VHOs to PCs to T5s to MHs to HQIs and now LEDs.

[MUCHO REEF]

If you're reading this, obviously there are zoas and/or palys in your tank. Having them is one thing, illuminating your zoas and palys with LEDs is another. The introduction of LEDs has taken the hobby by storm. Some of the pros are for them, and some are very much against them.


What are your thoughts?

So what about PAR output?

Are they all the same?

What about bulb and fixture life/longevity?

Are they worth the price tag?

What are the pros and cons if any that you have read, wirnessed or experienced in your system?

If you've made the switch, was there a noticeable change, shift or growth increase or decline?

Are you running them, if so, which brand?

Yep, this thread is about LED's. Any thoughts? Please don't limit your answers to my questions, feel free to share any and all knowledge, experience and/or opinions you have on them.


Mucho Reef

 

[listen2bob]

I know that there are benefits and downfalls to each form of lighting. I run 4 forms, 2X150w HQI, 2X21w t-h, 2X 65w pc, and 2 blue leds. Everything seems to grow pretty well

 

[Jarred1]

What are your thoughts?
I have a DIY LED system and I couldn't be any happier. I like them more than T5HO and Power Compacts; I cant say I like them more than halides though because I don't have any experience with them.

So what about PAR output?
My set up can put out serious amounts of light, it doesn't look like it is putting out much but when I crank the lights up you can clearly see the corals don't like it.


Are they worth the price tag?
It is expensive at the inital investment but in the long run you will be saving a lot of money each year because you don't have to replace the bulbs.

If you've made the switch, was there a noticeable change, shift or growth increase or decline? What are the pros and cons if any that you have read, wirnessed or experienced in your system?
LEDs make your corals look very nice and I noticed an increase in growth. My zoas didn't grow much when I was using 48w of T5HO on a 10g tank but once I switched over to LEDs the growth took off like no other. The only bad thing is that they don't look like they are producing much light when they actually are putting out a lot of par so you have to be careful with that; I have had zoas shrink a lot in size because of this. Other than that I love my LEDs so far.


Are you running them, if so, which brand?
I have Cree 3w xr-e royal blue and xr-e cool white at a one to one ratio on dimable drivers. I have had them for about 6 months now with no bad complaints

Hope this helps everyone.

 

[Fcamdog]

Great thread, I hope many people with LEDs reply. I have had zoas and palys under every sort of lighting except LED, so far...

I would have to say T-5's are my overall favorite. With such a wide choice of bulbs I can take a 6-bulb retro and play with bulb selection to make all my polyps look awesome!

The only experience I have with LED is from buying Z's & P's from "well known" online vendors at Frag Swaps, only to be disappointed when they get home. The Pop and overall color is so intense under LED it's amazing. Some very, very average looking polyps can really look amazing under the right LED set-up.

Fcamdog

P.S. Nice to see you around Mucho.

 

[MUCHO REEF]

Awesome replies, thanks.

Has anyone performed any PAR meter testing to get an actual reading?

Hey Fcamdog, how's it going mate?

I hear you on the disappointment. A lot of people have proclaimed something they have is stunning rare, new and just discovered, when the majority of the time, as Organism said, it is just the lighting, and most likely something extremely common and has been around for years.

Any other LED users out there?


Mucho Reef

 

[meatball87]

I haven't tried leds but have the rest and u can't beat mhs for growth. I have read alot about leds and pellets say if u get the right ones they will work just as good as mhs plus no heat to worry about

 

[MUCHO REEF]

Anyone else with thoughts, opinions or info to share on this?

 

[Jarred1]

here is an example of what I mean by fast growth with reduced polyp size.

pink mohawks under t5hos 9/27/2010

Still under T5HO right before I upgraded to LEDs 10/7/2010

Under LEDs 11/15/2011

I now have a 15 polyp frag of these in my tank with power compacts to compare growth with LEDs

Also in the LED pic they don't look as nice as they used to because I accidentally had the 48w of LEDs on full power in a 10g tank. but they are starting to look better now!

 

[MUCHO REEF]

Any other LED users out there?

 

[SIR PATRICK]

I just added a strip of 12 3 watt blues to my existing lights.

I will share any changes that might occur with my long term established colonies as I see them.

 

[Jarred1]

Well if not that many people are using LEDs for their zoa tanks what kind of lighting do you all like the best to light these z and p tanks?

 

[sweet d]

mucho i just added leds to my solana i had a nova extreme t5 ho unit lighting my tank prior i had no complaints about this unit has far has preformance goes,that being said your replacing bulbs every what 9-12 mos maybe longer if you want to deal with ha for a while and those little 18"bulbs going for 20 bucks a peice and you need 6 of them lol the fixture i bought is the same has evolution or made by the same manufacturer without the sticker i duont know. i got it brand new for 300 i dont know about par readiongs but they would be the same has the evolution so we could look them up.ive never had mh but these leds make the tank shimmer and made plain grey zoas POP all of a sudden they had bright red skirts with cool centers very wild.has far has growth time will tell but from what ive read its good.so for 300 bucks the unit is the same has buying bulbs in like 3 years,

 

[organism]

I just went from pc's to hqi to LED's about 4 months ago in my nano at work and wow, the difference is huge. I did a 3:1 royal blue to white ratio, 12 bulbs with 80 degree lenses in a DIY canopy over an 11 gallon tank. Colors are so much better than under pc's and hqi, the heat is zero, and it's got that great shimmer effect. Every LED fixture I've seen that sucked had either the usual 1:1 blue to white ratio or 2:1. Those tend to just be good at looking like *** and growing algae, so far I haven't seen any commercial fixtures with a decent blue to white ratio.

Zoanthids are pastel colored and grow pretty well, and the mushrooms, orange hammer and orange frogspawn look amazing. I haven't taken a PAR reading but they're pretty strong, it took me about a month to acclimate the tank to them and I had a 90w hqi about 4" over the tank before. Everyone that looks at the tank at work asks what kind of halide is in it.

Cost me about $200 total to put together the entire canopy, got the LED kit for about $140 shipped and used $60ish in wood from home depot. Will be posting a DIY thread on it later this week since I finally found the pictures again

 

[Jarred1]

I just went from pc's to hqi to LED's about 4 months ago in my nano at work and wow, the difference is huge. I did a 3:1 royal blue to white ratio, 12 bulbs with 80 degree lenses in a DIY canopy over an 11 gallon tank. Colors are so much better than under pc's and hqi, the heat is zero, and it's got that great shimmer effect. Every LED fixture I've seen that sucked had either the usual 1:1 blue to white ratio or 2:1. Those tend to just be good at looking like *** and growing algae, so far I haven't seen any commercial fixtures with a decent blue to white ratio.

Zoanthids are pastel colored and grow pretty well, and the mushrooms, orange hammer and orange frogspawn look amazing. I haven't taken a PAR reading but they're pretty strong, it took me about a month to acclimate the tank to them and I had a 90w hqi about 4" over the tank before. Everyone that looks at the tank at work asks what kind of halide is in it.

Cost me about $200 total to put together the entire canopy, got the LED kit for about $140 shipped and used $60ish in wood from home depot. Will be posting a DIY thread on it later this week since I finally found the pictures again

I also used 80 degree optics and I had problems with my zoas bleaching and browning out so one of my friends that has LEDs sugested for me to take the optics off and that has since helped with the colors and they are coloring back up nicely.

 

[MUCHO REEF]

Good stuff guys, thanks for sharing. I'm considering them as supplements, but still love my HQI's. Time will tell I guess. Was also wondering if anyone had any PAR readings to share?

Thanks again.

 

[dublo8]

I went from PC>T5>HQI MH and I'm not ready to make the switch to LED yet. I'm not a fan of the colors. It seems so washed out on every tank I have looked at. I believe in the power and heat benefits but I haven't seen anything long term with them yet. I understand there are different color options but so far it's just blue and white. One thing I do have against the LED's is the separation of color in the tank.

There is a local LFS in my town that the entire store is lit by AI LED's. I think you can see the store on the AI website still. Either way, not all the colors "pop" like they do with my HQI setup. I run a phoenix 14k with no supplemental lighting and I love the way it looks. I'm just going on and on here but something about the LED's I just don't like. So until there is a giant leap forward with optics and color options I'm going to stick with my MH.

 

[jc-reef]

I have a mixed reef tank (mostly SPS/LPS) and along the sandbed, I have probably 15 different colonies of Z's & P's. I run a T5 and LED combo. I have a 4 bulb T5 fixture along with 3 LED REEFBRITE Strips (2-Blue / 1-50/50). The blue LED's give off the most incredible POP than any T5, VHO, MH that I have seen in person...by FAR! Now some of the white LED lights I have seen do tend to wash out some of the colors. Whats interesting is that the LED strips I use by Reefbrite come with angled reflectors built in which really end up putting out some serious light and also elimiate the 'tunnel' or 'tube' lighting effect that LED's have been know to produce. I would imagine thats how the future LED fixtures will end up being mass produced (kind of like the MH's reflectors). With the T5/LED combo, I get a really nice looking tank with good growth. At some point I will be switching to 100% LED, but as others have said, I am not sure the technology is quite there yet....especially with the lower to mid Kelvin (reds/yellows/greens). The higher Kelvin (Blues) the LED's hit it out of the park...IMO.

---------------

 

[KafudaFish]

Very interesting on the 3:1 from above.

I must say of all the aspects of reefing lights are the #1 hit my head against a brick wall issue.

Person A says great growth and great colors with these lights.
Person B says good to great growth and ok colors with these lights.

Then it seems that every day there is some new fixture is coming out and how this one fixes all the issues of the old one and how DIY is the way to go but if you do spot lights you have to hand the fixture 2 feet off the water's surface.

Who wants to do that on a nano with no canopy etc? If my tank is 10 inches tall I don't want a 2 ft. canopy to hide everything.

bang bang bang

 

[mallorieGgator]

I don't know too much about them but may try using them on the 40 gallon when I get it going.

 

[PinkDamsel]

Don’t know if this thread is still active, but I’ll share my experience.

Boostled PAR 30: 4RB/1Cool Wh, 60° optics, 3 w but driven at 2 watts; non-dimmable, 22.5” above sandbed of my 3 gallon pico. The Boostled website has specs on the PAR output.

Results are mixed & puzzling:

- Overall shimmer and glitter lines are wonderful!

- Fluorescent greens fluoresced immediately (didn’t need time to “color up”): Mint Chips & Eagle Eye skirts. Both seem happy @ 12” below the LED, but were also happy under my earlier 9w CF.

- 2 orange palys are nice & bright. Same for some tiny orange zoas, but I had to move the zoas to the sandbed and off to the side. I want to move them up onto the rock but don’t know if they will take the increase in light. Some cinnamon palys have nice color but don’t always open and when they do not all the way.

- Tubbs Blue have intense blue color, but are much tinier (1/8” diameter) than pictures I’ve seen of other people’s Tubbs. They, too, are on the sandbed. They have added some polyps, in spite of staying small.

- All the pinks are a disappointment, I was expecting these would color up under the LEDs, but no. I should add that the first 2 I already had under the 9w CF and the color was the same dull gray-pink then as well: Pink & Gold palys; dull pink zoas that started to bleach until moved to the sandbed, since then quite shrunk; Pink & Green palys that were intensely colored under the vendor’s T5s but are grey-pink under my LEDs, although they aren’t flinching like some others.

- The Nuclear Green started off fully open & great-looking, then positively shrank, and even under partial shade on the sandbed is not opening now.

- The Purple Death also shrank, but less so, and is remaining open. May need to move him back down 6” to the sandbed again. There isn’t room for EVERYONE on the sandbed and there’s empty space on the rock, so this is a dilemma.

In retrospect I think a custom-built, dimmable LED would probably have been more appropriate for a such a small tank w. softies rather than the PAR bulb. Alas! The Damsel is not skilled in the DIY department, but is having fun anyways!