Should I add red LEDs?

[pearsonhurst]

Howdy folks.

I recently built a 12 LED fixture using the kit from RapidLED, which consists of 6 cool white and 6 royal blue LEDs. I am using only one Mean Well ELN-60-48D driver in order to dim the entire fixture instead of dimming the whites and blues separately. In retrospect, I probably should have gone with 2 drivers for finer control over the color, but what's done is done I suppose.

There are a couple of locals who have LED arrays over their tanks, and they are all 50/50 cool white, royal blue mix. After looking at a couple of tanks, the color isn't quite to my preference. Seeing as my driver will drive up to 14 3W CREEs, would I benefit from adding one of two red LEDs and running them with no optics to enhance the colors of whatever is going to end up in the tank, or would that be a waste of time/money?

I have seen a couple of DIY threads with red incorporated into the mix, but i can't find any pics comparing the tanks with and without the reds.

Any input from the LED gurus?

 

[wickedfish]

I don't like the hue it gives I have reefbrite strips in the center of my ai's. If you can get a color I would look for purple to make oranges and green pop.

 

[mike_cmu04]

I would not. I also dont like the color it gives off

 

[pearsonhurst]

Hmm. Maybe some warm whites then, or should I just learn to love the look

The real reason I considered red was that I'll have a RBTA in the tank, and have heard the color can be a little lacking under CW and RB LEDS.

 

[mcgyvr]

I'd just get another meanwell so you can dim whites/blues on their own.

 

[pearsonhurst]

I thought about that, and if I'm really unhappy, that may be the route I go, but I'd have to re solder all the connections, and add at least 4 more LEDs as the minimum for a driver is 8 diodes as I understand it. Not to mention the fact that another driver associated stuff to dim it will be running into money for a small array over a small tank. Splicing in 2 more LEDs is the much easier, economical solution, if I can hit upon the right color.

 

[RenoR1]

I recently added purple. Made the Coralline POP...Maybe a little too much...

 

[pearsonhurst]

Do you have a pictures with and without the purples? How many did you use, and what's your other mix of LEDs?

 

[jeff@zina.com]

Red is a bad color for corals or anything else. It's one of the first to disappear as you go deeper in the ocean, so nothing expects to see it. It also looks ugly. If you want less blue, just use more white and less blue in your array. Or different colors of blue.

Jeff

 

[bamf25]

If you want some warmer coloration it seems that adding natural white or maybe warm white will get you the effect you are looking for. LED's tend to have a very narrow color spectrum especially with the colored ones. Even the whites have a skewed color spectrum usually favoring the blue end of the spectrum. The natural and warm whites will get you a little spectrum in the high 600's and maybe a very small amount in the low 700's.

 

[pearsonhurst]

Thanks for all the input guys. I may be trying to correct a problem that doesn't exist. I guess I won't know for a few more weeks, at least, until the acrylic parts for my array holder get back from the CNC guys and I can see how it looks. I was just convernec because betweent he RBTA and clowns, there will be a lot of warm colors in the tank, and I don't want them to get dulled out because there is NO warm spectrum in the CW and RB LEDs.

 

[L98-Z]

Does anyone have pictures of this? Calling it ugly is a bit subjective.

 

[Neogenocide]

Red no, but I plan to try some purple soon.

 

[pearsonhurst]

Hmm, you're the 2nd person to mention purple. Please post some before and after pics once you add them. That may be a reasonable solution. Where are you getting yours from?

 

[Neogenocide]

I should have also mentioned that I ripped out the red led's I added, i disliked them that much. I'm not sure when I'll get some purples, but I will post some links soon. I had found a link to them in another thread, they were around $10/piece.

Scott

 

[redfishsc]

Everyone keeps mentioning purple, but I wonder if they aren't really referring to violet, which is a whole animal of a different color.


You can get VERY high power violet (ie, "actinic" around 400-420nm) stuff from Satistronics or Satisled.com all day long. They have them as big as 20 and 30 watt versions. Some places call them "purple" but if you look closely at the spectral output, they are usually anything but purple and will have a totally different effect on the tank than a true purple color.


"Purple" on the other hand is just blue/red combined and will cause you the same color shadow issues that the reds did, just to a lesser degree. You'll see about half of the red color shadows and about half of the color that you found unpleasant. The blue portion of the purple LED will just blend in with the rest of the blues.

Now, if someone found a very cheap price on the purples, such that you could use an equal number of them as you are using blue or whites, and put them on their own separate driver, then you would have no color shading issues and be able to dim them however you wanted. But I've never seen a true purple LED (I haven't looked for them) but I'd imagine they aren't cheap.


There's more promise in the violet LEDs. There's also significantly more cost in them too.

 

[TenKreefer]

http://www.nanotuners.com/product_info.php?cPath=74&products_id=694&osCsid=5u33p5bl45r77pp0ala59ufek3

 

[Neogenocide]

redfishsc,

You are correct, I actually meant violet......I hope to be installing some soon.

Scott

 

[L98-Z]

Anyone find pictures of red LEDs?

 

[hardin4019]

Red is a bad color for corals or anything else. It's one of the first to disappear as you go deeper in the ocean, so nothing expects to see it. It also looks ugly. If you want less blue, just use more white and less blue in your array. Or different colors of blue.

Jeff

Jeff is on the right track, one of the books I am reading shows the light colors and depth of penetration and also a warm to daylight color chart.