No, the radium bottom measurment was at 18.5" the 10000K was at 27" I expect that the radium will be around 100 PAR at 27" this is why I am using 12" as the standard not a deeper one .. as you can't compare 27" in all tanks but 12" can be.. for PAR levels the 10000K is higher all around.. the difference is in what the owner wants.. do you like a overall "Blue" look or do you want a white look with blue highlights.. ect...

I am starting to develope my own theory on color of the corals and it seams to me it is more reliant on ALK than light (as long as the min lighting requirments are met) I have seen this in my own tank.. color increase dramaticly with no change in light but a large change in Alk, and I think Brad is starting to wonder the same things... I have always stated that I don't beleive that light is the major factor, just take a look at all the different types of lights on tanks that have wonderfull color.. there is no end to the combanation and seams to be no rhym or reason when it comes to looking at lights alone.. Hmm maby this is material for another thread / poll

Steve

Tony, FYI, Adam and I do have halves of the same frag. I believe they are in similar positions relative to the light, so we can keep track of this experiment.

If you wouldn't mind, post your observations and pictures (if any), as time goes on. I would be very interested to see how things progress! Thanks

which frag is that Brad, I just took a bunch of shots of Adams tank with the proper white ballance.. I could come set up for your tank and take one, then we have a even playing ground that will take out any artifical high lighting caused by the color of the lights.

Steve

Steve, the green tipped fuzzy guy....the one Adam thinks is a table :P

well, I just got back from Brad's place whare I had the chance to test the 400 watt 20000K radiums on the san agro ballast.. there was some interesting results and ones I didn't expect personaly.

just for some background, the 400 watt Radium on Adams tank (run off of a normal PFO ballast had a PAR value of 343.09 @ 12"

first visualy, the bulbs looked a little more white running on the Son Agro ballast than on the regular PFO ballast

as for actual PAR Values on the new ballast the result was strange.. on the Son Agro ballast it had a PAR value of 356.202 @ 12"

yup almost no increase in PAR. the only explanation I can come up with for this is that maby by overdriving it a bit, it shifts the over all color spectrum up to make it a little more white. In doing this the blue is decreased a bit which drops the PAR levels, as blue is a large player in the PAR game.

just for a reference for people thinking of upgrading there lights, my Ushio 175 watt 10000K MH bulb puts out 262.14 PAR @ 12" so a 400 watt Radium would be a step up, but not as much as I would have expected.

anyways here are a couple comparason pics.. the first one is the Ushio on the left and the Radium on the right. the secon pic is all radium.

http://members.shaw.ca/islandaquatics/ushio_radium1.jpg

http://members.shaw.ca/islandaquatics/allradium.jpg

as a disclamer it doen't look that "Blue" in person, and I think this is why I have disliked all the pics of radium tanks so far, is that the amount of blue in them plays havoc with digital cameras ( I have to admidt that when I get used to the inital blue haze that there is in real life I actualy find the color pleasing.. so much in fact that I am debating on going this way myself).

The only way you are going to get a nice pic though, is to redo the heck out of it with a photo program or set the white ballance to cancle out the blue and show the true colors as I did on the pics of One_Divided's tank. The only problem with doing this is you do cancle the slight blue haze you would see in real life, but it does give you the "actual" colors of the corals.

so what other conclusing can be drawen from this? well I have a opinion that I will share.. for starters I do not belive going to a radium from another 400 watt bulb will give you better growth, nor do I believe that it will make your corals color up more, what I DO believe is that it is more asteticly pleasing while still providing enough light for good growth, what I also believe is that the large amount of actinic light in the bulb makes the colors stand out more and the corals that have Fluorescent properties it will make them glow a little more with the more intense light.. this would normaly not stand out in a 10000K set up unless you had intense actinic suplament that can over power the white of a 10000K.

anyways that is just my opinions that I have formed sofar and I will quite rambling now so you all can see the post :lol:

Steve

Ya, that's a fair amount bluer than it really is. FWIW, I'll be switching to this combo as soon as I can. It is the nicest looking light I've seen. It may not be for everyone, but for me, it's light changing time. Anyone wanna buy a 10k bulb? or 2? :D

So I've got a question about par values.
So the 10000 bulbs put out 262.14 PAR at 12"
The radium puts out 343.09

Where does an Iwasaki sit in all this?

I guess I ask this cause when It comes time to change my bulbs, If I go to 10000 bulbs I would like to know the diffrence it's going to make on my tank compared to my Iwasaki setup.

Thanks

Jon, the 175 10k puts out 262, not the 400w

that is a 175 watt 10K and a 400 watt radium, the 250 watt iwasaki will probably be around the same as the radium, but not having tested on I am not sure.

Steve