Phoenix = Miracle Lamps? High PAR Maint & Low Spectral Decay @ 1 year?

seandanekind · #1 02/26/2006, 07:27 PM

OK, so the title is there to get all the light junkees to pay attention to this post.

Let me preface this by saying that I'm a halide light junkee. I've read all the lighting and reflector articles and many of the threads.

I started a few years ago with Ushio 10K DE's in a monster DIY hood and was stunned by the difference when I relamped after 15 months on IceCap 250W e-ballasts. It was like going from 6.5K back up 10K.

Now, I currently have 4 x 250W Phoenix 14K in ReefOptixIII Pendants on BlueWave HQI (M80) ballasts. This is my 1st relamp with the Phoenix.

I just got the Apogee QMSS ELEC - just like JBNY's, so I waited to change the lamps until I got the new light meter... assuming I'd see a stunning difference both visually and measured. Granted, my impression was that these lamps started showing their age at 9 months... but that may have been more of an expectation than a real observation.

The new lamps make the reflector appear more purple, but it's only noticable when looking indirectly at the reflector - not when gauging coral flourescense or general color in the tank visually (and we know the eye is a bad judge anyway).

For the measurements, I kept the sensor right at water level. That's 7" below my pendants, and 9" below the actual bulb with glass sheild in place. I'm giving the absolute peak measurement from directly below the center of the bulb. If you look at Sanjay's graphs for the ReefOptixIII reflector, you can see that this peak value is over a very small area. I measured at least 3 times per pendant (more like 5) and took a reasonable estimation of the average value (i.e. calculated in my head). There wasn't much estimating to do since they all measured very close to the round numbers I have listed below...

Measuring 3 of the old lamps (appx 3000 hours each):
Old Lamp 1 - clean glass = 1100 PPFD
Old Lamp 2 - slight salt spray on glass = 1100 PPFD
Old Lamp 3 - clean glass = 1250 PPFD

NOTE: Cleaning the glass consistently added about 200+ PPFD when going from excessive salt spray to clean. About 50-100 PPFD when going from light salt spray to clean. It also gave a slightly more blue appearance to the light you see coming off the reflector (on the old lamps).

Measuring the new lamp (50 hours):
New Lamp 1 - Clean glass = 1350 PPFD
** note - this lamp also measyres 1350 at 0 hours.

Another brand spanking new lamp (0 hours)
New Lamp 2 - Clean glass = 1450 PPFD

I know the sensativity of this meter is relatively bad in blue and purple, but I expected more than a 20% decline (versus a "broken in" bulb) over 1 year. I'm assuming that most of the significant change happens around 415-460nm and the meter really doesn't catch it. In the tank, visually you really can't tell the difference between the old and new lamps.

I may send one of these old "miracle" lamps to Sanjay just to see what his spectrometer says... I assume he'll find a much wider gap in PAR and spectral curve than I can observe with my eyes and a cheap PAR meter.

Sanjay · #2 02/27/2006, 10:03 AM

send them to me.. will be interesting to see the change in spectrum.

sanjay.

raskal311 · #3 02/27/2006, 11:45 AM

do you know what a new pheonix bulb would put out at about 50 hours? Do you think it would be higher then the new bulb you just got?

seandanekind · #4 02/27/2006, 02:54 PM

Hey Sanjay-

I'll send 2 of them. PM me the shipping address and I'll send them out this weekend.

One observation is that neither lamp appears "burnt out" with dark discoloration in the inner bulb the way many of my old 10K lamps look. There is a very slight discoloration if you look carefully, but nothing like my old, charred 10K's looked after 1 year...

Raskal-

I don't know. That lamp actually had more like 70 hours on it (after checking my photoperiod) I don't really trust the accuracy of the QMSS ELEC meter for scientific data. Even so, I haven't seen a significant change in output on the 1 lamp that I put in last week. I'll check again next weekend at appx 140 hours.

HippieSmell · #5 02/27/2006, 04:47 PM

Interesting. I know that aquaconnect (and phoenix) touted that these bulbs would hold their spectrum and output for a long time. It's nice to see that it might be true.

ReeferAl · #6 03/09/2006, 12:39 PM

I just switched out 3 lamps with 3 new Phoenix bulbs. That put them along side 4 Aqua Connect bulbs. They are supposed ly the same bulb. The 3 new Phoenix bulbs had about 30% more PPFD (Apogee meter) than the AC bulbs, all about 16 months old. I devised a measuring device to give me reproducable measurements, within about 2% precision. I now just replaced the other 4 with Phoenix. I'm now planning to check the PPFD about monthly and see how the intensity decreases over time.

Sanjay- The 4 AC bulbs and 3 AB bulbs are now on their way.

Allen

oct2274 · #7 03/10/2006, 11:02 AM

i'm looking for a good 14k bulb. what do these bulbs look like with no other suppliements on....pics........also do they have 150 watt DE?

ErikS · #8 03/10/2006, 11:49 AM

Here's an old picture - much brighter & whiter in real life

manderx · #9 03/10/2006, 04:09 PM

my 2 p14s dropped off significantly in visual brightness after 6 months of running on m80.

ReeferAl · #10 03/10/2006, 05:43 PM

My phoenix 14K bulbs look bluish when looking at the reflector, but just look white in the tank.
Allen

ReeferAl · #11 03/10/2006, 05:52 PM

Here's an interesting finding. I now have 7 ph 14K bulbs, all running on Ice Cap MH ballasts. One of the new bulbs has a PPFD only about 70% of the others. The old bulb running on that ballast also had a lower PAR than the other similar bulbs. I'm going to switch some ballasts around when I get a chance and see if I can confirm that it is actually a ballast problem.

Allen

Ti · #12 03/10/2006, 10:11 PM

interesting

seandanekind · #13 03/21/2006, 10:58 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by manderx
my 2 p14s dropped off significantly in visual brightness after 6 months of running on m80.

For clarification, I don't know what the original PAR levels were on my original Phoenix lamps when they were new.

Another update:

I had one coral bleach about 2 weeks ago (Acropora Millepora). Not sure if it was realted to the lights, but it was coincidental. This may be the blue and violet light that my PAR meter has trouble reading.

Coloration of most of the "green" corals has improved over the last few weeks - similar to adding an Actinic VHO, only it took a few weeks to notice:
Pavona sp. went from greenish-tan to more greenish.
Galaxia sp. and Frogspawn went from flat to glowing green.
Rhodactis mushrooms are darker and glowing green.

Growth is still very good for all corals. Since I'm only there on weekends, I see obvious growth.

Sanjay-

Sorry, I still have the lamps. It's been a busy month. I'll try to ship them to you tomorrow...

seandanekind · #14 04/15/2007, 01:57 PM

OK, new data:

The PAR readings are the highest I could get spending about 2-3 minutes per fixture searching for the max value while maintaining the same 7" distance as before. Lamps A and D are the 2 that I replaced 14 months ago

Lamp A + Clean Glass = 915 PPFD
(appx 3400 hours for 425 starts)

Lamp B + Clean Glass = 810 PPFD
(appx 6400 hours for 800 starts)

Lamp C + Clean Glass = 890 PPFD
(appx 6400 hours for 800 starts)

Lamp D + Clean Glass = 1015 PPFD
(appx 3400 hours for 425 starts)

915/1350 = 68%
810/1100 = 74%
890/1250 = 71%
1015/1450 = 70%

So roughly, all of these lamps are giving about 70% of the output they gave 14 months ago.

Assuming from my earlier measurement that these lamps (+reflector+ballast) are averaging 1400 PAR brand new, the 2 older lamps have retained 57% and 63% of their original output after more than 2 years.

So I'm seeing a 30% drom from the original PAR level in the first year, and about another 10% drop from the original level the second year. I'd say that's pretty close to what Al found...

I'll post this in Al's author forum next:
http://archive.reefcentral.com/forum...readid=1091168

And here's his awesome article:
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2007-04/ac/index.php

ReeferAl · #15 04/15/2007, 02:10 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by ReeferAl
Here's an interesting finding. I now have 7 ph 14K bulbs, all running on Ice Cap MH ballasts. One of the new bulbs has a PPFD only about 70% of the others. The old bulb running on that ballast also had a lower PAR than the other similar bulbs. I'm going to switch some ballasts around when I get a chance and see if I can confirm that it is actually a ballast problem.

Allen

If you read my article you'd find that I never got around to checking if this was a "ballast problem". It turns out one of these bulbs was actually an old Aquaconnect and not a new Phoenix. I had accidentally mixed them up and apparently "discarded" one of the new Ph 14K bulbs.

Quote:

And here's his awesome article

Thanks for the compliment.

Allen

kdblove_99 · #16 04/15/2007, 03:14 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by oct2274
i'm looking for a good 14k bulb. what do these bulbs look like with no other suppliements on....pics........also do they have 150 watt DE?

They are a nice blue, but not too blue. I don't use supplements with this bulb they look great as is.

Yes they do have a 150W DE in this bulb. The Phoenix has great par for a 14K bulb!

My photo skills are terrible and so is my camera!

But the Phoenix 14K is on the left

[IMG]

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ReeferAl · #17 04/15/2007, 03:42 PM

What's on the right?

kdblove_99 · #18 04/15/2007, 04:35 PM

Thats a Ushio 10K.

I bought a cheap 20K bulb off ebay and it broke after like 3 months so i had this Ushio 10K so i put it on until the website where i get my Phoenix gets them in stock!