Question to all AI Sol users

[MikeG]

I really want to upgrade the lighting on my 180 to LED's and am seriously leaning toward AI Sol's. Like everything else this is boiling down to finances ($$$). My questions are:

1. How many units would I need for a 6 foot (72") 180 gallon tank. This tank is NOT gonna be heavily populated with corals as my 2 Butterfly's are already coral eaters and I figure someday soon my Blue Girdled Angel will be too. But there will be some corals.

2. Which color choice did you go with? The Super Blue unit or the White unit?

Any other advice, input or recommendations will be appreciated. Thanks.

 

[Northstar24]

The number of units comes down to how much space you have over your tank. If you can hang them above the tank ~10 inches or so, 3 units will provide sufficient coverage. If they have to be mounted directly on the rim of the tank, you'll probably need more like 6 of them (the original recommendation was 1 unit per foot before the redesgin and the introduction of the Super Blue)

Looking at the graph of the output spectrum, the blue was a no brainer for me. If you turn the blues and the royal blues down, the tank is almost yellow - so you can still get a very white look out of them, especially if you aren't going crazy with corals

I have had the AI Sol Super Blues over my tank for about a year now, I'll never be going back to non LED lighting

 

[little_fish]

If you cant keep corals in there why dont you go with a few LED stunner strips, it will light the tank and be much cheaper.

 

[MikeG]

This tank is NOT gonna be heavily populated with corals as my 2 Butterfly's are already coral eaters and I figure someday soon my Blue Girdled Angel will be too. But there will be some corals.

There are gonna be some corals, it's just not gonna be over populated with corals. I have to pick and chose between corals the Butterfly's don't go after.

The reason I'm thinking of AI Sol is I like all the variables/adjustments/effects you can do with them.

 

[FishyReef]

Go with the superblues - the white units came out before the blue units, and the blue units are a better balance between the various colors. I have 2 units over a 48" tank, so 3 over a 72" tank should be good. I would also recommend getting the controller so that you can adjust the intensity of the lights - I'm still figuring out the right intensity for my own tank but there are plenty of stories out there of the lights melting or bleaching corals if you have them at their full intensity. Your tank probably won't look as bright wiht LEDs as it will with the other lights because you need to lower the intensity to not melt your corals, but they will still get more than plenty of light. Good luck!

 

[Sir Alex]

I'd think you'd need 4 if you're going to be keeping high light corals, but Northstar has 3 over his 180 and has melted some corals...

 

[Northstar24]

I melted acropora I had because when I originally got them, they looked dimmer to my eye than my halides, so I took the old halide fixture off and turned these up to 100% on all three channels.

After that experiment, I ramped them all the way down to like 25% and slowly increased the intensity over several weeks. I am now running them at 75% and I'm able to keep clams and corals happy

 

[R3verb]

+1 Super Blues. These are amazing lights dude. I will say I kinda agree with LF on this one! For the same price, you could get like 5 stunner strips and a ReefKeeper lite to control all of them. That will keep just about anything except the more expert SPS which you wont keep anyways because of your angles. I preach the Sols to everybody but in this case, I dont know that it is necessary.