Radium metal halide bulbs will not be produced anymore!

[jda]

I also have never understood why LED people want MH to go away. I could argue that nothing has made LED companies innovate more than MH have. More spread, better coverage, better blending of color. The apps all suck - maybe somebody besides Sifolgi should have had apps and maybe LED apps and software would all be better. Heat has come down on MH in the last decade and LEDs have nearly all gone up in power at an attempt to avoid multiple units to cover the same area.

It seems to me that LED folks should want MH to stick around to continue to drive improvements.

I have seen some talk of mercury - bulbs do need to be recycled. However, the use and toss panels are not exactly super environmentally friendly. Most cannot be fixed and are as disposable as plastic water bottles. Nobody should throw any stones here... nobody.

 

[A. grandis]

I don't think this time I have anything to add to what @jda said here.
Thanks very much, @jda!
If @crit21 has any questions he can ask directly to Dana!
I think people are starting to get that I'm not too worried about discussing what's better to whoever anymore. What I wrote in post #303 was enough to understand about the subject and to correct.

 

[Nonya]

I'm definitely happy. Yes, I'm definitely biased based on my personal education, growth and success in the obsession (hobby).

I'm growing high end SPS under blue, royal blue, violet and a few near-UV LEDs. The tank is 48" long. Right now they're at full intensity I'm running at 348 watts, including 30 watts of fans. Right now I'm using clustered groups of emitters. I'll be converting to a wide array to improve coverage and eliminate the need for fans. There is no way halides could do this with 350 watts, right?

Anyway, I'm sorry that the halide lovers are running low on options. Time to hoard?

 

[jda]

I don't know. I would have to see your tank and take some PAR readings. I have grown and documented decade plus of high end SPS growth under 150w HQI. If you are doing it with 348 watts, then you could do it with 348w of MH and fans too... 300w of MH and a 20w fan. The argument that you can use less wattage of LED to do the same thing mostly ended 6-10 years ago. If you replaced 400w halides and 5x T5s, then the 348w is less but the usage was dumb in the first place and you never needed that much.

How about some photos of this 48 inch tank and high end SPS. I put mine out there... showed my work. Most of what I see when people post about this is some monits, easy acropora and some birdsnest. Most folks with corals beyond this are using the same wattage, or more, of LEDs... like 2x Hydra 64s or xr30s over a tank where I would use a single 250w Halide, for example.

 

[jda]

The reason that I ask for photos is to look at coral types and sizes. If not really shadowing or are low light, at 70w MH can do more than a prime or kessil can. Energy savings there. Bulb/fixture choices are slim and 70w MH might not be a good ongoing selection, but if just talking about energy, then there is a good discussion to be had.

 

[Nonya]

I also have never understood why LED people want MH to go away. I could argue that nothing has made LED companies innovate more than MH have. More spread, better coverage, better blending of color. The apps all suck - maybe somebody besides Sifolgi should have had apps and maybe LED apps and software would all be better. Heat has come down on MH in the last decade and LEDs have nearly all gone up in power at an attempt to avoid multiple units to cover the same area.

It seems to me that LED folks should want MH to stick around to continue to drive improvements.

I have seen some talk of mercury - bulbs do need to be recycled. However, the use and toss panels are not exactly super environmentally friendly. Most cannot be fixed and are as disposable as plastic water bottles. Nobody should throw any stones here... nobody.

I don't know of any anti-halide groups. I wouldn't be a member of them. As far as apps, I'm not a fan. It was fun at first, and I've experimented with them enough to realize they aren't all that helpful. I have my spectrum fixed. The only thing I control is the photoperiod and changes in intensity. The rest is pretty much hype, I agree.

I'm not so certain that halides contributed that much to LED development. By their nature, LEDs produce less heat, provide the most flexibility in spectrum and intensity, and run cooler (when not over-driven).

The biggest driver to commercial LED luminaire "features" are the ability to change intensity and spectrum. The result has been a lot of experimentation by the hobby. Some manufacturers have increased the output intensity, and even focused on increasing the blue spectrum.

We live in a throw-away society. That's just the way it is. As far as reparability, I can easily troubleshoot, repair or replace failed LEDs, drivers, power supplies and fans on my own. Most users wouldn't try, though. What part of an electronic ballast is reparable? I used to build/repair my own magnetic ballasts when I used MH. Simple technology.

 

[minus9]

I’m pretty sure I was using 14k bulbs in the late 90’s and there’s plenty of blue in the 6500k bulb, it’s just masked by the higher spectrum. I’m not sure why people fight/argue over lighting so much? Just because a certain lighting technology isn’t relevant to you, doesn’t make it irrelevant to others. Also, lighting doesn’t cause algae issues, bad husbandry does. Algae and coral desire the same conditions to grow.

 

[Nonya]

I don't know. I would have to see your tank and take some PAR readings. I have grown and documented decade plus of high end SPS growth under 150w HQI. If you are doing it with 348 watts, then you could do it with 348w of MH and fans too... 300w of MH and a 20w fan. The argument that you can use less wattage of LED to do the same thing mostly ended 6-10 years ago. If you replaced 400w halides and 5x T5s, then the 348w is less but the usage was dumb in the first place and you never needed that much.

How about some photos of this 48 inch tank and high end SPS. I put mine out there... showed my work. Most of what I see when people post about this is some monits, easy acropora and some birdsnest. Most folks with corals beyond this are using the same wattage, or more, of LEDs... like 2x Hydra 64s or xr30s over a tank where I would use a single 250w Halide, for example.

 

[jda]

The monti, poci/stylo and LPS are fine corals. There is no doubt that 150w MH alone could grow these out of the tank - 2x over a 48 inch tank. All of those could probably have more color to pop if you added in 4-5 hours of daylight when you are not viewing them.

 

[Nonya]

The monti, poci/stylo and LPS are fine corals. There is no doubt that 150w MH alone could grow these out of the tank - 2x over a 48 inch tank. All of those could probably have more color to pop if you added in 4-5 hours of daylight when you are not viewing them.

There's no monti there. The first is an Ultimate Milli (pink, blue, green) and a raspbery milli. The brain coral is 6" in diameter.

I have a multitude of blastos, digis, various unnamed acros, cyphastreas, a few other millis, unidentified encrusting, etc. There are some "brand name" in the tank, but I don't pay attention to that They didn't "create" them.

 

[Troylee]

The monti, poci/stylo and LPS are fine corals. There is no doubt that 150w MH alone could grow these out of the tank - 2x over a 48 inch tank. All of those could probably have more color to pop if you added in 4-5 hours of daylight when you are not viewing them.

This!!! My corals sit under 14k halides all day and my goal is perfect color under those! Guess what happens when the sun goes down and the blues come on?!?!? Bingo! Your corals might look great under blues as almost any does but get them legit under daylight and watch the blue at night!

 

[jda]

I meant mille. Sorry. I will leave it in there to show how stupid I am. That actually looked like Prostata to me, but they are the same as millepora now, so I gotta get with the times.

In any case, unless your tank is four feet deep and you are using like super narrow lenses, the same wattage of MH or likely T5 could do the same thing.

 

[Nonya]

I don't know. I would have to see your tank and take some PAR readings. I have grown and documented decade plus of high end SPS growth under 150w HQI. If you are doing it with 348 watts, then you could do it with 348w of MH and fans too... 300w of MH and a 20w fan. The argument that you can use less wattage of LED to do the same thing mostly ended 6-10 years ago. If you replaced 400w halides and 5x T5s, then the 348w is less but the usage was dumb in the first place and you never needed that much.

How about some photos of this 48 inch tank and high end SPS. I put mine out there... showed my work. Most of what I see when people post about this is some monits, easy acropora and some birdsnest. Most folks with corals beyond this are using the same wattage, or more, of LEDs... like 2x Hydra 64s or xr30s over a tank where I would use a single 250w Halide, for example.

My PAR sensor, like some others, under-measures PAR in the blue-violet region. I wouldn't fathom a guess, but since increasing by 75W a few months ago the corals have looked much happier.

 

[jda]

I have kept every one of those corals under 1000+ PAR from MH. I have no doubt that while they don't need that much light (and thus sugars/energy) they can do good things with it when they get more. I have kept millepora and styos (and many others) outside under the sunlight in Missouri and the growth and color was astounding... this was 1700+ PAR for me. When I brought the millepora back in as the weather turned cold, they were stunning under 14k halides with a bit more blue.

 

[Nonya]

I meant mille. Sorry. I will leave it in there to show how stupid I am. That actually looked like Prostata to me, but they are the same as millepora now, so I gotta get with the times.

In any case, unless your tank is four feet deep and you are using like super narrow lenses, the same wattage of MH or likely T5 could do the same thing.

I would never call it stupid. I really lost the desire to keep up with the scientific delineations. I was told they were millis--they may actually prostratas. I have no need to dispute. I've gotten to the point where I just say, "I'll take the blue one with pink polyps", and hope for the best.

 

[Nonya]

Oops. Accidental post.

 

[Nonya]

My electric and heating oil bills are high enough as it is. I'm sure 1,000 watts would smoke my entire tank. I'm very happy with what I've got, just as you and Grandis are with halides.

My tank is bursting at the seams with colonies and frags. I'm getting ready to break out the welder(s) and go really big.

 

[TaylorPilot]

I don't know. I would have to see your tank and take some PAR readings. I have grown and documented decade plus of high end SPS growth under 150w HQI. If you are doing it with 348 watts, then you could do it with 348w of MH and fans too... 300w of MH and a 20w fan. The argument that you can use less wattage of LED to do the same thing mostly ended 6-10 years ago. If you replaced 400w halides and 5x T5s, then the 348w is less but the usage was dumb in the first place and you never needed that much.

How about some photos of this 48 inch tank and high end SPS. I put mine out there... showed my work. Most of what I see when people post about this is some monits, easy acropora and some birdsnest. Most folks with corals beyond this are using the same wattage, or more, of LEDs... like 2x Hydra 64s or xr30s over a tank where I would use a single 250w Halide, for example.

That is right. And what most people don't understand is that a watt is a watt...They think that 400 watts of LED produces less heat than 400 watts of MH...they don't, they produce the exact same amount...if they are both running 400 watts, they are both releasing 1364 BTU...same thing with pumps...I have seen guys who swore that two different pumps pulling the same wattage are heating their water differently...it's impossible...

 

[Yanir34]

Those SPS looks good ...but this SPS are definitely not high-end corals. Also , growth patterns of SPS that is grown under LED's are weird.

 

[Nonya]

Those SPS looks good ...but this SPS are definitely not high-end corals. Also , growth patterns of SPS that is grown under LED's are weird.

Yeah, that tri-color Ultimate Mille is junk, right? So is the softball size brain. I'm not going to paste pics of the whole collection here. Gimme a break.