*Reef Breeders Photon v2 and T5 installation, testing, and review*

[jason2459]

Lets see if this makes any sense

With just the dual 80watt coral plus which are themselves slightly less then 5'

Location : PAR

On the sand
Center of the tank 80
Along Front glass center 59
Along Front glass end corner 29
End of tank along Side glass middle 38

Half way up the tank
Center of tank 100
Center along front glass 60
Along Front glass end corner 25
End of tank along side glass 40

[iced98lx]

that makes total sense thank you VERY much for the information, it is very helpful.

[jason2459]

RBTAs keep looking better and better every day. But something that I didn't think was having any issues actually look the best I've ever seen them.

My red mushrooms. They seem fuller or something. Not so much a color change.



Par right there was low 80s with no T5s. But I think that's before I went up 2 more %. I have to stop taking par readings. I'm getting overloaded with data. It's been addicting.

I don't plan to increase intensity at all anymore but get my bulb/led spectrum figured out. Then I'll get more par numbers. For now I think I'm good there.

[jason2459]

Amazing what a change lighting can make. Everything is really starting to look better.

Cyano is getting cut back




Fiji yellow is starting to look fuller like the mushrooms


Bubble tips are filling out again now that they aren't stretching up and coloring up well


The branching sps and and lps on the sand are still pale

[jason2459]

WOW! The 5watt Cree Royal Blues are awesome! I didn't notice this before either because I missed it or my anemones are REALLY starting to color up.

I have never seen my Bubble tips glow like this under blue lights. The Anemones are ready for night time and they do some funny stuff sometimes. Usually though not anywhere as full as during the day and sometimes all puffed up at the base.

This is with 1% Channel 3 Royal Blues only. And it's even more impressive in person!



The selection of LEDs used in the Photon V2s is one of the reasons I went with them over other fixtures in this price range as well. They are basically high end fixture type LEDs. No Epi or Bridgelux LEDs. Epi being slightly better of the two but the Cree, Osram, and Semi in their specific wavelengths are better. From what I've researched at least.

And right now I'm very happy.

[Ron Reefman]

The first pic in post #29... is that a toy submarine on the bottom?

[jason2459]

Originally Posted by Ron Reefman

The first pic in post #29... is that a toy submarine on the bottom?

Yes, yes it is. It was a Christmas gift from my son so it gets front and center attention.

[jason2459]

Originally Posted by jason2459, post: 3587966, member: 56516

Relevant question on T5 PAR spread.



Lets see if this makes any sense

With just the dual 80watt coral plus which are themselves slightly less then 5'

Location : PAR

On the sand
Center of the tank 80
Along Front glass center 59
Along Front glass end corner 29
End of tank along Side glass middle 38

Half way up the tank
Center of tank 100
Center along front glass 60
Along Front glass end corner 25
End of tank along side glass 40

[/QUOTE]


I got my ATI Blue+ and True Actinics in and finalized on Blue+ and True Actinic. 2 Blue+ bulbs was to much windex blue for me. The True Actinic seems to tone it down.

The Blue+ actually brought up the PAR a bit. The Coral+ bulbs were only about 2 months old so don't think par would have dropped on them.

On the Sand Par center of tank is 85 and half way up 110.

[jason2459]

Played around with the settings and will see how the tank reacts. I ilike the colors. so I'm happy but lets see if everything else is. I'm gong to set the Seneye in the tank and get readings through out the day tomorrow.

One of my favorite time settins right now is amazingly with the white channel mixed with the royal blue channels at 10am and 10pm. The warm white with the deep royal blue is very nice looking. The warm whites help balance the blue+ bulbs too during the hours the T5's are on.

Here's the settings I have logged right now. Ramping up to a peak at 4pm and back down mirroring the previous hours. I'm just shooting from the hip here and seeing what happens.

Channel 1 Deep Red Osram 3watt 660nm
Channel 2 Green Semi LED 3watt 520nm
Channel 3 Royal Blue Cree XT-E 5watt 450nm
Channel 4 White Cree XP-E 5watt 5500K
Channel 5 Cool Blue Cree XP-E 3watt 480nm
Channel 6 Violet Semi LED 3watt 420nm

Dual Hamilton Aruba Sun V w/ 80watt ATI down the middle
True Actinic + Blue+

Lunar Lights on from 12pm to 9am (separate lunar led modules)

%s Ch1, Ch2, Ch3, Ch4, Ch5, Ch6
9 am 0,0, 2, 0, 0, 0
10am 0,0, 6, 1, 0, 0
11am 0,0,10, 1, 3,10
12pm 1,0,14, 4,10,14 12:30pm T5s on
1 pm 1,1,16, 6,16,16
2 pm 1,1,18, 8,18,18
3 pm 2,2,20,10,20,20
4 pm 2,2,22,12,22,22
5 pm 2,2,20,10,20,20
6 pm 1,1,18, 8,18,18
7 pm 1,1,16, 6,16,16
8 pm 1,0,14, 4,10,14 8:30pm T5s off
9 pm 0,0,10, 1, 3,10
10pm 0,0, 6, 1, 0, 0
11pm 0,0, 2, 0, 0, 0

[jason2459]

I have the SWS reporting up but have had some snafus which some of it was some misunderstanding on my part and some quirkiness things and some errors. But the Seneye support has been doing an awesome job in responding to my emails and also pointing out one of the issues which was my lack of actually reading what the instructions said. But I'll get another thread started for the whole Seneye and SWS vs Laptop experience to not distract this one.

Needless to say I still have par readings going up to my seneye.me cloud portal and I have my new 2016 EB832 power bars tracking Watts used. The seneye.me portal gets updates 2 times an hour which is good as I can get a snapshot before and after my T5s get turned on.

Only negative with the seneye.me reporting is it is a snapshot so from my experience so far if something like a fish is over the device at that time the reading will be way down. I'll get to the SWS live portal later but for now I'm finding just the watts used interesting.

[iced98lx]

Originally Posted by jason2459

I got my ATI Blue+ and True Actinics in and finalized on Blue+ and True Actinic. 2 Blue+ bulbs was to much windex blue for me. The True Actinic seems to tone it down.

The Blue+ actually brought up the PAR a bit. The Coral+ bulbs were only about 2 months old so don't think par would have dropped on them.

On the Sand Par center of tank is 85 and half way up 110.

Interesting choice on bulbs, I am adding 4 80w T5's to my LED's and had planned on trying out the Aquablue Special as it may not require as much balancing with whites, have you looked at that bulb?

[jason2459]

Originally Posted by iced98lx

Interesting choice on bulbs, I am adding 4 80w T5's to my LED's and had planned on trying out the Aquablue Special as it may not require as much balancing with whites, have you looked at that bulb?

I have not but from what I understand its close to the coral plus. I still think I may prefer one coral+ bulb in but going to give this combo a chance over the weekend so I can see it through out the day more.


Edit: actually I have but its been so long and it was combined with many other bulbs I don't remember to much about it.

Trying to remember back when I ran T5s I think I ended on a combination of blue+, aquablue special, uvl actinic white, and fiji purple. Coral+ wasn't out.

[iced98lx]

Cool, looking forward to your observations.

[jason2459]

This whole PAR light measurement thing has been addictive... ha!

Keep waiting for seneye.me to update the readings and hope some fish doesn't shade it. There was one reading where there was most definitely something blocking some light.

You can see the dip when its blocked a lot



Going to do some long term tracking and once I can get access to the SWS I can get PUR and track it to.

[jason2459]

1st day of measuring par and watts used with the new settings and bulbs. The Par has some variance as I couldn't get the live readings early but is pretty close but having lots of fish will cause some shading that is not conducive to snapshot readings.



That pretty much shows me T5s are not very efficient lights. lol

But they sure are pretty. As soon as the T5s kick on the watts used jumps over the PAR produced. But as the LEDs were really starting to ramp up the PAR started edging back closer.

Average PAR for the 15 hour period was 112
Average Watts used for that period was 110 watts

[jason2459]

Opps correction. I shouldn't do excel at 1am

And FYI the T5s added about 170watts so you can Subtract 170 watts from the 12:30 to 8:30 numbers to get just the LEDs watts used.

So, this still shows T5s aren't very efficient and pulled far away from PAR produced once they turned on.

[Ron Reefman]

Great stuff here Jason. You almost make me wish I had a canopy again. I'd love to add a t5 front and back of the 50" Photon V2, but I just can't find a way to make it look good above the tank.

BTW, I completely understand the submarine now. And this is from a guy who has a ceramic Santa Clause ornament scuba diving in his tank at Christmas!

[jason2459]

Originally Posted by Ron Reefman

Great stuff here Jason. You almost make me wish I had a canopy again. I'd love to add a t5 front and back of the 50" Photon V2, but I just can't find a way to make it look good above the tank.

BTW, I completely understand the submarine now. And this is from a guy who has a ceramic Santa Clause ornament scuba diving in his tank at Christmas!

Thanks. Taking measurements today and will one more day. Get a 3 day avg. And probably do it again in 3 months to see how the T5s are holding up. And getting PUR now that I've figured out my access to the Seneye webserver.

Can you make a floating canopy? I saw a DIY one somewhere maybe on youtube that looked decent.

[Ron Reefman]

Absolutely I could. But I REALLY like the incredibly clean look of the V2 on legs. It's so minimal. And it's not like I feel thr need for t5's is that important. After all, even my old Photons over my old 180g tank were growing sps faster than I really wanted. I was fraging corals and having to post up sales on our local club website to sell them more often than I really cared to. But on the other hand, reducing some of the deeper shadows in the tank would be nice... but certainly not critical.

[jason2459]

I hear you. They are a very nice looking fixture and would love to show them off too.

[jason2459]

2% Royal Blues + 1% Deep Red!!!!!! it's awesome!! It's like I have those glo fish. My lyretail anthias and one spot foxface are glowing like crazy and so are a few other things like my two common star fish. My anemones too but they were doing that with just the Royal Blues.


Oh wow the coral beauuty is cool with this like that. Yellows and oranges just glow.

[jason2459]

One more day of collecting par/pur/watts. I think a 3 day average should be good enough. I'll see if I can do this every 3 months or so. I added the PUR to the chart.

[jason2459]

After watching the tank all weekend I'm pretty happy with the Bulbs and LED settings. I don't know if I'm ramping up and down like I should so will keep watching the inhabitants.

To me peak and around the peak times it is more blue then 14k , not near 20k, but it is a very crisp looking color I was looking for. Everything is vibrant which the Actinic may be helping that and the Blue+ seems to be helping the brightness and crispness. If that makes sense. The white(yellowish white) from the LEDs is definitely helping the tank from looking to 20k or like Windex. So, even though I was hoping for a whiter white it might just be a good thing its not in this case.

As for the light meter testing I added LUX in too as I have the numbers may as well plug them in. First time doing this I will most probably do this better and more efficiently next time and more accurately.

Few things I learned this first go around.

Adding LUX in was interesting and corresponded directly with watts used. T5s being the biggest impact.

White and interestingly the cool blue channels ramping up decreased PUR.

T5s are obviously not nearly as efficient as LEDs in delivering PAR per watts. Blue+ bulbs deliver more PAR then Coral+ and True Actinic. They did not seem to impact the PUR up or down at 77% of the PAR value. I will need to see where their PUR values are when on by themselves as I only seem to have PAR values.

Pretty cool and hope to learn more. For right now though I'm not changing any settings.

[Ron Reefman]

Jason, I think the work you have done here is worthwhile and I'm following along. But I do have one issue with the readings.

I'm curious about the PUR readings. I'm still far from convinced that the PUR readings from this meter are all that useful... or maybe accurate would be a better word choice. I'm not saying PUR isn't more important than PAR, it obviously is. But I'm, at the very least, skeptical of the value of the PUR readings you are getting.

First do you know which spectrum they are reading and then calling PUR versus what spectrum they are reading and calling PAR (I assume 400nm to 700nm)? Does the manufacturer give you specific spectrum they measure? Or ranges? Or even name the basic colors they read?

And where did the info on exactly what the PUR spectrum should became from? It seems to me that the PUR for a shallow coral could/should/would be quite different than that of a deeper water coral given the different light they get due to the water's filtering effect.

If it's just an average and the sensor is reading mostly blues and some red, it's just a percentage of the PAR. And your charts seem to bare that out pretty dramatically. The PAR and PUR graphs have a very solid correlation with PUR being roughly 2/3rds to 3/4ths of PAR.

I think it would be very interesting to compare the PAR vs PUR of each led channel and each t5 bulb. In particular we have green leds in the Photon V2. It's not typically considered a PUR is it? How does the PAR vs PUR look if the green leds are the only light to be measured?

[jason2459]

I also brought up those questions on how accurate, valuable, and specific are the PUR values as a whole or for different corals. There is one research the shows red light hinders the growth for at least one specific coral but but about others and other photosynthetic organisms like clams and anemones. You'll want to check out my PAR shootout thread
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/sh....php?t=2626700

I do feel better about the PUR ratings after going through the testing at least as far as being potentially useful in seeing when the phosphors in the T5s and LEDs start burning out before the bulb does. Of course T5s much faster.

The Seneye has spectrum sensors along with PAR and LUX. From that it calculates the PUR based on general photosynthesis research on chlorophyll A and B which peaks PUR at around 420, 450, 640, and 660. So, the PUR value is the percentage of the PAR value that lays in the spectrum defined by chlorophyll a/b and possibly carotenoids as the spectrum chart in the Seneye follows this.