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LED's whats the verdict?
- Thread starter s_kelley
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OP
OP
That is what I worry about. What didn't you like about it? I have two 250w 20k radiums now but the low heat and low wattage is very appealing to me. From what I have seen you can dial halides in to look like the blue of my 20k radiums very easily though.
I guess it's hard to explain but... I'd equate the leds to cheap disco lighting, the mh to Fenway Park at 10pm. I like to keep my tank on the warmer side, 80-84, so I consider the heat of my mh to be a benefit. The electricity savings on my led lit tank are negligible. Also, according to my par meter, my leds aren't going to last anywhere near the times claimed.....
Bobbofin
Non-member
Yup, I went from LED back to metal halide. I now have a Hamilton Belize fixture. One 150 watt, 14,000k, two ATI Blue PLus 420/460nm T5HO and two LED moon lights. LEDs are a mixed bag in my opinion. I found that SPS grew like weeds but my LPS declined and finally died. There so many opinions, designs, and DIY concepts I'm gonna wait a few years for it all to shake out before diving in again. In a few more years they'll have things figured out just like when T5HO came out a while back. Evidentually T5HO manufacturers got the bulbs, kelvin colors and reflectors figured out so you could even grow SPS under them. But at first there were those on both sides of the fence concerning T5HO. Also, there's so much we don't know about sustained growth two-three years out, the actual lifespan of the LEDs. It's gonna be interesting to watch this new emerging technology grow into the mainstream.
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Yanni
Non-member
I posted in another thread but just wanna add to this also..my experience with my AI sol LED system has been the opposite of the feedback i have been reading. I run a mixed reef..usual suspects LPS( hammers,torches..acans)softies(leathers and mainly zoos),three anemones and four captive farmed maximas. Everything is doing great and growing just fine...i did borrow the light meter a few months ago and tested the readings around the tank and moved things accordingly. What i found is that the LED is very powerful in spots and does not reflect like halide does around the tank especially if the bulbs have the optics. Just moving certain corals a few inches over made a huge difference...i did have a few leathers that were being difficult so i moved them around to lower areas so they were not directly under the bulbs and they recovered quickly. Also i took alot of time raising the intensity of the lighting over the coarse of about three months till i found the right mix of light for my inhabitants. My clams are doing great...bought them small at about an inch and they are easily 2-2.5 inches now and the shell under the mantle is always white which is a sign of quick growth. If i do see any problems happening in the long term i will post them. I am not telling people to go out and change their lighting or anything i could care less what people use these are just my experiences...positive or negative.
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My kryptonite has probably increased in size somewhere around 30-50% in the past 5-6 months. My BTA anemone split a couple days ago. The BTA was under Panorama LEDs for around 2 months and recently under AI SOL Blue LEDs for around 2 weeks. I also have a frogspawn that has been under both Panorama and AI SOL LEDs for 3 months and it has been doing fine as well.
I have AI SOL Blue LEDs on both of my tanks.
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Ray
frrrrunkis
Well I have been playing around with some LEDs from china that use the GU10 sockets, the bulbs are running from $5.50 to $8.00 shipped each. I have used cool white, warm white and blue. The bulbs have come in a single 3 watt LED, 3 1 watt LEDs and 4 1 watt LEDs.
Currently I have 4 of the 3 watt blue on my 30 cube that I use for dusk/dawn actinic. For cheap bulbs they do have some serious power as I have bleached a couple of chalices from one of these 3 watt bulbs and it was 25 inches above the coral but on the other side of the tank same distance from the LED I have a sunset monti that is growing great and has amazing color.
The drawbacks are they are not dimable and the whole bulb/socket combo is about 2.5 inches. I have them draped over my MH fixture and attached to some scrap wood. I have to figure a good way to mount them so they look good. It is also impossible to take actinic pictures with LEDs, there is a way but I have not figured out the settings (or even tried yet)
The good things is that they are cheap, powerful and the actinics look better then anything else I have used! My corals really pop with these blue LEDs and I have use VHO, T-5, PCs
Currently I have 4 of the 3 watt blue on my 30 cube that I use for dusk/dawn actinic. For cheap bulbs they do have some serious power as I have bleached a couple of chalices from one of these 3 watt bulbs and it was 25 inches above the coral but on the other side of the tank same distance from the LED I have a sunset monti that is growing great and has amazing color.
The drawbacks are they are not dimable and the whole bulb/socket combo is about 2.5 inches. I have them draped over my MH fixture and attached to some scrap wood. I have to figure a good way to mount them so they look good. It is also impossible to take actinic pictures with LEDs, there is a way but I have not figured out the settings (or even tried yet)
The good things is that they are cheap, powerful and the actinics look better then anything else I have used! My corals really pop with these blue LEDs and I have use VHO, T-5, PCs
mordibv
Non-member
Old post .. but here's my take .
I went from MH to leds .
I used a Pacific Sun LED unit . Loved playing with the software and the way it ramped sunrise to sunset .
My SPS grew just fine . I had never seen new frags base so quickly .
I am SPS dominate and got the inclination to start collecting chalices .
I did get a few here and there . I bought a BPC flamethrower 2 eye frag .
Out of the 6 chalices the BPC went south first .
I gave all my chalices to a buddy .
Any other lps ..favia's , blastomussa, duncans , krytonite cc grew @ nice rates with a nice color pop to them ....
I got rid of the led unit . I wanted to try the REEFTECH but gave up on it after I was reminded that I just lost a not so cheap chalice ...
I relocated to North Hampton Mass . All I have is a nano now .
I went back to the halide I had on hand . Temp went to 84 degrees one day .
No corals were in the nano yet .
I went right back to LEDS .
I use the larger Sunbrite Slime Line S model 50 watt . CREE unit .
I also picked up another chalice ..
Yes I am hard headed ... I am coming out of the brown out phase .. and everthing looks good far . .. no verdict yet ..
To the OP I would contact pecan2phat since he is the longest user of a led unit that I am aware of .. not that i know anything ..
He was a early adopter of the Solaris units .
I went from MH to leds .
I used a Pacific Sun LED unit . Loved playing with the software and the way it ramped sunrise to sunset .
My SPS grew just fine . I had never seen new frags base so quickly .
I am SPS dominate and got the inclination to start collecting chalices .
I did get a few here and there . I bought a BPC flamethrower 2 eye frag .
Out of the 6 chalices the BPC went south first .
I gave all my chalices to a buddy .
Any other lps ..favia's , blastomussa, duncans , krytonite cc grew @ nice rates with a nice color pop to them ....
I got rid of the led unit . I wanted to try the REEFTECH but gave up on it after I was reminded that I just lost a not so cheap chalice ...
I relocated to North Hampton Mass . All I have is a nano now .
I went back to the halide I had on hand . Temp went to 84 degrees one day .
No corals were in the nano yet .
I went right back to LEDS .
I use the larger Sunbrite Slime Line S model 50 watt . CREE unit .
I also picked up another chalice ..
Yes I am hard headed ... I am coming out of the brown out phase .. and everthing looks good far . .. no verdict yet ..
To the OP I would contact pecan2phat since he is the longest user of a led unit that I am aware of .. not that i know anything ..
He was a early adopter of the Solaris units .
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mordibv
Non-member
NP .. crappy camera but u can see the chalice in this pic .
Notice the polyp extension on the Blue iris acro (i think it is ) in the upper left and corner of the pic .
[/IMG]
Better pic . Okay ,just checked my wallet and the chalice was bought on 6/13 ..
So I will keep an eye on it . Well see if it does well or not
Notice the polyp extension on the Blue iris acro (i think it is ) in the upper left and corner of the pic .
Better pic . Okay ,just checked my wallet and the chalice was bought on 6/13 ..
So I will keep an eye on it . Well see if it does well or not
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I have 2 AI SOL blue pods over a 36" x 36" x 24" Cube. They are suspended Aprox 18" off the water surface. Arguably, not enough lighting but I specifically did that for a spot light type display on rock islands over black sand. Previously I had smaller tanks, but used 14K Ushio 250W bulbs in PFO ballasts suspended 1 ft high over approx 18" of water depth. I have had the AI SOL pods for 7 months now, had 1 small issue to which they quickly responded and had a new unit out to me no questions asked in 2-3 days. Very happy with the experience.
What this thread is not telling you are the settings people are running LEDS. MH bulbs have on and off. You will get different burns from different bulbs and ballast, but it is basically on and off. LED's are a different story. You can mix and match % use from different colors a well as times to simulate rising and lowering light. This makes it VERY difficult to compare apples to apples. But at least you can get a general sense. The same pod shown at the same water depths run at different % will give different results.
Even with my own tank, my initial thoughts on the AI SOL were mixed. For the first 2 months I ran them at near 100% on all colors mid day for 5 hours. The hours I was in front of the tank I had more blue etc. I quickly burned up and killed a lot of my tank. I blamed the Light spectrum, played with the length of time the lights were on etc. When I saw healing after I reduced the times it dawned on me I was running them too strong. Now, I run them at 50-70% at most. Most of the day is at 50% or so. The blue spectrum is stronger than it seems. I've been able to ease up the % slowly over time. Now I love them. I am getting great color and growth but it had everything to do with how they were set.
Softies are good, SPS are healthy and growing, LPS are nice and fluffy. I have never used a PAR meter on my tank, I'd love to know what I am getting at different depths etc. The tank is rimless, so with barely any suspended fixture I get a great shimmer effect and an incredible blue shimmer reflection to the white ceiling I did not expect at night. Lights up the entire room.
Given the spectrum, deep red is a color I can't seem to get. All my reds turn to orange. I need to move some red/orange stuff to shaded areas to get the darker red colors back.
Now, I like them much better than my old halides. Time will tell.
What this thread is not telling you are the settings people are running LEDS. MH bulbs have on and off. You will get different burns from different bulbs and ballast, but it is basically on and off. LED's are a different story. You can mix and match % use from different colors a well as times to simulate rising and lowering light. This makes it VERY difficult to compare apples to apples. But at least you can get a general sense. The same pod shown at the same water depths run at different % will give different results.
Even with my own tank, my initial thoughts on the AI SOL were mixed. For the first 2 months I ran them at near 100% on all colors mid day for 5 hours. The hours I was in front of the tank I had more blue etc. I quickly burned up and killed a lot of my tank. I blamed the Light spectrum, played with the length of time the lights were on etc. When I saw healing after I reduced the times it dawned on me I was running them too strong. Now, I run them at 50-70% at most. Most of the day is at 50% or so. The blue spectrum is stronger than it seems. I've been able to ease up the % slowly over time. Now I love them. I am getting great color and growth but it had everything to do with how they were set.
Softies are good, SPS are healthy and growing, LPS are nice and fluffy. I have never used a PAR meter on my tank, I'd love to know what I am getting at different depths etc. The tank is rimless, so with barely any suspended fixture I get a great shimmer effect and an incredible blue shimmer reflection to the white ceiling I did not expect at night. Lights up the entire room.
Given the spectrum, deep red is a color I can't seem to get. All my reds turn to orange. I need to move some red/orange stuff to shaded areas to get the darker red colors back.
Now, I like them much better than my old halides. Time will tell.
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UtahGetMe2
Non-member
This is something I definitely have noticed with the LED's. Vivid red colors are hard to achieve no matter what color percentages you used.
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