Reef breeders photon getting much growth

[legacyline]

I have the photon 48 for about 3 years I have not gotten very much growth from my sps ..All my parameters are in check I run them at 80% blue 70% white ( worked up over time) should I be trying to run these at 100% ? Everything is alive but very little growth ..Dose everday..Po4 is 0.02 nitrates 5 ..Mag 1350 cal 475 alk 9 I'd like to see some people who have had these running for a long time with good success I'm thinking about going back to t5

[Ron Reefman]

I used EverGrow's version of the RB Photon and had a custom led lay out. I don't think my choices of leds made much difference as several friends of mine got the same fixture with their own personal led lay outs and we all have had very good success growing all kinds of coral. I seriously don't think your fixture is the issue.

I don't think the problem with coral growth is due to the light. I ran mine at 100% blue and 40% white over a 24" deep tank and kept a wide variety of corals from a couple leathers to lots of lps and some nice sps.

If you have a 24" deep tank, your 80/70 split is OK. I might offer you do the blue up to 100% and back off the white to 50%. What is your ramp up, midday,ramp down schedule look like? I did a 4 hour sunrise, 4 or 5 hour midday and 5 hour ramp down. I considered the last hour of sunrise and the first hour or two of sunset to still be bright enough for the zooxanthellae to do photosynthesis.

Do you feed the corals anything? I feed a very wide variety of foods and I shut down all my pumps for 15 minutes, then star them up for a minute and shut them back down for 10 more minutes. The short run stirs things up and allows food to settle back down on most of the corals.

[legacyline]

Thanks for the info Ron ...I don't feed anything I've always got mixed answers on feeding some say you should some say no need too. I'll start adding some reef chili and maybe start adding some amino acids .. I bumped my blues all the way and backed my whites down to 50% so I'll see how that goes here is my schedule..I keep a 50% blue difference for ramp u and down

900..25
930..35
1000..45
1030..55.5
1100..60.10
1130..70.20
1200..80.30
1230..90.40
1300..100.50
1330..100.50
1400..100.50
1430. 100.50
1500.100.50
1530..100.50
1600.100.50
1630..90.40
1700..80.30
1730..70.20
1800..60.10
1830..55.5
1900..45
1930..35
2000.25
2030..5
2100.3

[legacyline]

Also I removed my optics last night for more even light

[Ron Reefman]

Nothing wrong with that schedule. You should have enough PAR for photosynthesis from noon till 5pm. You might want to add another hour maybe even two, to the high end of the day. Zooxanthellae need an hour to get photosynthesis started and then will do it for 4 to 6 hour before it stops, even if there is more than enough light.