Lights-How long on?

[sumthinfishy]

I have one of the pc 3 way lights. It is awsome! I spent close to $400 for it and corals are doing ok but I have a question. I have all three cycles on timers and am wondering how long should I leave each one (daylight, actinic, moonlight) on. I imagine this has alot to do with what I have in the tank (80 gal) but equally I would think that there is a baseline that I should start at no? Any advice or input would help. As I said everything is doing ok but I have had problems in the past with algae growth although that was with the flourecent home depot strip lights I had when I was knieve and broke.
This site has been very helpfull in my continuing education in this hobby and all of your advice is greatly appreciated and respected.....ideas?????

 

[flydan]

Hey,
When I upgraded my lighting I started at 10 hours of actinic and 8 hrs of pc's. After a week I added an hour, and then a week later I increased to 12hrs and 10 hrs and that's where I left them. Never had a problem with algae with the new lights.
HTH
Dan'l

 

[adrian]

Its generally suggested to run the lights for about 12 hours a day. You can use timers to have the actinics kick on an hour or two before the main lights, and turn off an hour or two after the main lights go out, and the have the moonlight kick on until morning.
I have a different lighting setup, but heres how my photoperiod is set up to give you an idea:
8am actinic VHOs kick on
10am metal halides kick on
8pm the halides switch off
10pm actinics go off
10pm-8am moonlight
HTH

 

[sumthinfishy]

Thanks for your input. That is not the cycle I am on now. My day lights are on from 10am to 2pm (insufficient I suppose) Do you think I should crank it up and see if that helps or hurts. I am just leary due to the past algae problem but that was probably due to improper spectrum huh?

 

[sumthinfishy]

Flydan,
I was reading one of your other threads on culpera. I have heard of this stuff being put in the sump and I dont have that is this something i should consider? Could you explain the culpera concept to me?

 

[adrian]

Algae blooms are not only the result of lighting, but also nutrients, if you have problems with blooms most likely you have an overabundance of nutrients that needs to be dealt with. HTH

 

[sumthinfishy]

It seems to be much better since i got a good cleaning crew but before it was horrible. the whole back glass was covered and it started on my rock and tha was it took for me to find out that the cleaning crew was needed.

 

[spyderreef]

What does your cleaning crew consist of? Just curious, I am having some problems.

 

[flydan]

Hey,
I haven't really heard of anyone putting caulerpa in a sump, but rather in a refugium. You do know the difference? Anyway, a refuguim is a sort of a biological filter for your display tank. The caulerpa works buy absorbing free nutrients out of the water and preventing bad algae from getting any food. When you thin out your growing caulerpa you are exporting these nitrates out of your system. A refugium sort of works like a sump in that you are increasing the volume of water in your system although a true sump is usually much larger. HTH
Dan'l