Lights... hit me...

If a 80% as good of tank is OK with you, then cool. When people ask, it is good to tell them that even the BEST tanks lit with LED will admit that the color is not as good...but it might be worth it for other reasons. Saying that they produce "gorgeous" results and leaving out this, and every other, nuance that might matter to somebody is bad advice. They are not the same - I try and describe the differences. I don't hate on anybody who decides to use one over the other, but I kinda do have a problem with those who refuse to relay the differences to those who are interested. Rickyb's post is kinda like Dr. Joshis article and is very honest and true from what I see - really nice tank with LEDs and he described the differences well (color not as good and lots and lots of panels) - I wonder if rickyb strugges with milles like a lot of LED folks do.

I am sure that you have never seen me recommend 400W MH and T5 to all but the biggest tanks and most serious folks who are OK with the wattage for various reason. 150W HQI and 250W will do for most. Switch to some 150W Phoenix for a while, save some electricity and you will likely never switch back.
 
I know when Sanjay was first experimenting with Radions (years back, gen1) he ran 3 on a 40 gallon breeder I think. This was to get best coverage and do his best to eliminate shadowing. I know leds have came a LOOOONG way since then, but the point is 3 on a 40 gallon. That's a lot of light. At some point the savings in electricity become void. I think that is mostly what jda is trying to emphasize.
I tend to agree, we need to double or at least 1.5 the number of units the manufacturer suggests. While there is no doubt LEDs grow corals, but as you stated we are still learning a lot about them which could include multiple units over recommended numbers.
At some point buying x number of units becomes ineffective of cost savings. One for e up front cost, and 2 for running number of said units at said watts, might be cheaper to run another source. This was my experience, I ran four rapidled units, at high intensity, didn't get the coverage I wanted so I switched back to a single 400 radium and it's easier to operate and is doing its job!

It's personal preference for sure.

Corey
 
As beautiful as Stoli's reef is, you can tell it's a point light source just by looking at the growth. It could be the way the corals are fragged but (especially the left side) they seem to grow mostly up and towards the center of the tank. With a softer light source (or more led panels) you get more even, rounded growth.
 
If you want lower cost, LEDs are the worst option of the bunch. This was the marketed story in the beginning, but the argument holds no water now. Most don't even break even with bulb replacement until 5-7 years down the road.

The coverage issue plaguing LEDs isn't a matter of light footprint, but rather shading and light refraction after coral colonies start to take hold. The more mature your reef, the more challenging it will be with LEDs.
 
Potatohead said:
As beautiful as Stoli's reef is, you can tell it's a point light source just by looking at the growth. It could be the way the corals are fragged but (especially the left side) they seem to grow mostly up and towards the center of the tank. With a softer light source (or more led panels) you get more even, rounded growth.
Click to expand...
Not my tank. Ricky's tank.

Sent from my SM-G935V using Tapatalk
 
jda said:
I wonder if rickyb strugges with milles like a lot of LED folks do.
Click to expand...

I have 3 or 4 millies in there, I know 1 for sure is not growing due to the green slimmer covering the sky above as well as encrusting around it.

Potatohead said:
you can tell it's a point light source just by looking at the growth. It could be the way the corals are fragged but (especially the left side) they seem to grow mostly up and towards the center of the tank. With a softer light source (or more led panels) you get more even, rounded growth.
Click to expand...

This is due to the panels are 5FT long, running 60 and 90 degree lenses, and not able to cover the edges of the tank, plus there is a frag rack on that area.
 
Dugless said:
If you want lower cost, LEDs are the worst option of the bunch. This was the marketed story in the beginning, but the argument holds no water now. Most don't even break even with bulb replacement until 5-7 years down the road.
Click to expand...

I am not getting the basic logic here. I replaced 2 mH fixtures of 250w + 100w ho actinics running at 700 watts total, with 2 kessil a360's 180 watts total rated for 50,000 hrs.

I had to pay approx $140 annually for the two 20k mH bulbs and another $75 a year for the ho actinics, which I replaced only every 2 yrs.

Say you run your kessils for 5 yrs: the total bulb replacement cost for the mH fixtures would be well over $600 alone. And there has to be an energy savings when you replace 700 watts worth of mH light with 180 watts of LED.
No?

I used the same photo period, same tank, at least as good results with the Kessils, after replacing the mH with them. I also very much like the kessil shimmer, but that is a personal choice.
 
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ComforablyNumb said:
I am not getting the basic logic here. I replaced 2 mH fixtures of 250w + 100w ho actinics running at 700 watts total, with 2 kessil a360's 180 watts total rated for 50,000 hrs.

I had to pay approx $140 annually for the two 20k mH bulbs and another $75 a year for the ho actinics, which I replaced only every 2 yrs.

Say you run your kessils for 5 yrs: the total bulb replacement cost for the mH fixtures would be well over $600 alone. And there has to be an energy savings when you replace 700 watts worth of mH light with 180 watts of LED.
No?

I used the same photo period, same tank, at least as good results with the Kessils, after replacing the mH with them. I also very much like the kessil shimmer, but that is a personal choice.
Click to expand...

Wattage is wattage. You are not getting the same amount of light into the tank with 1/4 the wattage you had before... You just aren't (that doesn't mean it's not working for you). Even if LED can get by on average with half the wattage, it still takes a lot of bulb changes to make up for the price difference of the fixtures themselves.
 
Your Kessil LEDs are visually lighting your tank, but I would wager that the PAR and possibly spectrum aren't as capable as your MHs were. Either that, or your reflectors were poorly applying that light and just wasting energy.

I'm not sure how long it has been since your transition to LEDs, but I would encourage you to reassess your coral health after 6-8 months to see if growth and color are still as good. Most go the route of slowly adding more LED fixtures as they aren't providing enough light.

But then again, it depends on what you're trying to keep. A mixed reef doesn't demand the type of light some fixtures provide.
 
Potatohead said:
Wattage is wattage. You are not getting the same amount of light into the tank with 1/4 the wattage you had before... You just aren't (that doesn't mean it's not working for you). Even if LED can get by on average with half the wattage, it still takes a lot of bulb changes to make up for the price difference of the fixtures themselves.
Click to expand...

Wattage is wattage, yes. Wattage for a given amount of light, absolutely not. An LED is light years more efficient than either incandescent or fluorescent. So, for the same wattage, an LED gives you way more light. MH wastes an order of magnitude more watts on heat than an LED. If you don't believe it, touch a 150 halide bulb and a 150 watt LED fixture.
 
Wattage is Wattage and PAR is PAR
PAR is not Wattage.

and PAR is not even a complete indicator of light. It's just the best one we've got.
 
The argument for efficiency in LEDs is always centered on energy, but very little attention is given to the small light footprint and high fixture costs. In order to achieve a diffuse blanket of light, you unfortunately need so many LED fixtures at high initial costs. And unfortunately more fixtures use more energy. This is not very efficient in my book.
 
"Wattage is wattage."

Most good quality LEDS claim to output 2.5 - 3.5 times more lumens per input watt than hot-burning sources like mH. Maybe they lied to me, dunno. Efficiency is also efficiency.

When I went thru the conversion to LED, I only bought one Kessil and replaced one fixture with it. Certainly in appearance there was not that much more light, side by side with the Kessil running at 100% intensity. The nature of the light was certainly different but not the overall brightness to any great discernible extent. Both sides of the tank were viewable side by side for 2 months before I bought the 2nd kessil. I watched coral growth on both sides of the tank for that period of course and again, not that much difference between them.

In my above example...the actual bulb replacement costs over 5 yrs are:
mH = $760 (2 mH per annum at $70 per bulb is $560 and 2 actinics per year per fixture at $25ea is $200 ......... 4 replacements over 5 yrs) $760

LED = $0

And I know my electrical and cooling costs dropped by quite a bit as well. Straight math says it would be one third of what is was. And the heat. I also have to dispute what someone said above about heat not being transferred into the tank. That was not my experience at all. Under mH, I had a heat problem in the summer..under LED I did not.

- two new kessils = $800
- two new mH fixtures like I had (Orbit Marine 250w mH with 4 x 25w HO actinic) is approx $500 + $760 in bulbs = $1260 + increased electrical costs

Maybe the mH's were putting out more light, but from my observations it wasn't really that much. And if my corals had suffered I would have reverted back to mH as I still have those mH space heaters around. My corals always come first.

I grow most types including SPS






As with all things reef, your mileage may vary. ;) Regards, Tim
 
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Agreed. I'll give it some time, but right now I'm pretty sold on my Radion's performance. Once again, I'll grant that it's a new tank with mostly frags, but all are high end and require pretty intense quality light and all are both retaining excellent color and growing. I'll also grant the possibility that I may have to add one more fixture a year or two down the line but thats still an 'if come'. Oh, and I'm running the Radions at about 60%
 
Potatohead said:
Wattage is wattage. You are not getting the same amount of light into the tank with 1/4 the wattage you had before... You just aren't (that doesn't mean it's not working for you). Even if LED can get by on average with half the wattage, it still takes a lot of bulb changes to make up for the price difference of the fixtures themselves.
Click to expand...

Comfortlynumb is exactly right.

Don't count the watts, read the PAR meter (as karimwassef said, it's the best measuring tool we have for light) and you'll see leds produce more light inside the tank with less watts. It's about watts wasted in heat, and the difference between MH reflectors and led design and lenses.

I have 4 tanks and replaced MH & t5 fixtures (1500 watts) with $1200 in led fixtures in a group buy deal that would have cost $1700 retail (900 watts). The MH and t5 ran at full power, the leds ran at about 65% power (roughly 600 watts) and produced the very same PAR numbers.

I replaced t5's every year and MH's every 2 years. My bulb savings alone was over $400! Now I'll admit, I live in SW Florida so I run A/C a lot (but just keep the house at 80F ) and ran a 1hp chiller and a 1/3rd hp chiller (4 tanks/ 2 systems/ 600g total) and both chillers are outside in the backyard. My chillers hardly run anymore and my house A/C runs less. The first year my electric bill was $400 less than the year before and the next year is was even a bit lower!

So my new leds (6 fixtures) paid for themselves in less than 18 months! And even at full retail would have paid for themselves in 2 years. At the end of 5 years I bought newer fixtures that are even more efficient and sold the old ones for $400.

There is nothing wrong with using MH or t5, they light tanks as well or better than leds, but they all work. And you don't need to but $800 EcoTech Radions to have great led performance. MarsAqua, Viparspecta, Euphotica, and others do fine at $100+. So the cost of led fixtures being too high is also BS.
 
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I'm not going to get into the science of it, BRS has done a ton of testing on lighting and you can watch until your heart's content. I don't have much experience with halides so I'll leave those alone, but I have a definite doubt that LED watt for watt put more light into the tank than an ATI Sunpower and it's definitely not spread out as evenly.
 
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