I am looking to switch to led need help

D

dieseldaisy

New member
i currently have a 54 corner with a 20gal sump with a 24 inch marine land fixture which includes 4 t5 blue and 1 250 watt 14000k halide that I replace every 6-8 months costing me over 100.00 dollars each time for all the bulbs. With all the led fixtures on the market now I think it is wise to switch over but I have no idea which one to buy! If anyone has any suggestions they would be appreciated!
 
Take a look at reefbreeders. Just ordered one of their value fixtures to go over a 40 breeder while I'm cycling/finishing the new 90.
 
Stu I will! Thanks let me know how yours is

Gary?? Really I've been told to switch every 6-8 by lfs what type of fixture do you have and what do you do?
 
I've been using Led for over two yrs now. I'd say led does the job pretty well. Make sure you have reds and violets and uv if you want your sps color up. I don't know about greens cause my fixture doesn't have them. Just white and blue will brown out your sps
 
Like Gary says stop switching them out. Who told you 6-8 months? Quite a waste. Really think about it before you switch. The electric savings is definitely there but not as great as some think it will be. And your looking at a long drawn out period to get the corals use to the led setup. And personally, never saw a tank lit by LEDs that looked as nice as a MH setup. Especially w T5 supplement like you run.
 
I have never seen a led setup myself either, I just thought that is where the hobby was going these days and wanted to reduce in replacing my bulbs so often they say they lose their light spectrum. What am I gaining or causing by switching them out so often?
 
dattong said:
I've been using Led for over two yrs now. I'd say led does the job pretty well. Make sure you have reds and violets and uv if you want your sps color up. I don't know about greens cause my fixture doesn't have them. Just white and blue will brown out your sps
Click to expand...

I agree on your statement that leds will def do the job. I don't agree with the statement that you have to have reds and violets to color up your sps and that running only whites and blues will brown out your sps. That's a load of crap my man. I don't have any brown sps in my tank.
 
dieseldaisy, there are alot of different vendors out there. I would do some research and see what you might like and what wont kill ya in price. If your ever in Rochester send me a pm and you could stop by and check out my lights if you are interested. I know a few of the lfs in town are running leds over their tanks that would also give you a chance to possibly look at different manufacturers of led lights. I've been running chinese made fixtures over my tank since april 2011 and have had great sucess with them.
 
First off, replacing halides on a 6-8 month schedule is pretty conservative at best, even "ludicrous" wouldn't be much of a stretch. Even if you jump up to 18-24 months, you'll still stand a good chance at re-couping your cost for switching lamps by upgradnig to LED's if you build the fixture yourself (kit or full DIY). Buying a retail LED fixture isn't CURRENTLY going to save you any money in the long run (that may change in coming years as costs come down). I built my own LED fixture and have at LEAST as good a growth as I did with halides, if not better, and don't have to deal with the worry of cooking my tank in the summer. That alone is worth the peace of mind for me...
 
I have the reefbreeders leds IT2080 over my 125gal tank and love them. I had MH switched my bulbs at least in a year span and it would cost over $300 now am switching leds on my reefbreeders lights just to get it perfect for my corals and fish and the leds cost about $2 and last up to 5 years. Leds are the way to go :spin1:
 
Gary Majchrzak said:
x2

sorry LED folks!
Click to expand...

x3 for the MH

LEDs were a pretty hard switch for my corals and I def missed some of the color pops that I got from MH. Some of my corals did better than others. Also remember that quality proven fixtures are big$$$ and DIY isn't as easy as it looks without experience. Yes there are definitely some awesome LED lit tanks out there. For me I'm back to MH+ VHO, IMO nothings better than 14k MH whatever the cost
 
I change the halides in the display every 15 mos and then run them for another 6 mos in the grow out tanks. I change vho actinics every 8 months.
IIRC, generally, most of the photosynthetic available radiation (PAR) loss that will occur , occurs within the first 3 months of use. After that the curve flattens out with a much less significant loss over a long period of time.

Not sure about leds for sps yet, I'm very happy with halide and vho actinic. Henry has certainly had success wtih them andthey warrant a second look. . Evergrow and Reef breeders leds get reasonbly good reviews for the lower end price range.
 
LED are the future and should be fully matured in the near term. MH will be like the beta tape in a few years. In the end T5 bulbs will be used by the diehards who swear by the color and growth. This is similar with how a select few are obsessed with vinyl records while the rest of us have moved onto digital and don't care about the slight loss in fidelity.


But seriously, Look into the AI VEGA and the Ecotech Radion (gen 2 or Pro). I own Gen 1 & Pro Radions. I don't change bulbs anymore and if I don't like the color and go in and adjust it.
 
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Definitely the future, and even if you don't think they're "there yet" the safety of never being able to overheat the tank is worth the few current tradeoffs.
 
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