Anyone Thinking of Dumping LEDS and going back to Halides
- Thread starter Goldcoastreefs
- Start date
Uncle Salty 05
New member
With MH and T5 you don't need LED.
They really have nothing to add that isn't already there.
The expense of running and maintaining them is why I turned to LEDs.
They really have nothing to add that isn't already there.
The expense of running and maintaining them is why I turned to LEDs.
d2mini
Premium Member
The unnaturally blinding florescent black-light highlighter colors are what some people tend to miss about LED and what some people refer to as "obtaining good color" or "coloring up". :jester:
Johnseye
Reef Addict
That's what I'm saying. In order to get all things for all people you need each type of light. With LEDs it's the colors that can't be seen with MH or T5.
Uncle Salty 05
New member
All color can and are seen with MH and T5.
It just depends on your array of T5s and the color temperature of your MHs.
It just depends on your array of T5s and the color temperature of your MHs.
Johnseye
Reef Addict
Is this fact?
If so is switching to LED is only about the money? Keeping in mind heat can be controlled with chillers and fans.
power boat jim
Well-known member
Edit for above post . . . exceptible should be acceptable . . . duh
Jim,
Everyone's tastes are different and it is in no way a reflection of your skills as a reefer or of the general greatness of your tank, but I have seen plenty of "cell phone" pictures of tanks with great color in fact I have taken many many cell phone photos of my own tank. In addition, corals lose color in a day, but to get them to recover to full color can take years so "a couple of months of metal halide" is not enough to make a difference.
To me (and I want to emphasize the to me) your colors are washed out and heavy on green. Get a real photographer to come over and take some macros of the blue coral and the pink pocillipora. Macros close enough to show the symbiodinium density. I am certain that we will see densely colored tips and bodies less full of color.
As a brief aside here are two recent LED stories I posted on. The number of stories like this is just silly, but yet folks on this thread want to keep explaining how their "heat saving" and "energy costs" are so great. . .
Its not a question of is your tank nice or not. As others have tried to explain it is a question of degree for the hardcore SPS nuts like myself. I am not satisfied until I get color saturation like this . . .
Joe those are very good pictures, funny thing was my son walked by while I was looking at them and asked who took those pics of your tank? I had to tell him it wasnt mine. I wish I had a way to get that quality photo of mine. Not all my corals look as rich as those but Im not sure that I have the talent or knowledge to get an entire tank to look that good no matter what lights I run.
The part I dont understand is that you mentioned that it takes many months to undo the damage LEDS do using MH. Most people who post must be miracle workers since they say they see the corals come back to life in just a couple weeks after switching over. I may put one MH back for the winter months since the heat from MH lets me eliminate two heaters.
Johnseye
Reef Addict
It's just time, money and effort Jim. Anyone can do it if they put those 3 things into it. Not everyone has limitless amounts of those things. Do your best and be happy with what you have.
Uncle Salty 05
New member
Fans and chillers just use more electricity.
My reasons for changing to LED were economic and convenience.
It is nice to not worry about spectral shift and bulb replacement.
The money savings is just gravy.
d2mini
Premium Member
Ok tell me which T5 will do that.
Uncle Salty 05
New member
It depends on which MH you are running and what you are trying to achieve.
I personally like a mixture of 420nm and 453nm, but it is really up to personal preference.
I personally like a mixture of 420nm and 453nm, but it is really up to personal preference.
If you're not using a chiller and if you factor in the increased heater usage with most LED tanks, in my experience, there is minimal savings to switching to LEDs.
I should probably walk away from this, but the pedant in me can't.
In the first link the poster clearly states that he was having problems with bleaching under T5 so he switched to LEDs.
You completely missed what he wrote and told him his problem was the LEDs only to make things worse. When someone can't grow corals under T5, they are having basic husbandry issues, not LED lighting issues.
In the second link you posted the following as part of your response:
" Here's what we know about Symbiodinium.
1) Symbiodinium are responsible for the colors of our corals."
That is completely incorrect. The Symbiodinium that live inside corals are a golden brown colour. That is the ONLY colour they are responsible for imparting on corals. The colours we see in your pictures are produced by proteins the coral expresses to protect itself from too much light. They do so by either absorbing light in a particular spectrum and emitting it in another (mostly green) or by reflecting light in a particular spectrum.
You are correct that there are a silly number of posts like this, but your responses look to me like a Metal Halide hammer looking for an LED nail, not like good advice or a particularly accurate assessment of the state of LED lighting.
Uncle Salty 05
New member
What color temp. are the Radiums?
"More natural colors" is a very vague term.
Natural at a depth of 10 feet, or 10 meters?
Do you dive or snorkel?
With LEDs at least you have nearly limitless flexibility.
If you don't like blinding flourescent color, you can tone it down to your liking.
With MH you have maybe 3 choices.
Don't get me wrong, I still love and run MH.
Just not on my main DT.
d2mini
Premium Member
LOL, Forget MH, natural colors, snorkeling, it all has nothing to do with what I'm saying.
The royal blue LEDs produce a black-light effect on coral that I have never seen with mh or t5. It's the look that makes some people go gaga for LED.
So again, if you know of a blue T5 bulb or combo of T5 bulbs that gives the same effect, do tell.
I don't want this, I'm just responding to the guy you were responding to about using all 3 types of lighting.
IME, no.
The royal blue LEDs produce a black-light effect on coral that I have never seen with mh or t5. It's the look that makes some people go gaga for LED.
So again, if you know of a blue T5 bulb or combo of T5 bulbs that gives the same effect, do tell.
I don't want this, I'm just responding to the guy you were responding to about using all 3 types of lighting.
Stlouphil
Member
It would be interesting to see the numbers heating a 300g tank verses lighting a 300g tank with MH.
I switch a while back. With MH my chiller ran a lot even with sump doors open all the time and canopy open all the time.The room the tank was in was also noticeably hotter. Now I get to close everything and the chiller may run 2 times a day for a few minutes. I don't even own a heater. LEDS still produce heat just a lot less than a MH.
power boat jim
Well-known member
The truth is LEDs produce more light per watt used then MH each watt the lights use produce the same amount of heat.
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