Anyone Thinking of Dumping LEDS and going back to Halides

[nynick]

What you are basically saying is that there is not yet an industry standard for reef leds. I for one agree with this. There certainly is a lot of garbage out there. THere are also a lot of great setups.

You see what is basically mounted xmas lights with the usefull terms "blue & white" being sold as reef lights. You can also see companys trying to change over a thousand bucks for what is really a very simple item. That doesn't mean that there aren't really good and affordable LED setups out there that are more than capable of growing anything MH can. It just means you have some more rubbish to sort through to find them.

 

[tru2nr]

So selling CREE leds and an avid MH user I will state that unless you are doing a DIY led setup and have a strong understand of spectral graphs than the LED fixtures are lacking being able to provide a full spectrum light as they have a very narrow spectrum. Also PAR does not read correctly on LEDs theirfore the high PAR numbers are very misleading. Also by the time the leds are developed and made available to the small users (yes aquarium lights are small users) they are obsolete. LEDs have a long way to go before they are a direct replacement, take a sps coral from an LED tank (fixture not diy) and put it into a MH tank and leave it there for a couple of months and you'll initially see a difference in color (leds provide a general ly more pastel color than MH) also some of the reason why wild aussie acans will change color in MH and LED...I had an aussie acan go from blue and green in a led tank to red and orange in my mh tank and put it in a led tank and the green started to show up again.

...Warrior says that this post is Legen....wait for it....dary

 

[Slawdude]

LED is available in every color temperature and every strength we could ever want so it is "there". As long as you get the right amount and the right spectrum the end result is identical with MH, T5 and LED....or a big enough candle that burns at the right color.

Whenever I read these discussions I always get the feeling that some people think that LEDs produce LED light and MHs produce MH light. They don't. It is only telling us how the light was made, the end result is the same.

That's the theory, not the practice unfortunately. Any spectral comparison of the latest LED lights compared with MH or Natural sunlight will show you that there have been significant compromise in the way any LED coverage has been setup. The problem is the narrow band and varying intensities within each band produced by each LED. That is why most of them now talk about how many of each colour they have put in their array, they are trying to get a reasonable compromise between output intensity, spectrum and the number of chips they can fit in.

The frequency with which new models are being released (with substantial variations to output qualities) combined with the anecdotal but significant experience of reefers whose experience spans the MH/T5/LED timeline strongly supports the premise that LED does not provide the same quality of lighting for a reef tank than MH/T5 or natural sunlight (yet).

 

[megadeth72]

That's the theory, not the practice unfortunately. Any spectral comparison of the latest LED lights compared with MH or Natural sunlight will show you that there have been significant compromise in the way any LED coverage has been setup. The problem is the narrow band and varying intensities within each band produced by each LED.

The frequency with which new models are being released (with substantial variations to output qualities) combined with the anecdotal but significant experience of reefers whose experience spans the MH/T5/LED timeline strongly supports the premise that LED does not provide the same quality of lighting for a reef tank than MH/T5 or natural sunlight (yet).

I've done this, and found this true ONLY with commercial leds, when comparing DIY what you said is untrue

 

[Slawdude]

I've done this, and found this true ONLY with commercial leds, when comparing DIY what you said is untrue

I agree that DIY allows you to get closer to the theoretical coverage which "should" be available however you run into physical limitations of placement and intensity (or at least I have). Not to say there is not one out there (maybe yours!) however I have not seen an array design which can match the output spectrum and intensity.

 

[megadeth72]

try the dreamchip

 

[Slawdude]

try the dreamchip

How cool is that! Maybe this will be the chip that helps us replicate our previous success with MH and T5s :beer:

 

[dotcommer]

I was considering purchasing LED's for my new build, However, I decided not to for right now.

I visited Vivid Aquariums in Los Angeles two weeks ago and I was able to stand in front of their 14' Long Aquarium, which half is lit with Radions and the other MH.

What a difference. The MH made everything look so much more vibrant.

The only way I could explain it is. Say you are standing in front of a Plasma TV. When its by itself in a room, it looks fine. However when you put it next to a high end Plasma, you really see the difference. This is the case as I stood in front of the Vivid Aquarium. You really notice how much difference there is between the two when they are lit on the same tank.

 

[CHSUB]

imo, every lighting discussion should start with your goals....example: sps, fo, leathers and zoa's etc.... ime led's are great, however not suitable for sps's. i recently make the switch back to MH because led's simply didn't meet my expectations with regards to sps's.

 

[megadeth72]

I was considering purchasing LED's for my new build, However, I decided not to for right now.

I visited Vivid Aquariums in Los Angeles two weeks ago and I was able to stand in front of their 14' Long Aquarium, which half is lit with Radions and the other MH.

What a difference. The MH made everything look so much more vibrant.

The only way I could explain it is. Say you are standing in front of a Plasma TV. When its by itself in a room, it looks fine. However when you put it next to a high end Plasma, you really see the difference. This is the case as I stood in front of the Vivid Aquarium. You really notice how much difference there is between the two when they are lit on the same tank.

yeah most of us have seen what crappy leds look like

 

[nynick]

imo, every lighting discussion should start with your goals....example: sps, fo, leathers and zoa's etc.... ime led's are great, however not suitable for sps's. i recently make the switch back to MH because led's simply didn't meet my expectations with regards to sps's.

so YOUR led setup didn't work for you. You could get crappy MHs and make the same claim.

 

[sirreal63]

so YOUR led setup didn't work for you. You could get crappy MHs and make the same claim.

Interesting...let's see your tank with the right LEDs over it?

 

[CHSUB]

so YOUR led setup didn't work for you. You could get crappy MHs and make the same claim.

your point???? led's are led's....mine were cree, 10 colors: xml, xpe ,xte, uv, full spectrum. brand makes no difference. they didn't grow sps's as well as MH=fact!!!!! that is my point!!!

 

[nynick]

your point???? led's are led's....mine were cree, 10 colors: xml, xpe ,xte, uv, full spectrum. brand makes no difference. they didn't grow sps's as well as MH=fact!!!!! that is my point!!!

My point is that leds are not the all the same just like all MH are not all the same. Are you trying to say that they are?

 

[CHSUB]

My point is that leds are not the all the same just like all MH are not all the same. Are you trying to say that they are?

yes they are all the same!!!!!tell me how they differ???

 

[nynick]

Interesting...let's see your tank with the right LEDs over it?

When did I become the poster boy for LED? All I am saying is that the source is not important as long as you can get the right temperature and the right amount. If someone has a good MH or T5 setup, fantastic, but why this need to knock led?

If you were interested in seeing sps tanks successfully run with them you could try Youtube or this very forum. My tank at the moment looks like garbage unfortunately after a stupid misstake that is not in the least light related.

 

[nynick]

yes they are all the same!!!!!tell me how they differ???

If they are all the same why did you get Cree? Why pay a hundred (or something) times as much if the diode for 8c is identical? Why is Osrams red diodes used in many high end setups even though Cree also has a red. Why can you use less 3w Crees compared to 3w Bridgelux? What about Multichips, different color combinations, 1w, 3w, 5w, optics....it goes on and on.

I can not think of anything in this hobby with more variations. It is near endless and probably a reason a lot of people have had problems with led.

 

[CHSUB]

If they are all the same why did you get Cree? Why pay a hundred (or something) times as much if the diode for 8c is identical? Why is Osrams red diodes used in many high end setups even though Cree also has a red. Why can you use less 3w Crees compared to 3w Bridgelux? What about Multichips, different color combinations, 1w, 3w, 5w, optics....it goes on and on.

I can not think of anything in this hobby with more variations. It is near endless and probably a reason a lot of people have had problems with led.

what brand of led do you have?

 

[nynick]

what brand of led do you have?

I have a combination of Cree, Bridgelux and Osram, revamped cheap Chinese 120 x 2. I am pretty happy with it but I really miss the shimmer of my old MH's. Also has a couple of spots of blue/green that I am not too exited about. Gonna hold on to them for a bit until someone comes out with a really great multichip.

I only had perhaps 7 or 8 months out of them to compare with my old MH/T5 before I did something incredibly stupid (haphazard carbon dosing) and killed off a lot of my tank. During this time I saw great growth on my very few sps, clams and softies. It actually grew faster than under my old MH but I would guess that the reason was that the bulbs were very (VERY!!) old.

Compared to my old tank that was MH/T5 I see no notable difference what so ever other than that I have less shimmer and more stable temperature. The supposed electricity savings are really nothing to write home about as the heater eats up most of them. Maybe if you have a chiller there will be some.

Having ran setups with only T5, MH/T5 and led my conclusion is....it's all the same. If I had to pick a favorite it would be MH or the multichip simply for the shimmer effect.

 

[MedRed]

maybe I just have a more discerning eye, but I can definitely tell the difference between lighting types when I see them in person. Heck, I could tell the difference between the Radions and AI's when I had them.