Bad advice that floats around the forums.

[Allentown]

I heard it time and time again, "those Marine land reef ready LEDs are garbage"...

Trusting that i was getting good advice, i was already in the process of picking my next set of lights when something interesting happened. My Finger leather coral which had lived HAPPILY under a 6 bulb T5 HO Nova extrme Pro got burned to a CRIPS under the Marinelands.

Thinking i was getting good advice here, i thought it was light starved, i moved it HIGHER in the tank, and let it fry for a week before i realized what was happening.

Finally i moved it to the back of the tank where it was not under direct light...it appeard to still be burning. It shrank, the skin had a shiny glistening look to it and it was beginning to swell at the base.

I thought it was dead, in a final act of desperation, i moved it to my quarantine tank where it only got a few hours of LED moon light a day for over a week.....

Today its coming back to health! Its back in the main display tank, in an area where it wont get direct light, and lower in the tank. I have reduced the phto period but...

.....im STILL almost afraid to fully turn on the Marineland lights.

My torch coral looks fantastic and its been mainly under the ACTINICS only for over two weeks(before i moved the leather coral i tried just running actinics only to let it heal).... (the marine land only has 4 actinics bulbs but ive been running the T5 Actinics (3 of the bulbs) for an additioanl 3 hours a day.


Now i am not trying to call anyone out as being a liar on here...but if a coral that thrived under 6 bulb t5 system gets the worst case of coral burn i have ever seen under these lights....

I have a hard time thinking they are "garbage" or hardly inefficient. Im betting i could easily put some sticks at the top level under direct lighting and they would thrive.

So far the only valid criticism of these i can find is that they dont have enough coverage...the site recommends a second set for every additiona 10 inches of width you need full coverage for, my tank is 18 inches wide so i probably need two.....that part is valid.

The rest of the feedback im going to have to call into question here. I have the almost fried coral to prove it.

 

[BonsaiNut]

I'm glad they're working out for you. Most people would have trouble keeping corals under 64 PAR. Then again, they must be using some double-top-secret technology, since their illuminance claims at 12" exceed (by about 2x) the highest LED efficiency currently known to man.

 

[kissman]

That fixture should be fine for Softies I am not sure the PAR is enough for SPS which is what most people want to achieve. The PAR rating with that fixture is around 100 if I remmeber correctly its been awhile since I did the research on it before I bought my 6bulb Nova Extreme Pro which ahs a PAR of around 300. But from what I do remember the only difference between it and the non-reef was that it has blue LED's instead of all white. How old were the bulbs in the Nova Extreme when you replaced it with the Marineland? and also since I have the Nova Extreme I am curious to see why you decided to replace it with the Marineland?

 

[Allentown]

I'm glad they're working out for you. Most people would have trouble keeping corals under 64 PAR. Then again, they must be using some double-top-secret technology, since their illuminance claims at 12" exceed (by about 2x) the highest LED efficiency currently known to man.

This is Valid. I started with it directly under the fixture at around 14 inches, then when i thought it was light starved...moved it to around 9 inches from the surface. For reference, the same coral was under the Nova extreme Pros at a debt of around 16-17 inches.

Good constructive point, thank you.

 

[Allentown]

That fixture should be fine for Softies I am not sure the PAR is enough for SPS which is what most people want to achieve. The PAR rating with that fixture is around 100 if I remmeber correctly its been awhile since I did the research on it before I bought my 6bulb Nova Extreme Pro which ahs a PAR of around 300. But from what I do remember the only difference between it and the non-reef was that it has blue LED's instead of all white. How old were the bulbs in the Nova Extreme when you replaced it with the Marineland? and also since I have the Nova Extreme I am curious to see why you decided to replace it with the Marineland?

I upgraded my tank. My Nova extreme Pro is only the 20 inch fixture. I am attaching a picture of whats going on with my lighting presently. I had planned to try and do the SPS in the center 25 inches of the tank and leave softies for the outer 15 inches on each side. (seemed like a good plan at the time, im cheap).

I replace 2 bulbs every 4-5 months on a rotating schedule.

For the record, when i burned the Finger leather...i was not even running the T5s.....

Also there were more differences between the reef ready. It has 54 bulbs where as the double bright has i think 20-30 bulbs (plus the Actinics and the dual timers they now include).

My jury is still out on the value of all this par rating talk after what i am seeing in my tank. I think its valid to state that with an LED design like this...you are ony getting the most adequate light directly under the fixture and the T5s flood the whole area. like...well flood lights. This wont be a concern to all reefers. My rock work is designed so that the water flows/and fish can swim down the back side of the tank as well...this creates a steep narror angle where the corals will all go that directly within a 6 inch wide area ride down the rock face that i can put the LEDS directly over.

 

[sirreal63]

Some things to consider...your 20" Nova isn't exactly a high end T5 so the par from it is lower than some T5's, but the spectrum is very broad. Your LED has a very narrow spectrum and the intensities are higher in a limited spectrum of light, as opposed to a broad spectrum. Bleaching occurs from high light, and in this case from a narrow range of spectrum, this is to be expected, especially with the difference in hanging height of the lights, you LED is very close to the surface and the T5 much father away. This is part of the reasoning behind starting with a lower intensity in LED's, they will be more intense in a few spectrum's and very dim in others, it is the high PAR intensity that is doing the bleaching. The corals need time to acclimate to the light.

 

[Allentown]

Some things to consider...your 20" Nova isn't exactly a high end T5 so the par from it is lower than some T5's, but the spectrum is very broad. Your LED has a very narrow spectrum and the intensities are higher in a limited spectrum of light, as opposed to a broad spectrum. Bleaching occurs from high light, and in this case from a narrow range of spectrum, this is to be expected, especially with the difference in hanging height of the lights, you LED is very close to the surface and the T5 much father away. This is part of the reasoning behind starting with a lower intensity in LED's, they will be more intense in a few spectrum's and very dim in others, it is the high PAR intensity that is doing the bleaching. The corals need time to acclimate to the light.

Thank you, very much. You guys give good constructive feedback here at reefcentral i don't care what the other reef sites say. :rollface:


I thought the 6 bulb T5 Nova pros were fairly high end? Don't many reefers use 4 bulb systems?. (Im speaking in terms of the area under the light as obviously that light is only covering 1/3 of my tank presently). Perhaps you are reefering to some of the better bulbs not being available in 18nch size? Im running Coralifes and Truelumens..and they have finally come out with Truelumens in the 12k spectrum in the 18inch size.).

Question: Its said that the actinic is the most important thing for corals, so i was considering running all 6 lights as actinics in that T5 once my two newest 12k bulbs run their course. Good idea bad idea?

 

[sirreal63]

High end T5 would be ATI, the difference between it and the Nova is significant, but yes the bulbs also make a huge difference, as well as the ballast and reflector, in this, ATI is the top of the line and is actively cooled, all of which equates to maximum PAR. The Nova is not a bad fixture, but with the small bulbs, and so so components it is not in the same league. That isn't to say it won't work, it will, but it isn't ideal, more of a upper middle of the road light. Much in the same way a 525i BMW isn't the same as an M5, they are both 5 series but the performance is strikingly different.

Actintic alone does not cover the photosynthetic needs of the corals but yes it is very important. Bulbs that produce the greatest growth are usually lower K bulbs, my corals grow significantly faster under 10k's than they do under 20k's, but that should not infer that 10k's do not have the lower k's frequencies, in fact they have the strongest peak in the 420 range but also cover the rest of the ranges adequately. Give the corals a more full spectrum that includes a good 420-460nm, they will appreciate it.

As far as advice goes on the internet, the majority of it is subjective, what works for one person may not work for another. That doesn't mean anyone is right or wrong, just that there are many paths to success and each of us measures that success differently. The fun is in figuring out what works for you.

 

[Allentown]

Always glad to hear from those more experienced than me. One Caveat, the extreme Pros have what appears PC component dual cooling fans that blow through the fixture and the reflector inside looks darned high end to me (cant speak to the ballast). I was wondering if may you were referring to a different model of the Nova extremes (perhaps not the Pros)?

 

[sirreal63]

I haven't seen one of the newer ones yet, but it looks to be cooling the fixture more than the bulbs. Cooling of the bulbs to the correct temp is what helps, the bulbs run better and last longer when run at the correct temp. If it is cooling the bulbs, that is a good thing, I just can't tell from the pics. Are they still using a single contoured sheet instead of true individual reflectors? I don't guess it matters, the fixture is adequate for growing corals and the rest is semantics.

My point is not that the T5 is bad or the LED is bad, but rather that there is a reason why the corals bleached, the intensities changed and the corals reacted as they are designed to, they expelled the zooxanthellae from stress. I am dealing with the same thing from switching from 20K Radiums to 10K Ushio's, and even with careful acclimation, I still have some SPS not happy, but they are recovering. This is easier to do with LED's because of the intensity of a narrow spectrum. The corals may be used to a higher total PAR but the difference with the LED's is a high concentrated PAR in a much narrower range than the corals are adapted to. Even if the total PAR is less, it can be significantly higher in a few parts of the spectrum, ones that coral is not acclimated to. The result is bleaching. Even an underpowered LED can bleach a coral if it is close enough.

 

[Mmiller40gt]

I dont think there is that much "bad" advice, especially from well seasoned reefers. Everyone has their opinion of what works for them. This hobby has so many quirks and many things yet to be discovered. You got people pumping vodka into their tanks, others purposefully running electric currents etc. I was even reading about a guy the other day putting bleach in his aquarium! We can all argue/discuss whats best but there is nothing lost in free and open discussion. Start with the consensus then add your own thing.

 

[Allentown]

I haven't seen one of the newer ones yet, but it looks to be cooling the fixture more than the bulbs. Cooling of the bulbs to the correct temp is what helps, the bulbs run better and last longer when run at the correct temp. If it is cooling the bulbs, that is a good thing, I just can't tell from the pics. Are they still using a single contoured sheet instead of true individual reflectors? I don't guess it matters, the fixture is adequate for growing corals and the rest is semantics.

My point is not that the T5 is bad or the LED is bad, but rather that there is a reason why the corals bleached, the intensities changed and the corals reacted as they are designed to, they expelled the zooxanthellae from stress. I am dealing with the same thing from switching from 20K Radiums to 10K Ushio's, and even with careful acclimation, I still have some SPS not happy, but they are recovering. This is easier to do with LED's because of the intensity of a narrow spectrum. The corals may be used to a higher total PAR but the difference with the LED's is a high concentrated PAR in a much narrower range than the corals are adapted to. Even if the total PAR is less, it can be significantly higher in a few parts of the spectrum, ones that coral is not acclimated to. The result is bleaching. Even an underpowered LED can bleach a coral if it is close enough.

More helpful information here!

Just for informational purposes, yes, each bulb has its own contoured reflector area (no single sheet). The airflow appears designed to go straight across the top of the bulbs and there is are exhaust ports on the other side directly opposite the intakes. Again, i can't speak to the ballasts, but the cooling system and reflectors appear to be on target. I think i may hold on to this fixture.

Thanks again for the input about the par being higher but just in a narrow range but possibly lower in total. I definately screwed up by not acclimating this thing better. The LFS had swithced almost entirely to LEDS and this will help with future purchases as some of there stuff will be at least partly acclimated. Looking at their displays (they often dont move the corals very fast so they sit a while in the store) i would say most look good under the LEDs, although a few don't...im too knew to be of much use in discussing that any further.

I will certainly keep updates going here on how my marine land/ Mini T5 fixture combo works out in the coming here with purchases, although ill probably only add about one coral every 60 days or so.

 

[kissman]

I have been using the Nova Extreme Pro for 3 years now. The construction to me is good, I like that I can fit 6 bulbs over my 55g with no waste of having any hang over most of the ones I looked at did seem better but you needed a tank 14-18" wide. My 55g is 12" the Nova Pro fot perfect! The bulbs it comes with are junk in my opinion and I ended up getting all ATI's and its much better. I would love to get a great LED fixture for my next build in the spring I hope. I run the following and have good sps growth so far they have only been in tank about 6-8 weeks.

1 ATI AquaBlue Special
1 ATI Blue Plus
1 ATI Coral Plus
1 ATI True Actininc
1 ATI Blue Plus
1 ATI AquaBlue Special

 

[mtcoins123]

i would add only one comment here i think i am qualified to add. i do know that in nature the sun doesn't always shine and is not always consistent. it is impossible to replicate nature in our home aquarium. also i always wonder if plants and trees expand and grow towards dim light will dim light cycles or sparse light cycles elicit growth response from some corals???





i will stick to my MH's and 11 hour cycle cuz it seems to work well, but i do think about this stuff a lot and read more than i can remember, i would recommend much reading to anyone who contemplates lighting advice of others. (and not material written by manufacturers)

 

[Allentown]

i would add only one comment here i think i am qualified to add. i do know that in nature the sun doesn't always shine and is not always consistent. it is impossible to replicate nature in our home aquarium. also i always wonder if plants and trees expand and grow towards dim light will dim light cycles or sparse light cycles elicit growth response from some corals???





i will stick to my MH's and 11 hour cycle cuz it seems to work well, but i do think about this stuff a lot and read more than i can remember, i would recommend much reading to anyone who contemplates lighting advice of others. (and not material written by manufacturers)

Good points... 3 days a week (friday/saturday/sunday) im usually home all day and i do just this. I have 4 different switches (2 on the Nova T5s and 2 on the Marineland LEDS) and i randomly turn the different lights on and off all through out the day just ti simulate cloud cover, bright times and dim times. Of course when im not home the other 4 days a week its just vanilla actinics an hour before the 10k/12ks and then in reverse).

I actually think the randomized lighting is good for the tank, good for the corals and helps retard nuissance algae.

 

[jerpa]

I'm sure some have said they are garbage and you interpreted that to mean they were unable to grow corals. I agree the statement is rather general and gives no useful information about the light. This is something that happens all the time on the internet unfortunately.

If you had asked me I would have told you that the marineland reef ready fixtures are capable of growing corals. They don't use high quality LEDs. The coverage area is lacking even by their own PAR numbers. The spectrum is less than ideal IMO. Most importantly you can cover the same area with a number of other commercial fixtures that don't have all of these flaws and include many other features for the same amount of $$$. I think the lights are garbage.

 

[Allentown]

I'm sure some have said they are garbage and you interpreted that to mean they were unable to grow corals. I agree the statement is rather general and gives no useful information about the light. This is something that happens all the time on the internet unfortunately.

If you had asked me I would have told you that the marineland reef ready fixtures are capable of growing corals. They don't use high quality LEDs. The coverage area is lacking even by their own PAR numbers. The spectrum is less than ideal IMO. Most importantly you can cover the same area with a number of other commercial fixtures that don't have all of these flaws and include many other features for the same amount of $$$. I think the lights are garbage.

Given that argument in comparison to other LEDs, maybe.


But compared to the T5s, i just dont see it.


I am happy to report the coral is recovering nicely directly under the T5s. Now the picture however.

Notice how much more dimmly the tank is lit in the back under the T5s then it is in the front under the Marinelands?

Do they have some down falls yes...but they are light wt, they stay cool, the are flexible among tank sizes, easy to clean, easy to remove, and what are you basing that the LEDS are "low quality" on? Is it that they are 1w vs 3w or........???

 

[Toadally]

I can tell you that 64 watts of LED can absolutely grow SPS corals. I have a 40 breeder with two Kessil A150's and growing SPS quite well. The tank has a 3" sand bed and the SPS are mid tank. The lights are 8' off the water. One of the corals is an ORA Red Planet that's just absolutely beautiful.

 

[Michigan Mike]

I'm one of the people that steer people away from marine land LEDs. Having some myself and seeing all the people I run into who have them also at a couple of my LFS that sell them exclusively won't use them for their corals.
Of course they will grow soft corals and hard corals any white/blue 2 channel LEDs will, but they have limitations, big time, namely poor color of SPS corals.LEDs are notorious for bleaching corals if not acclimated slowly if moving from other lighting like t5.
I don't hate on 1w and 2w LEDs because I know they can be near equals to the big 3 & 5w LEDs if correctly set up.
Hope it works out or you but I disagree about the title of the thread,lol! I think you got good advice from people who know what hey are talking about and tried to keep you from making a purchase you may be unsatisfied with. My marineland LEDs shift color spectrum and have quit working. I would bet my t5 will outgrow marineland LEDs and have better color too.
Funny you guys mention current and reflectors as I made a post this morning about getting the most out of your t5 bulbs and reflectors is of coarse an important factor, check this out.
My ATI sunpower's reflectors

now the reflection on the water's surface

Now my Current Outer Orbit's reflectors

And the water's surface

Here's my Fishneedit reflection. I have crudely bent the reflectors a long time ago

You can see the importance of good reflectors. There's a huge difference in quality compared to CURRENT and ATI. Cool the label end of those T5 bulbs to get longer life and more PAR out of your T5 bulbs.

 

[Allentown]

Well if it doesnt work out then i will probably get a 6 bulb T5 60inch setup. However, i actually soft/flowing corals so we will just have to see how it goes.

Im running 12k and actinics in the short T5s adn of 54 1w 10ks and 4 actitincs in the leds....maybe the combo will work as is, who knows.