250W, 400W).

	SPS Small Polyped Scleractinians - Sometimes known as Small Polyped Stony corals. These are hard corals that have extremely small polyps. They are typically on the difficult side and require Metal Halide lighting or dense Power Compact or T5 arrays. These corals are prized for their rareness and ability to be easily fragged into multiple colonies.

	VHO Very High Output Fluorescent Lighting - Fluorescent bulbs that run on special ballasts and have an output that is significantly higher than normal tubes. It is very possible to run an entire reef system on VHO lighting providing the proper number of bulbs and mixture of spectrums are chosen. For most hobbyists, these tubes are used in conjunction with Metal Halide lighting for simulating dawn and dusk. They often provide the "bluer" end of the light spectrum and thus a more aesthetically appealing display.

[Deanos]

Quote: Originally Posted by jackson6745 If you can't get color using these lighting systems then lighting is not the issue.