Light acclimation

[Miah2bzy]

Moving a bunch of Zoas and some montis from a 120 watt full spec led that's been running blues 11-7 and whites 12-6 for a year now to a tank w 2x150watt metal halides. Any suggestions on how to acclimate them to the new lights w/out burning them up? Putting Zoas on bottom, monticaps midway and the digis up top (rock will extend to about 3/4 up the tank. Thanks!

 

[fishguy69]

Depends on how high the LEDs were running (100% or what?). If you were running at full strength I would say move things a little lower than normal and then just watch for a week or so.

V

 

[Shaunv]

Also, run a shorter photoperiod for example, 4 hours. After about 3-4 weeks, ramp up the photoperiod by an hour a week until you reach your desired photoperiod.

 

[Miah2bzy]

Depends on how high the LEDs were running (100% or what?). If you were running at full strength I would say move things a little lower than normal and then just watch for a week or so.

V

Blue 100%, whites 50%.

 

[fishguy69]

Agree with Shaun about the exposure time.

 

[jda123]

Just do it. The LED will probably have less than half the radiated watts that the MH does.

 

[Shaunv]

I have melted stuff with my LED's by not doing an acclimation. But I have also had some be fine. So, if you don't want to risk it, I'd do an acclimation.

 

[zombie]

You can also put a screen like material on top of the tank in several sheets (enough to cut brightness in half) using the same or reduced photoperiod. Every week, remove one layer until you are up to full brightness.

 

[sethsolomon]

Just do it. The LED will probably have less than half the radiated watts that the MH does.

+1 I doubt you will cook anything swapping from LED to 150 halides. Just keep an eye on them and move them accordingly.


+1 to reduce the halide exposure time to 4 hours a day or so.

 

[Walter White]

for what its worth when I switched from my Radion to a 250mh I started out at 4 hours a day and used three sheets of window screen to dim the light. One thing I didnt know at the time of switching was that Halide puts off more lumens per par than led does so it appeared much much brighter to me and freaked me out. I was thinking OMG if my LEDs where that bright id be cooking everything so I assumed so would be the case with MH. I acclimated over 6 weeks first pulling off one screen a week then after all the screens were off I increased my light duration by 1 hour per week until I was at 7 hours.

I took the ultra safe route but now that I have been running them for awhile I'm fairly certain I could have just made the switch with no issues. Even taking sps corals from other LED tanks, I just plop them right in only about 14 inches below the halide and they perk up right away.

 

[jda123]

Typically, it is the bad light that you are acclimating the corals to. Under certain light, they need time to develop the "sunscreen" to protect themselves, if they can at all. The 150W phoenix doesn't have much bad spectrum so you should be fine.

This is why I would just plop them in under the 150s. Put them low if it makes you feel better.

I just plop stuff under my lights now Bag => dip => tank in about 10 minutes with no light acclimation.

 

[Walter White]

"I just plop stuff under my lights now Bag => dip => tank in about 10 minutes with no light acclimation."

Yup thats pretty much how i do now as well. Been working great so far. I find when i take corals from mh there is seemless transition. However coming from led i dont get bleaching but there usuually is some color change that occures at least in sps. I suppose that is to be expected. I find that sps from led sometimes brows out slightly for a few weeks then colors up again. This is just my experience however.