Ok so just a quick background I have a 27 gallon cube with a 6 gallon sump... I am keeping LPS and SPS...A couple days ago I switched from a 150w MH Phoenix 14k to 165 watt LED's... They are dimmable so I plan on slowly increasing intensity... I tried starting it at 50% and everything seems fine except my spongodes that was a great lime green color has paled out... My question is how many days should I wait before increasing intensity.. should it be a week at 50% and then a week at 60% and then 70 and so on? Or should it be more or less? I dont want to burn everything as the LEDS are much more powerful then the MH's... If anyone who has done the switch can throw me a little guidance I would really appreciate it..
-
Folks, if you've recently upgraded or renewed your annual club membership but it's still not active, please reach out to the BOD or a moderator. The PayPal system has a slight bug which it doesn't allow it to activate the account on it's own.
Acclimating corals to led's
- Thread starter Brizjuan
- Start date
You might have to run at 50% that is a lot of wattage for a small system. 60 to 70 watt would be good for your system
The spongodes is at the bottom of the tank... I turned it down to about 35% so well see what happens... I know the light is overkill... Its really for my 120 gallon I am switching everything over to in august... Of course I was impatient and couldnt wait to see what kind of coloration I got out of my sps.. If I start at 35% how often should I be increasing the intensity?
Yea, start around 35%. I'd suggest increasing only about 5% after first week, then 10% each week after that.
Another thing that will affect this is how high off the water are the leds mounted? I'd recommend at least 12" above water level. If not that high, then I wouldn't go over 50%... ever!
Another thing that will affect this is how high off the water are the leds mounted? I'd recommend at least 12" above water level. If not that high, then I wouldn't go over 50%... ever!
why do you say that? as long as the corals are acclimated to higher light most are fine. my spongodes is 4in under water went from 6 t5 to 180watts leds no problems.
brian if you need another frag of it to try let me know.
+1 to this
Even though par meters dont measure leds 100% accurately I think every led fixture should come with one. I think too many times people think that since they were running 300w's of t5's or mh that when they get a 150w led fixture that it needs to be set at 100%. You are so right when you say every tank is different. Rock structures will vary...one side of my tank looks brighter than the other side and its becuase of the amount of rock I have, water flow will also change your par numbers....when I turn my pumps off and my lights are at 100% I get par readings of 350 on my sand bed but as soon as the pumps come back on I drop to 275, the type of led the fixture uses will create huge differences as well...and the list goes on and on.
If you start low and gradually increase the intensity you are giving your corals the opportunity to adjust slowly and speak to you. A lot of guys that have been in the hobby a while will say they can just look at the tank and know something isnt right....the tank is talking to you. I have peaked out at 85% on my fixture because I noticed that when I crossed over things just didnt "look right" to me and shortly after backing back down to 85% things looked better in a few days.
Of course this is just my honest opinion and sharing my very recent experience with LED's and not to be taken as fact....LOL.