How important is light acclimation?

I feel like I'm taking over the Lighting forum with all my threads but, one more.

Upgrading from Coralife 260w PC fixture to a 216w TEK Elite 4-bulb fixture. I have mainly softies, euphs, 3 nems, & two clams (Derasa & Maxima). The only reason I have the Maxima is I got it for $10 and couldn't pass it up. It will only be under the PC lights for a few more days.

So, how important is the light acclimation when getting this new fixture. FYI most of my corals are expoxy'd or glued down so I cannot move them lower in the tank. Some of them are higher up, esp my nems they planted their feet up top.

I run about a 9hr light cycle, should I decrease it, or use 2 bulbs at a time to slowly get them used to the Elite?

BTW the bulb combo I'm going to use is 2 AquaBlue & 2 Blue +, also nabbed a Fiji Purple to experiment with too.

Thanks in advance!

 

super important, you can fry your corals if they are not acclimated to the more intense light. so you would just need to scale back your lighting schedule to give the corals time to adjust.

 

Thanks, yes I was planning to cut back. If I'm normally 9hrs on my cycle, shall I cut back to around 4-5hrs with the T5's?

 

Light acclimation is important depending on the coral. You may need to cut back more than 5 hours on the lighting cycle. I upgraded from stock bulbs to Geismann bulbs and ended up almost killing my candy cane, blasto, monstrasa, and some favia. Not even light type, just bulb quality! Just watch everything very closely, and maybe have something reef safe you can add to the tank to provide some shade (A piece of acrylic or plastic across the top of the tank to add some more diffusion is your best bet here).

I read somewhere that discussed different light acclimation types and one of them was using acrylic sheets. What you do is start off with 5 or 6 sheets of acrylic over the coral that needs to be acclimated and every week (or longer depending on the corals health) you remove one of the sheets and eventually you won't need them anymore.

 

Given the range of coral you have and the permanence of their locations and that you're going from PC...


I'd scale down to a total of 1-3 hours and add one hour per week. Maybe every couple weeks increase by 2 hours.

 

Got it, thanks for the in-depth advice guys. So 1-3hr cycle even, would that be ok for my nems also? I'm just worried they will wander as they are in the perfect place at the moment.

It's amazing how even though similar in wattage, the jump from PC to T5 is a pretty big one. Should I expect my tank to come alive with color & growth, I'm hoping so.

 

Yes after acclimation you should see better color and growth.

 

I was amazed at the differance in colors when I switched from PCs to T5s...you will be too

As far as acclimation...I cut my run time in half and added an hour each week. I also had my light unit about 6-7" above the water. Once I was back to my normal lighting schedule, I moved the unit closer to around 4" off the water. Might have been a bit cautious in my methods but didn't know what to expect and wanted to make sure my corals where ok with their locations.

Cheers-

 

Cool, I can't wait for this fixture, I've mulled over getting T5 forever, feel like I made a really smart purchase after all my research and price budget.

I like how the TEK's have the adjustable mounting brackets so I can raise it up higher initially and then I'll lower it once everything seems ok.

Thanks!