6500 k to 10k halide bulbs

[amstar15]

okay I just got two 175 watt 10 k bulbs for my tank. since I can not raise my canopy nor raise and lower alot of my corals. do I just start out with smaller amounts of light time? say 7 hours for two days, 8 hours for two days, 9 hours for two days then end up at my 10 hour day?

 

[JJ1234567]

everything Ive read says to take screen and cut 7-14 layers of it and then remove one layer a day.

 

[Def]

Yeah, it's not light duration that shocks corals, it's changes in light intensity.

 

[Ed4567]

If you have gone from 6500k to 10000k then you will actually be decreasing the PAR output so no acclimatisation will be nessasary.

 

[amstar15]

they are so blue. when i took my other lights out they were not 65 k they were 5500k. so I went from very yellow to very blue (i have actinics on the tank as well) maybe the next time around I may go to the 65k and see the color there. or maybe the blue/white tint will grow on me

 

[Def]

no acclimatisation will be nessasary.

Hrm. I'm not convinced.

 

[Ed4567]

Hrm. I'm not convinced.

If you are decreasing the 'useful' (photosynthetically active) light reaching the corals by changing the lamps, why would you want to make the change greater by initially blocking some of the light?

 

[Def]

Yeah my bad, I got confused. The original post didn't mention a change in k, he just said he couldn't raise the new lamps. So I figured he'd just increased the lamp wattage, hence my bleaching/shock comment. Then you started talking about 6500k to 10000k and confused me totally, lol. How did you even know he'd made that change...

 

[amstar15]

sorry about the confusion. in my topic, I put 65oo k to 10k change. thats how they new. I did not lower, raise or change the time of the lamps and all of my corals look great. like i said though, i have to get to use to the bluer (is that a word) look to my tank. overall it still has a very nice look to the tank.

 

[Navarre]

I would still acclimatise even if choosing a higher K than the previous bulb. The reason for this is because you are increasing the UV rdiation to the corals and thus they need to acclimatise to this. As the bulb increases through 10k/14k/20k ect its moving closer to the blue spectrum and eventually Ultraviolet light. I could be wrong of course but i would prefer to accliamtise corals even if going higher in K

 

[superman]

The idea that you can simply assume that no acclimation is necessary is crazy. How old was the 5500k bulb? The 5500k bulb may have been older, and may not have had a very high PAR rating. The new 10,000k bulb may have a higher PAR rating than the 5500k bulb. Initial PAR output can be significantly higher during the initial "burn in" period a bulb goes through when it is first being used. In short, definitely slowly acclimate your corals to your new lighting. Your acclimation process will give the zoanthellae time to figure out which should be more dominant, and how much zoanthella will be needed.

 

[superman]

The idea that you can simply assume that no acclimation is necessary is crazy. How old was the 5500k bulb? The 5500k bulb may have been older, and may not have had a very high PAR rating. The new 10,000k bulb may have a higher PAR rating than the 5500k bulb. Initial PAR output can be significantly higher during the initial "burn in" period a bulb goes through when it is first being used. In short, definitely slowly acclimate your corals to your new lighting. Your acclimation process will give the zoanthellae time to figure out which should be more dominant, and how much zoanthella will be needed.

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Oh, and give the new lighting a chance to grow on you, I always tell customers to wait about 2 weeks before making an aesthetic decision on whether or not to keep a different color temp bulb.

 

[Ed4567]

Re: UV output. I'm not sure if higher K bulbs emit more UV, (they definatly would if they behaved as black bodies, but the K rating is only an approximation- otherwise a 50000K bulb would barely emit any visible light) but I hadn't thought of this.

This thread: http/reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.p...ght=aging+bulbs
and this site: http/www.personal.psu.edu/faculty/s/b/sb...alideLamps2.htm
show about a 20% decrease in PAR output over a year (fairly typical time period for bulb replacement).

If you then look at then PAR output of the Iwasaki (6500K) even after losing 20% intensity, it is still above the output for a new 10000K bulb (with the occasional exception of the XM10K bulb)
http/www.cnidarianreef.com/lamps.cfm shows clearly

Therefore I think that in the majority of cases, it is less stressful for corals to be placed straight under the new lamp than acclimitised which would actually increase the change in PAR output they experience.

edit: spelling

 

[amstar15]

would you still run your blue actinics on this tank now? with the 10k being so blue? i have 2 actinics that i have not been running at all. is this a good or bad idea? should i have them still come on before the halides and off after the halides?

 

[superman]

ED4567, Newbie15 wasn't using a 6500k bulb, he was using a 5500k bulb.
Newbie15, I would let the 10,000k bulb grow on you, to most of us in the hobby just running a 10,000k bulb is a little on the yellow end, and most of us then suppliment it with actinics. The lighitng schedule sounds good as you stated on before the halides, still on after the halides. How long are you keeping your halides on?