Anyone Thinking of Dumping LEDS and going back to Halides
- Thread starter Goldcoastreefs
- Start date
I heard due to the overwhelming popular deman, they might be coming back! Fingers crossed! I to am looking for a replacement for my Phoenix 250 DE
BeanAnimal
Premium Member
Some of us can actually articulate our opinions regarding different light sources and support our those opinions with facts. What gets tiring is arguing with folks who don't understand the facts surround the subject they have chosen to argue....
As it were, the "pro" led crowd is chock full of very poorly informed folks who get their (mis)information from the gyre of scientifically challenged public opinion on everything "green".
With regard to "coral" and LEDs, the topic is complex. Things are certainly getting better and some fixtures are doing a very good job at growing some coral species. There are still plenty of missing spectra that set an LED array apart from a true full spectrum source. At the same time some of the mussing IR and UV may be of benefit. As time passes, so will the quality of the light emitted from LED arrays.... that is a given.
As for "my" opinion.... I hate them from a visual standpoint. The color (to me) is not pleasing, regardless of how I "tune" my Radions. A MH bulb (just about ANY MH bulb) looks better to me 100% of the time.
So why do I keep the Radions? Well, I purchased them and hey cost a lot. I don't miss buying MH lamps and I don't miss the added power consumption and heat. I like the built in dimming and I like their footprint.
So, the light has an ugly, unnatural cast to it. Some corals have done well, others not so well but at this point I live with it...
So OP, yes! I think about dumping the LEDs and going back, but in the end I just don't care enough anymore.
Likewise, almost every lamp in my home is LED. Why? Well they will never "pay" for themselves, but I don't have to deal with the even uglier CFL bulbs and worry about finding GE Edison or other pleasing incandescent rarities.
msderganc
New member
Mine are crossed too - I haven't been able to find anything similar at all that puts out such good PAR.
itche_scratche
New member
Bumped. I'm currently using 250w 14k phoenix. Thinking about switching to xm 20k for the replacement. Anyone has good experience on xm 20k?
overexposed
Acroholic
I was using DE XM 20k bulbs when I had 250 watt fixtures over my 90 gallon. I loved them, never had such great colour in my tank!
I ordered XM 20k bulbs for the 400 watt fixtures over my 200 gallon, but the warehouse sent me 15k.... I decided to use them anyways but I wish I had fought to have them send me what I ordered.
If you want to see an example of an amazing tank grown under XM 20k bulbs look up dvanackers build thread.
msderganc
New member
Hmm, good to know. I might try those out if Phoenix doesn't come back.
d2mini
Premium Member
I thought the purple+ was too pink. haha Especially when paired with a Coral+.
Now I run two Giesemann Super Actinics and two KZ Super Blues (less green than the blue+).
T5
T5
LOL, did i forget to tell you I was color blind? It is a little pink when its just the T5's on, but when the MH comes on, I love it.
T5
LOL, did i forget to tell you I was color blind? It is a little pink when its just the T5's on, but when the MH comes on, I love it.
JB NY
Active member
I'll have to try those combos. I am running 2 Giesemann Actinic+ and 2 KZ Fiji Purple, it's nice when the radiums are running. I am trying to balance out the blue from the radiums still. I know people say it's the radium is white, but I ran 10K for so long that the radium still look pretty blue.
BigCountry74
New member
How ofter do you need to replace the Phoenix 14k bulb?
msderganc
New member
There's a study that says you can pretty much run them for two years with minimal PAR loss. Not sure about spectrum shift, but I change mine every year.
Dummyforclownfi
New member
Just dropped my photon 48 for an ATI 6 bulb fixture. I sure did miss having T5's. Better color combo.
muttley101
Never go full retard!
Yeah with the Coral+ I can see the Purple+ making it look cotton candyish! Im running all Blue+'s with 1 Purple+ on my CeBu.... Thinking about adding a coral+ in the mix instead of mostly blue+'s ... Need a little more PAR...
BeanAnimal
Premium Member
The loss in output is not really "minimal", as I remember it was maybe 15% after 6 months 20% after 12 months, 23% at 18 months and 25-30% at 24 months. So you take the "big" hit between 0 and 6 months and if you are till good to go, then you can drag it out for another 12-18 months. The decline is gradual enough that you and your corals will not be shocked...
New bulbs will shock you and you need to acclimate.
Also FWIW, you can't trust that a "phoenix" bulb today is anything like one from a year or 5 years ago, or any MH for that matter. Most of the vendors just buy and brand what they can get their hands on and the actual OEMs make what industry demands. The aquarium market is so small, that even in the MH heyday, there were few "custom" bulbs designed for aquaria. Now, there is likely NO BULB being built specifically for this market. We get whatever industry orders and it gets labeled whatever the importer wants.
d2mini
Premium Member
I'd like to see some factual data to back that up.
Why would a bulb like the Radium for example look consistently the same from batch to batch?
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