Scott,

A bit off topic but I ended up sending my 400W Bluelines back because of the interference issues. As it turned out I found a company here in Australia that has developed a 400W electronic ballast for the hydroponics industry. They are made in China though. These ballasts are WAY nicer to look at than the BlueLine (no seperate leads hanging out etc - they have a built in 3 pin socket and just seem much better quality) and power consumption etc is similar to BlueLine. They still have a small amount of interefernce but I estimate that it is about 10-20% of a BlueLine judging from my TV and portable phone. I have not tried them in a "real life" situation but in test runs they seem to run the Iwasaki 6500K bulbs indistinguishably (to my naked eye) from the BlueLine. And here's the kicker -
they cost about US$70 ea! Trouble is they are 240V so probably not much use to you folk in the US. A guy at the company told me they were trying to get UL listing for a 110V version though.

Hey Ninong, why don't you think that UV is involved in coral colouration?

Gavan

I used to use power-bait about the same color as those Iwasaki BH lamps when I was a little tike. [img]/ubb/smile.gif[/img]

Hope you get that all straightened out RBF.

Ninong~ When you figure out what HQI was tested be SURE to let us know. Thats what will be replacing my Iwasaki's in a few months.


-Perry

Hi All,

Well, one of the other contributing factors to my situation, is the fact that the BlueLine ballasts may also be down about 20 to 30% relative to transformer ballasts.

My first experiment will be to try transformer ballasts in place of the BlueLine.

Regards,

Scott

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The definition of an expert is a washed-up drip under pressure.
You can see my reeftank at http://www.homestead.com/spasse/

gavan -

regarding these ballasts of yours that are rated 240v?

if i run 220 v lines, can i use these ballasts that are rated 240v?

Spasse
I have gone through a lot of lighting changes to get to where I am now. The 2-110 VHO/URI Actinics were a constant throughout. So let's just talk about the MH. I origionaly started with 2-250w 10000K Coralife running on 2-CSL ballast's. Needless to say I was very diapointed with them. They were much to blue and any Acro.I put under them faded fast. I then switched one of my ballast's to an IC, to do a side by side comparison. It was night and day. The IC blew away the CSL. You would think one was a 400 and one a 250. I ran this for about 6 weeks and still felt even with the IC the Corallife was not right. I purchased another IC ballast to replace the remaining CSL and switched to running Iwasaki's on them. Much better! To my surprise they were not looking yellow, something I always seemed to remember. I switched one of the ballasts back to the CSL and found that yellow I remembered.I ran the two side by side to give them a burn in to make sure. Even after ~ 100hrs. their was a very noticable diference. This is why I sware by running IC's with the 250w Iwasaki's. I never tried a BlueLine comparrison, but would be interested to see the difference. Everthing responded better with the 250 Iwasaki on IC's. I added another Acro or two and they did much better. Colors were retaining but I felt that they could still be better. I then added a center 400w Iwasaki on a BlueLine. (I would of used an IC if they had one.) That was the difference I was looking for.That 400 Iwasaki has just made the colors POP. I know that there are debatably other facters in coloring up Acro, but their is no doubt in my mind that the right lighting is #1. It just seems that Acro loves light and from what I am told most collected are from shallow water. I run the 2-250's ~ 10hrs. and the 400 ~ 8hrs. I say ~ because I am doing a "seasonal temp. flucuation" experiment, and am also slightly fluctuating lighting periods as I change temp. Since this lighting set up I have fraged several of my Acros and all have showed great growth and coloration. They are spreading over the rocks that I have attached them to at a very fast rate.
Like Ninong said there are also some other factors to also mention, to give a total picture. I use a 1/3hp CSL chiller. This gives me a very constant temp. never flucuting more than 1f either way of set-point. I dose ~ 2.25gals. of Kalk. a day. That makes up for all evaporation. If needed I adjust my Kh and Ca as needed with B-Ionic. My Kh I keep 11-12, my Ca 400-425. I do not like going over 425 as I have found it to start clumping my substrate, but that another topic. One other thing worth mentioning is feeding. I feed all my corals "Coral Heaven" once a week. I mention this because I feel that it has highly contributed to my growth rates. I am also told by both Tropiquarium that it contains many esential trace elements. I also feed DT's Photoplankton twice a week, but am wondering about it's contributions.I know that they are two different foods, but I do not feel that it contributes nearly as much as the Coral Heaven. Besides that I dose NOTHING. 20% water changes every two weeks with Red Sea Salt. That should about paint the full picture. I will be posting any observations reated to my "Seasonal Temp. Flucuation's" sometime in the summer.

------------------
We as hobbyists need to respect the reef, educate and learn so that it will live on for all to enjoy.
bajathree
Come Dive Into
Baja Reef

Hey Ironreef & Perry ~

I received the answer from Sanjay Joshi this morning:

George:

the lamp is made by Ushio. Brian at reefers (www.acropora.com) sell it.

sanjay.

Bajathree,

Thanks for that update.

The bottom line is that I will probably end up running (3) 400-watt Iwasaki’s (MT400DL/BH) and my present (2) 160-watt VHO Actinic.

Whether I will be using BlueLine ballasts from this time forward, is TBD. [img]/ubb/frown.gif[/img]

GavAn,

I appreciate the update on the ballasts. If you could foward me an E-mail address for the Australian ballast company, I would appreciate it.

Regards,

Scott

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The definition of an expert is a washed-up drip under pressure.
You can see my reeftank at http://www.homestead.com/spasse/

Perry ~

It would be interesting if you could get a Ushio version of both the 150w & 250w 10,000K HQI double-ended bulbs and run them next to the AB versions for comparison.

According to Sanjay's test of the 250w Ushio, it actually measured 11,723K vs. the advertized 10,000K. According to AB-Aqualine, their AB 10000 bulbs are actually 13,000K. Oh, and Sanjay measured the 250w 6500K Iwasaki as 7457K.

Everything I have ever read about the 150w & 250w HQI double-ended bulbs has been to the effect that they do not really need actinic supplementation. That's why the German fixtures that utilize these bulbs have only minimal actinics, mostly for dawn/dusk effect.

There is an online LFS operation in the Bay Area that is very high on HQI lighting. In fact, they claim that a 150w HQI lamp puts out more lumens than a regular 250w metal halide lamp. That is a pretty strong statement. I wonder if it is factually correct? If you want the link to their site, e-mail me.

Ninong [img]/ubb/smile.gif[/img]



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Irrational Exuberance!

Gavan,

This is an interesting article from the July 1999 Aquarium Frontiers by Dr. Richard Harker concerning UV light, and light intensity, and how coral coloration is affected. He also cites about a dozen other studies in the references.

http://www.animalnetwork.com/fish2/a.../2/default.asp

Ninong [img]/ubb/smile.gif[/img]

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Irrational Exuberance!

Valid,

I would think that you could run one of these ballasts at 220V but I would not like to say for sure as I am no EE. Just going on the fact that a lot of things that we have here are 220V and they seem to run OK at 240V but a 400W ballast I am not sure about. I would imagine the performance would be effected slightly though.

Scott,

I will e-mail you some details.

Ninong,

I didn't really think there was any compelling evidence in that article to suggest that UV has no effect on colouration on corals like Acropora but I would like to get hold of that Dove et al. (1995) paper that he cites. But that is not to say that such compelling evidence does not exist, I am just yet to see it. What I find interesting is that most aquarists (including me until recently) think that glass shields cut out all UV light. While it is true that glass cuts out most UVB and UVC, it transmits most UVA (eg Dana Riddle article). Also interesting is the fact that in this article by Dana Riddle, it indicated that glass from the outer envelope of Iwasaki bulbs does not block much UV. So at the moment, I am under the impression that people running Iwasaki bulbs (and maybe other types too), even if the have tempered glass between the bulb and the water, are probably subjecting their corals to fairly high UVA as well as high visible light... What I am getting at is I have heard a lot of people say "Iwasaki's are great for colouring up SPS corals" but because some people use glass shields they are assuming that they are cutting out all forms of UV and so the effect must be due just to visible light. I would light to explore the possibility that this effect is (at least in part) due to UVA. Richard Harker points out that the sun block we put on when we go to the beach is clear but he seems to be forgetting that our naturally occuring pigment (melanin) that protects us from UV burn is coloured brown brown. Anyway, I am not really decided either way at this stagem I would just like to see more evidence.

Gavan

Gavan ~

Most of the authors that I have read recommend UV shields in addition to the borosilicate glass envelope that surrounds bulbs like the 6500K Iwasaki. Of course, a tempered glass UV shield is absolutely essential for a double-ended HQI lamp.

The 6500K Iwasaki lamp does transmit a very tiny amount of UV-A which is beneficial, IMO. This is a spectral analysis chart of 250w metal halide lamps. UV-A is 320-400nm.



All of those bulbs were tested without a tempered glass shield, which is extremely obvious in the case of the Ushio HQI double-ended lamp.

There has been a lot of discussion lately (especially on reefs.org) as to the extent to which UV radiation affects coloration in corals, leading to lengthy discussions about the physical arrangement of the pigments themselves.

My understanding of some of the articles that I have read recently is that the argument is being made that certain pigments ARE a defense against UV radiation, but that the intensity of coloration is due more to the total intensity of the light rather than the amount of UV. This seems to make some sense when you consider that a lot of UV won't cause the coral to become beautifully colored, it will cause it to become dead. I can't seem to find one of the other articles I read on this subject. I thought it was on the AIMS site, but I couldn't find it there a while ago. It must have been on one of the university sites but I can't remember which one.

Ninong [img]/ubb/smile.gif[/img]

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Irrational Exuberance!

Perfect. Thatsgoing on my to-do list. As a side note....Aquarium Concepts setup a new tidepool system and used the AB HQI's for everything. 3 150's over the soft-coral tank, and will be utilizing 250w over the stoney tank. I have to say that the AB HQI have a very nice stand alone look. I think I'll go over there today and snap some pics.

-Perry

HI ALL DO YOU KNOW WHERE I CAN GET MT400DL-BH?THANKS.

J&S ~

You can get them at www.marinedepot.com or www.premiumaquatics.com

Ninong [img]/ubb/smile.gif[/img]

------------------
Irrational Exuberance!

Any news about Champion getting this bulb thing straightened out?

------------------
We as hobbyists need to respect the reef, educate and learn so that it will live on for all to enjoy.
bajathree
Come Dive Into
Baja Reef

Yea Champion knows which is the right bulb now.

Just wish they would treat me a little better!!!

Jamey[img]/ubb/biggrin.gif[/img]

------------------
"If at first you don't succeed, well so much for skydiving"

Check out my reef at REAL BIG FISH'S REEF

Whoa, 4 pages long. I really need to check the lighting forum more often. Ninong, that's a really nice tank you showed in those pics.[img]/ubb/wink.gif[/img] All kidding aside, I think this goes a long way to clearing up the "yellow" rumors people hear about Iwasakis. What strikes my interest, is that there are several of us here(including myself) that have been maintaining our reef tanks with 4500k iwasaki bulbs for a year or more. To be honest, besides my dislike for the color, they worked well. I had several different color varieties of M. capricornis that maintained their color. And my acros stayed steady too. Of course I am much happier with the new "correct" bulbs. But I guess D. Riddle is right about intensity being more important than spectrum.

I have to agree with ya Mark! My corals have done great. I have great color on everything. The only problem is I have lots of green algae growth on the glass that keeps me busy. I bet that a higher spectrum will slow it down!

Jamey[img]/ubb/biggrin.gif[/img]

------------------
"If at first you don't succeed, well so much for skydiving"

Check out my reef at REAL BIG FISH'S REEF

For those still interested, I had made a web page showing photos of the two different bulbs I had. One thing I noticed with the non-daylight bulbs is that the inner envelope that contains the ignitable goods is completely clear, while the daylight bulb's inner envelope is white at the ends. Real Big Fish's bulbs are clear too. I wonder if the true 400 watt daylight bulbs are white as well?

Here's the URL: http://www.tidalblue.com/iwasaki.htm

Mark

Yes mine are clear. I am working with Eye lighting(Iwasaki) on the issue with my bulbs and the whole confusion about the two types. I sent them a link to your pic of the two bulbs a week ago and they thought it was a great example of the two spectrums. The guys at eye lighting have been very friendly and helpful. I have yet to hear back form the Customer Service Dept. but, I hope to hear something soon. I know that Champion Lighting is not interested in correcting the mistake that was made and that's sad. I'll keep you up to date on the progress.

Jamey[img]/ubb/biggrin.gif[/img]