Ecotech Marine’s Radion XR30w wins the 2011 Reef Builders LED showdown

[cale262]

Originally Posted by MarkoD

Why am I having different results with my radion. A month with ai sols and everything was good. I put a radion on the right sideof my tank and kept ai sols on the left. I have my sols at 90% power and radion at 65% and wall my Zoe's under the radion have been closed for about a week now. I can't even tell if they're alive.

Last night i put radion on the far left and moved a sol to the far right. I'm gonna give it a week to see if anything rebounds

Maybe you have too much light coming from the Radion?...I went from a 200W PS BP LED fixture, to the two Radions...I ran the PS @ 90%, I put the Radions over the tank initially at 90% @ the same height and burnt a couple coral right away...I now run My Radions at a max Of 60% for about 3 hrs a day... everything is growing fast and happy.

[Zoaelite]

Originally Posted by MarkoD

Why am I having different results with my radion. A month with ai sols and everything was good. I put a radion on the right sideof my tank and kept ai sols on the left. I have my sols at 90% power and radion at 65% and wall my Zoe's under the radion have been closed for about a week now. I can't even tell if they're alive.

Those are peculiar results as the PAR test's I have read rank the AI to be higher than the Radion (Having the Radion @ a lower intensity should only compound this effect). If less light is getting to the zoas then they should become more expanded, they shouldn't close due to photo shock.

Anything else change in the tank or anything that could be irritating them? Have any photos?

Gah, I need a PAR meter to get some actual numbers here as what the box say's and what others are measuring seem to be different.

[unclesalty]

Originally Posted by MarkoD

Also I never intended to come across as saying that radions are garbage. I'm just saying that from my limited experience I've noticed more benefit from 2 ai sols than with 1 radion

I am not saying AI are garbage either. I was going to go with Vertex Illumina or AI until the Radions came into the picture and myself like many others prefer the Radion over the AI. Different strokes for different folks I guess one could say.

[MarkoD]

Originally Posted by zoaElite

Those are peculiar results as the PAR test's I have read rank the AI to be higher than the Radion (Having the Radion @ a lower intensity should only compound this effect). If less light is getting to the zoas then they should become more expanded, they shouldn't close due to photo shock.

Anything else change in the tank or anything that could be irritating them? Have any photos?

Gah, I need a PAR meter to get some actual numbers here as what the box say's and what others are measuring seem to be different.

I figured since radions are almost double the power of ai I'd lower it in the beginning. But I have Zoas in the tank just totally under the sols and they're wide open and expanding.

I guess in a few days I'll have my answer now that I've swapped the lights

I'll take photos tonight

[MarkoD]

Originally Posted by cale262

Maybe you have too much light coming from the Radion?...I went from a 200W PS BP LED fixture, to the two Radions...I ran the PS @ 90%, I put the Radions over the tank initially at 90% @ the same height and burnt a couple coral right away...I now run My Radions at a max Of 60% for about 3 hrs a day... everything is growing fast and happy.

Before any LEDs I had 4x250 mh and 4x 39 t5

[cale262]

Originally Posted by zoaElite

Gah, I need a PAR meter to get some actual numbers here as what the box say's and what others are measuring seem to be different.

I was going to buy a PAR meter but now I'm looking for a Spectrograph so I can measure the PUR which doesn't show up with the PAR meter...

[cale262]

Originally Posted by MarkoD

Before any LEDs I had 4x250 mh and 4x 39 t5

I was also running 250w MH and T5 before switching to the PS LED,...I started the PS fixture @ 50% and slowly worked my way up to the 90%...then I assumed the Radion was less W Than the PS and there should be no shock when switching the two LED fixtures as previously stated above...I was wrong... LED's are really new in this hobby and from what I have read, we are making a mistake by measuring LED fixtures with PAR....PAR undergrades the blue light spectrums and focus's more on the white/yellows...Higher end LED's used for reef lighting have no yellow as fould in traditional lighting (MH, T5, PC etc) thus measuring in PAR is old tech and not the correct tool for the job when measuring LED...this is also why less expensive 1W LED show more PAR, they have more yellow spectrum to measure yet this yellow is not usable light in reef corals...I think we'll see more about PUR (as oposed to PAR) as the LED fixtures become more common place in this hobby...


Stolen quote:

PUR (Photosynthetically Usable Radiation) also known as "Useful Light Energy" is what concerns us as aquarium keepers even considerably more than PAR in providing correct lighting (yet provides a lot of confusion, especially when considering LED Lights).
PUR is that fraction of PAR that is absorbed by zooxanthellae photopigments thereby stimulating photosynthesis. As noted above, PUR are those wavelengths falling between 400-550nm and 620-740nm.
Generally a Spectrograph is used to rate PUR (these are much more expensive than a PAR meter, with the result of many falsely considering PAR and ignoring the more important PUR.)

[Nano]

Originally Posted by cale262

I was also running 250w MH and T5 before switching to the PS LED,...I started the PS fixture @ 50% and slowly worked my way up to the 90%...then I assumed the Radion was less W Than the PS and there should be no shock when switching the two LED fixtures as previously stated above...I was wrong... LED's are really new in this hobby and from what I have read, we are making a mistake by measuring LED fixtures with PAR....PAR undergrades the blue light spectrums and focus's more on the white/yellows...Higher end LED's used for reef lighting have no yellow as fould in traditional lighting (MH, T5, PC etc) thus measuring in PAR is old tech and not the correct tool for the job when measuring LED...this is also why less expensive 1W LED show more PAR, they have more yellow spectrum to measure yet this yellow is not usable light in reef corals...I think we'll see more about PUR (as oposed to PAR) as the LED fixtures become more common place in this hobby...


Stolen quote:

So how do you really measure the light then if par is irrelevant? I am just wondering cause I am getting an AI for my new tank, and going from t5's to AI will be a huge change, I know I have to start it low, but how low is low lol? might seem like a dumb question

[Zoaelite]

Thanks for the post Cale, that clears up some misconceptions in my head!

[doch]

Originally Posted by MarkoD

It's a feature that someone who's "new" to the hobby or not in the hobby at all would think is cool, when in fact it's a novelty and pointless.

For examples: lightning storm. All your friends that don't know much about reef tanks would say "wow, that's so amazing".....

It's been the opposite in my world. Every person that I've demonstrated the lightning storms to has looked at me like there's something wrong. Then when I explain, several have asked if the fish are harmed by this. Uhhh.... pretty sure there is lightning in nature.