Where will LED be in 2 years?
- Thread starter mktang
- Start date
widmer
Drug Enthusiast
XP-G electricity consumption at "typical" drive current:
700mA x 3.2v = 2.25 watts
x 40 = 90 watts
But yea it's easy to reach 120w if they were run at a higher drive current of 900 mA. Also, :beer: @ 2-3x as much light...
TheFishMan65
New member
I was doing worst case to try and figure out where he would be using more power. I agree wih you that most folks run around 700ma, but that may change based on kcress's temperature research.
Acrotrdco
New member
There'll always be some nay-sayers when a new technology comes out.
When iPad was announced by Steve Jobs, tech critics here and there cried out loud saying they want a macbook air halved not a triple-sized iPhone.
Look around now and see how many folks carrying an iPad.
LED is in their prime imo, more and more folks will join the bandwagen within 2011 and by 2012 it'll very likely phase out MH and T5.
When iPad was announced by Steve Jobs, tech critics here and there cried out loud saying they want a macbook air halved not a triple-sized iPhone.
Look around now and see how many folks carrying an iPad.
LED is in their prime imo, more and more folks will join the bandwagen within 2011 and by 2012 it'll very likely phase out MH and T5.
Thread derail complete.... :jester:
But I do use LED moonlight! :rollface:
Perfect for my coral needs. I'm keeping mushrooms and zoas. I could keep SPS with my set up just dont have room for my cal reactor so it not worth the trouble.
But I do use LED moonlight! :rollface:
My light meter says different...
Perfect for my coral needs. I'm keeping mushrooms and zoas. I could keep SPS with my set up just dont have room for my cal reactor so it not worth the trouble.
Well then your tank might be set up with too much light do you measure yours with a par meter?
I would most likely need more than 40 to cover the tank evenly with the correct color and would have to build it custom DIY that wouldnt be hard. It just threw up red flags when looking at DIY leds that websites were set up just to sell LEDs to reefer. I bet there is a nice mark up if this is only thing they sell....
How do you know you dont have enough light. And enough light for what? :wildone:
myfrostymember
New member
just a thought --but alot of the post i read about the led commercial setups put out so much power the users are running them at 30-50% power- some higher-- but most say they are to powerfull to use at full 100%-- that being said what is the great point of coming out with a single led that is as bright as the sun-- its going to be whoever and whatever turns thats single super bright bulb into a usable "fixture" that will make all the stuff we have today obsolete-- ie. thinking 3-6 super bright leds over a tank just like we use mh lights now - this posible?
maybe when they come out with a bulb that does all that fancy high lumen wattage crap you can just mount it in a can light in the ceiling above the tank and then be set--
maybe when they come out with a bulb that does all that fancy high lumen wattage crap you can just mount it in a can light in the ceiling above the tank and then be set--
jmchzn123
New member
This is nuts. OK to all you scientists out there.....
**LED's work right now with current technology.
**BIG TANKS 72x 24x 31 (that I know of), 100% SPS GROWING , THRIVING AND LOOKING BEAUTIFUL.
** Corals on the bottom of your tank are more than fine with 300-400 PAR
** 1K -2K plus PAR is growing ANYTHING you can dream of putting in the tank. Even 10 yrs from now. Unless god makes new coral we have yet to discover.
** Energy, control, Heat and 5 yrs on a bulb........sign me up!
** Expensive....what isn't....your in the wrong sport partner I suggest Bowling.
** Fly by night purchasing options? The only fly by night websites are the DIY sites and a few ebay like LED sites but not the Major manufacturing sites. Just stay away its called common sense. That's why we come to RC...To hear about other people's experiences.
** Here is an analogy....I have a 7-9 yr old BK Skimmer. OMG if I hear one more person tell me how I got ripped off I'm goona put a bullet in my head. As all you haters are telling me in the same breath I should see their NEW skimmer # 3-4 in the same time period. The BK does the job as good as the best skimmer made today. Why change it? Its the same with the LED's on the market right now. If they grow SPS flawlessly in 2011 what's gonna change in 2020? SAME CORAL SAME LIGHT SAME RESULT....
** The AI's I have are modular and BUILT with the idea technology will advance and the AI design allows for easy change out of the emmitters and the software.
** Last but not least...Reef Keeping is just as much about the gear as it is the animals we keep. Some of us want the coolest gear...Others want to tinker in their garage and say dumb **** because they saved a buck. Who cares if their house burns down or it looks like a tag sale going on around their tanks....Some of us like lean and clean looking reef's we can show off and enjoy with our wives....who wouldn't let us spend the college fund on fish if it didn't look nice....lol...lil levity to break the tension...Lighten up...just saying
**LED's work right now with current technology.
**BIG TANKS 72x 24x 31 (that I know of), 100% SPS GROWING , THRIVING AND LOOKING BEAUTIFUL.
** Corals on the bottom of your tank are more than fine with 300-400 PAR
** 1K -2K plus PAR is growing ANYTHING you can dream of putting in the tank. Even 10 yrs from now. Unless god makes new coral we have yet to discover.
** Energy, control, Heat and 5 yrs on a bulb........sign me up!
** Expensive....what isn't....your in the wrong sport partner I suggest Bowling.
** Fly by night purchasing options? The only fly by night websites are the DIY sites and a few ebay like LED sites but not the Major manufacturing sites. Just stay away its called common sense. That's why we come to RC...To hear about other people's experiences.
** Here is an analogy....I have a 7-9 yr old BK Skimmer. OMG if I hear one more person tell me how I got ripped off I'm goona put a bullet in my head. As all you haters are telling me in the same breath I should see their NEW skimmer # 3-4 in the same time period. The BK does the job as good as the best skimmer made today. Why change it? Its the same with the LED's on the market right now. If they grow SPS flawlessly in 2011 what's gonna change in 2020? SAME CORAL SAME LIGHT SAME RESULT....
** The AI's I have are modular and BUILT with the idea technology will advance and the AI design allows for easy change out of the emmitters and the software.
** Last but not least...Reef Keeping is just as much about the gear as it is the animals we keep. Some of us want the coolest gear...Others want to tinker in their garage and say dumb **** because they saved a buck. Who cares if their house burns down or it looks like a tag sale going on around their tanks....Some of us like lean and clean looking reef's we can show off and enjoy with our wives....who wouldn't let us spend the college fund on fish if it didn't look nice....lol...lil levity to break the tension...Lighten up...just saying
rtparty
Raise The Reef!
It all depends on your setup.
I had a 4x24w ATI Sunpower over my 40 gallon breeder and could melt any LPS I felt like on the sand bed. I bleached out a few SPS that were half way down the tank. I kept SPS ANYWHERE in my tank including on the "darker" edges.
Sounds like you have a bad setup
To the rest in this thread:
This thread is a joke. The OP had a great idea and then a few people jumped in here claiming they know everything there is to know about LED technology and more importantly they know EXACTLY what corals need.
None of us have ANY clue as to what corals really need when it comes to light. We can throw PAR, PUR and spectrum out all day. We still have no idea how UV and infrared light plays into the equation.
I am lucky enough to have one of the top marine biologists in this hobby in my local club. A guy who spent 10+ years diving every day and researching corals from Indonesia, Australia and the Caribbean. Some of you in this thread probably have the coral named after him in your tank, Blundell Buttons. Even though they are sold with different names now to jack up the price. We give them out for free while big online sites sell them for $70 a polyp! :hmm3:
Anyways in talking to him, he suggested that we can use ANY kind of lighting over our tanks. We can use incandescent bulbs if we can pack enough over the tank. Might not look great but with the right setup it could be done. Is it practical? NO WAY! Is it a dumb idea? Sure it is.
Kind of like producing these *1000* watt LED's that produce 2,000 PAR at 48". You can go barebottom and still light your refugium below. (Some sarcasm if you can't pick up on it)
Can LED's keep coral? Yes they can. Are they perfect and the end all in this hobby? Not by a long shot. By 2012 people will still be using T5, PC, MH and even VHO.
About 2.5 years ago I kept a small 5 gallon tank under LED's. At that time we had nothing compared to now. I had the Current PowerBrite LED's that were never meant to maintain coral. Yet, I kept mushrooms and zoas no problem. Acans and any other LPS didn't like the light. Wasn't enough power or the right spectrum IMO.
Everyone that complains about price needs to step back a little bit. You are talking about an industry that makes $MILLIONS$ a year. Our little hobby isn't even a penny in their well.
Therefore your little "fly by night" shops are all we have. They take a HUGE risk investing money into this hobby and technology. For now we have to rig things up to the best we can, with what we have. Is it perfect/prime time? No, not in my opinion.
The best combo is LED/T5 IMO. Shimmer, less electricity, less heat and you can run the T5s less and not replace bulbs for 18-24 months.
To everyone else claiming 500lm/w this and 750lm/w that, really? I mean really? Don't get efficiency and effectiveness confused. They are two different things but when working together they can be deadly.
For example, if two of us here decided to go cross country and only had $3000 and 30 days to do it, what method would you take? A plane, bike, car, walking? You could become the most efficient biker on the planet and it won't do you a bit of good if you are not effective. Same for taking the plane, you might have been effective but you weren't as efficient as the guy on a bike.
Bad example sure but the point is there.
We DON'T need more powerful lights. Using less LED's means more spotlighting, fact. We need different spectrum LED's that aren't available. We need a BIG company to produce very "hobby" oriented spectrums. Since it will take quite a bit of time and money in the research, no small time company can afford that.
For those of you that have used T5, think of what happened when KZ released the Fiji Purple. Was it a new technology? Nope. They took what we had though and tweaked it to work just right in our case. Pink grow tubes have been used for YEARS by FW planted hobbyists. They just tended to be a little overpowering for our crowd. Yet, KZ changed the way we looked at T5's. No more 50:50 combo that washed things out. The 50:50 combo has looked like crap for years. It is true in all types of lighting.
Kind of like the LED's today. The reds and even warm whites, are very overpowering. We have to dim them to make them work in our case. I am waiting for that *one* company to tweak an LED just a little bit to work for us.
I am a believer in LED. I have a 7.5 gallon cube sitting here on my desk with a PAR30 bulb over it. Just waiting on some parts and the tank to cycle, then I can add corals.
But is this PAR30 bulb, the "answer"? No way, it has a lot lacking IMO but, it is efficient and pretty effective. If I get 5 years out of it, I will be ecstatic. I think we will all soon learn that LED's won't last 50k hours above our tanks. Kind of like how T5's never came close to the 2 years we were all promised. Now we are being promised 50k hours, 100k hours!
Time will tell. Sorry for the long winded post and rambling.
I never said led do not work.
I read just yesterday that they are developing reflectors for leds. So you dont get that spot light effect. That will be the next break through. For example you could mount 3-10 led in a reflector and that blends the light and would cover a large area [ex 2x2].just a thought --but alot of the post i read about the led commercial setups put out so much power the users are running them at 30-50% power- some higher-- but most say they are to powerfull to use at full 100%-- that being said what is the great point of coming out with a single led that is as bright as the sun-- its going to be whoever and whatever turns thats single super bright bulb into a usable "fixture" that will make all the stuff we have today obsolete-- ie. thinking 3-6 super bright leds over a tank just like we use mh lights now - this posible?
maybe when they come out with a bulb that does all that fancy high lumen wattage crap you can just mount it in a can light in the ceiling above the tank and then be set--
rtparty
Raise The Reef!
Ecoxotic has been using "reflectors" on their Panorama fixtures since day one. They released the Panorama and Stunner strips at the 2009 Mountain West Reef Fest. Ike was there and I talked to him for about 30 minutes all about LED lighting.
That was one main thing he pointed out to me. The use of reflectors in their system compared to optics for others.
D5HP
New member
Thought I'd chime in a little bit as well.
Where will LEDs be in 2 years?
That's a strange question in my opinion because I continue to hear LFS owners and others rocking their halide heaters say that "the technology hasn't progressed enough quite yet".
I've had my reef running for ~6 months with LEDs from day one and I've gotten incredible growth, color, and health out of all the species I keep (once I turned them WAAAY down).
As for spotlighting? You obviously need quite a few and they need the be mounted a bit above the water if you're using extremely tight beam optics.
LEDs work. Halides do as well. Having used both I can honestly say that I like them both about the same after you weigh everything out. I will never use anything but LEDs again though.
I think spotlighting is a much bigger issue on larger tanks with people buying very small densely packed off the shelf fixtures and trying to make them work. LEDs are certainly more expensive but I've saved my money already through bulb replacement, AC bill in the house, and electricity to fire the bulb.
I believe that LEDs will get more and more powerful (obviously) and the package will get smaller and smaller so that this trend could actually worsen. Spread the LEDs out some more vendors!
I am an EE grad from the same university that the founders of Cree taught at before leaving to start the company so you could consider that a bias towards using the LEDs. My tank does show the capabilities of LED tech though and speaking from personal experience you cannot go wrong.
Where will LEDs be in 2 years?
That's a strange question in my opinion because I continue to hear LFS owners and others rocking their halide heaters say that "the technology hasn't progressed enough quite yet".
I've had my reef running for ~6 months with LEDs from day one and I've gotten incredible growth, color, and health out of all the species I keep (once I turned them WAAAY down).
As for spotlighting? You obviously need quite a few and they need the be mounted a bit above the water if you're using extremely tight beam optics.
LEDs work. Halides do as well. Having used both I can honestly say that I like them both about the same after you weigh everything out. I will never use anything but LEDs again though.
I think spotlighting is a much bigger issue on larger tanks with people buying very small densely packed off the shelf fixtures and trying to make them work. LEDs are certainly more expensive but I've saved my money already through bulb replacement, AC bill in the house, and electricity to fire the bulb.
I believe that LEDs will get more and more powerful (obviously) and the package will get smaller and smaller so that this trend could actually worsen. Spread the LEDs out some more vendors!
I am an EE grad from the same university that the founders of Cree taught at before leaving to start the company so you could consider that a bias towards using the LEDs. My tank does show the capabilities of LED tech though and speaking from personal experience you cannot go wrong.
hey
hey
read your LED post. (one of several i guess. I have a 100gal folwer but am considering adding some easy to keep corals. In your opinion, how much would a fixture cost me? my lights are crap now so i'd have to get a new set up. For fish i have tangs/ blue spotted buffer that MAY be a problem although he doesnt bother any of the hermits etc
hey
read your LED post. (one of several i guess. I have a 100gal folwer but am considering adding some easy to keep corals. In your opinion, how much would a fixture cost me? my lights are crap now so i'd have to get a new set up. For fish i have tangs/ blue spotted buffer that MAY be a problem although he doesnt bother any of the hermits etc
widmer
Drug Enthusiast
maybe when they come out with a bulb that does all that fancy high lumen wattage crap you can just mount it in a can light in the ceiling above the tank and then be set--
Here you go. This is a fixture I built last year, and have since passed to a local reefer. I'm working on an even more hardcore version right now. It could just as well be fit into the ceiling.
jmchzn - I was totally :lol: throughout reading your rant until I came across this part and found myself to be in one of the several groups you have successfully offended
lol. My reaction to this part is twofold: 1) yea, a lot of reefers make DIY LED setups that aren't packaged into a clean fixture.
2) When you say "coolest gear" you must be putting a *lot* of weight in the fact that manufactured LED fixtures come in a clean package. Because otherwise, most DIY fixtures are using significantly higher quality LEDs than manufactured fixtures.
Your liberal use of hyperbole isn't doing it for me. Who's "claiming they know everything" and "exactly what corals need"?
Again, this is way overexaggerated. Sure we don't and maybe never will know the finer details. But let's not discount the multitude of research which has given us some general guidelines to run successful tanks by.
I'm going to cast my vote here that LEDs will in fact lead to the phasing out of T5, PC, MH, and VHO. Just as VHO phased out NO, just as MH and PC has caused people by far and large to give up VHO, just as T5 has replaced PC and in many cases MH. Disregarding all other factors, these former technologies are rapidly becoming too expensive to keep when compared to LED.
You may be pleased to find that you can readily purchase Cree LEDs in a multitude of spectrums. Everyone talks about "warm white", "cool white" etc, but there are many many sub-categories of these general types that are available for purchase, including LEDs with a CRI that would put most T5/MH to shame...
The future of LEDs for reef and plant growth appplications will involve lenses over the indivudal mostly high energy LEDs that are coated with precise and prorietary mixtures of quatum dots. The QDs will act similir to phospors, by giving off light when struck by the high energy blue light LEDs. The mixtures will provide the desired spectra and color. Changing color will be as simple as replacing the lens (like replacing the acrylic lens on a powermodule). The QD coated lens will largely take care of the spotting effect as well.
brassmonkyballs
BMB
I'm not an expert but I am opinionated and smart enough to be dangerous. I don't think this thread is joke and I enjoy the exchange of information. I do agree everybody is an expert but lets face it, these opinions based on experience are valid. I didn't see anyone claiming they know everything about LEDs but those that have experience (particularly in DIY) are of course forced to research into what they are working with and much of that gets regurgitated here and I guess you view that as everybody giving a view thinks they're an expert. I personally don't think anything is wrong with that. Any forum on any topic is full of 'experts'...thats why they exist, are used, and grow.
I agree with your analogy that there's a number of ways to achieve an end result and just a matter of how you do it....though going cross country with 3000 bucks on a bike vs an airplane isn't particularly a good one. Any type of lighting can achieve a result...I get the point. LEDs are the now thing and I like them. Why are LED/T5 combo the best right now? Is that an opinion or an expert view?
I disagree that we do not need brighter more powerful LEDs. On a pure functional basis I agree but the bi-product of R&D into higher power LEDs is that we naturally get a trickle down effect to drive down costs of the existing high power LEDs to where we can pack more into the space for a lower cost while gaining efficiency and reducing problems such as the spot lighting concern. Yes we achieve a gain in efficiency and effectiveness at the same time...and yes in this case efficiency and effectiveness go hand in hand. The light output is needed and I am sure you agree. Plenty of people have been using LEDs just fine. My personal experience is I see much more rapid growth under LEDs than a MH...but MH absolutely rocks on its own. At the same time, I have had color issues on certain pieces under the LEDs and have learned to move the piece and tweak the lighting together.
I don't know what any coral likes or needs...but I do know our success in keeping these animals is based on a lot of collective experience over many years from thousands of reefers around the world which has turned into knowledge and passed to one another, from LFS, and on forums such as this to allow others to have similar success. The same is happening right now with LEDs.
People will be using all types of lighting beyond 2012 and at this point its a matter of personal preference. T5 and MH are well proven, LEDs work at least as well and have significant upside in some cases. Will they last? We won't know for a while. I agree 50k hours is questionable simply because the environment in which we run them.
Anyhow...I like them, I love to build stuff and tinker, and I love to learn. By the way, there is a supposed 18000k 220lumen 3W LED coming out of China at low cost. If you're a Do-it-Yourselfer it looks promising.
I agree with your analogy that there's a number of ways to achieve an end result and just a matter of how you do it....though going cross country with 3000 bucks on a bike vs an airplane isn't particularly a good one. Any type of lighting can achieve a result...I get the point. LEDs are the now thing and I like them. Why are LED/T5 combo the best right now? Is that an opinion or an expert view?
I disagree that we do not need brighter more powerful LEDs. On a pure functional basis I agree but the bi-product of R&D into higher power LEDs is that we naturally get a trickle down effect to drive down costs of the existing high power LEDs to where we can pack more into the space for a lower cost while gaining efficiency and reducing problems such as the spot lighting concern. Yes we achieve a gain in efficiency and effectiveness at the same time...and yes in this case efficiency and effectiveness go hand in hand. The light output is needed and I am sure you agree. Plenty of people have been using LEDs just fine. My personal experience is I see much more rapid growth under LEDs than a MH...but MH absolutely rocks on its own. At the same time, I have had color issues on certain pieces under the LEDs and have learned to move the piece and tweak the lighting together.
I don't know what any coral likes or needs...but I do know our success in keeping these animals is based on a lot of collective experience over many years from thousands of reefers around the world which has turned into knowledge and passed to one another, from LFS, and on forums such as this to allow others to have similar success. The same is happening right now with LEDs.
People will be using all types of lighting beyond 2012 and at this point its a matter of personal preference. T5 and MH are well proven, LEDs work at least as well and have significant upside in some cases. Will they last? We won't know for a while. I agree 50k hours is questionable simply because the environment in which we run them.
Anyhow...I like them, I love to build stuff and tinker, and I love to learn. By the way, there is a supposed 18000k 220lumen 3W LED coming out of China at low cost. If you're a Do-it-Yourselfer it looks promising.
It all depends on your setup.
I had a 4x24w ATI Sunpower over my 40 gallon breeder and could melt any LPS I felt like on the sand bed. I bleached out a few SPS that were half way down the tank. I kept SPS ANYWHERE in my tank including on the "darker" edges.
Sounds like you have a bad setup
To the rest in this thread:
This thread is a joke. The OP had a great idea and then a few people jumped in here claiming they know everything there is to know about LED technology and more importantly they know EXACTLY what corals need.
None of us have ANY clue as to what corals really need when it comes to light. We can throw PAR, PUR and spectrum out all day. We still have no idea how UV and infrared light plays into the equation.
I am lucky enough to have one of the top marine biologists in this hobby in my local club. A guy who spent 10+ years diving every day and researching corals from Indonesia, Australia and the Caribbean. Some of you in this thread probably have the coral named after him in your tank, Blundell Buttons. Even though they are sold with different names now to jack up the price. We give them out for free while big online sites sell them for $70 a polyp! :hmm3:
Anyways in talking to him, he suggested that we can use ANY kind of lighting over our tanks. We can use incandescent bulbs if we can pack enough over the tank. Might not look great but with the right setup it could be done. Is it practical? NO WAY! Is it a dumb idea? Sure it is.
Kind of like producing these *1000* watt LED's that produce 2,000 PAR at 48". You can go barebottom and still light your refugium below. (Some sarcasm if you can't pick up on it)
Can LED's keep coral? Yes they can. Are they perfect and the end all in this hobby? Not by a long shot. By 2012 people will still be using T5, PC, MH and even VHO.
About 2.5 years ago I kept a small 5 gallon tank under LED's. At that time we had nothing compared to now. I had the Current PowerBrite LED's that were never meant to maintain coral. Yet, I kept mushrooms and zoas no problem. Acans and any other LPS didn't like the light. Wasn't enough power or the right spectrum IMO.
Everyone that complains about price needs to step back a little bit. You are talking about an industry that makes $MILLIONS$ a year. Our little hobby isn't even a penny in their well.
Therefore your little "fly by night" shops are all we have. They take a HUGE risk investing money into this hobby and technology. For now we have to rig things up to the best we can, with what we have. Is it perfect/prime time? No, not in my opinion.
The best combo is LED/T5 IMO. Shimmer, less electricity, less heat and you can run the T5s less and not replace bulbs for 18-24 months.
To everyone else claiming 500lm/w this and 750lm/w that, really? I mean really? Don't get efficiency and effectiveness confused. They are two different things but when working together they can be deadly.
For example, if two of us here decided to go cross country and only had $3000 and 30 days to do it, what method would you take? A plane, bike, car, walking? You could become the most efficient biker on the planet and it won't do you a bit of good if you are not effective. Same for taking the plane, you might have been effective but you weren't as efficient as the guy on a bike.
Bad example sure but the point is there.
We DON'T need more powerful lights. Using less LED's means more spotlighting, fact. We need different spectrum LED's that aren't available. We need a BIG company to produce very "hobby" oriented spectrums. Since it will take quite a bit of time and money in the research, no small time company can afford that.
For those of you that have used T5, think of what happened when KZ released the Fiji Purple. Was it a new technology? Nope. They took what we had though and tweaked it to work just right in our case. Pink grow tubes have been used for YEARS by FW planted hobbyists. They just tended to be a little overpowering for our crowd. Yet, KZ changed the way we looked at T5's. No more 50:50 combo that washed things out. The 50:50 combo has looked like crap for years. It is true in all types of lighting.
Kind of like the LED's today. The reds and even warm whites, are very overpowering. We have to dim them to make them work in our case. I am waiting for that *one* company to tweak an LED just a little bit to work for us.
I am a believer in LED. I have a 7.5 gallon cube sitting here on my desk with a PAR30 bulb over it. Just waiting on some parts and the tank to cycle, then I can add corals.
But is this PAR30 bulb, the "answer"? No way, it has a lot lacking IMO but, it is efficient and pretty effective. If I get 5 years out of it, I will be ecstatic. I think we will all soon learn that LED's won't last 50k hours above our tanks. Kind of like how T5's never came close to the 2 years we were all promised. Now we are being promised 50k hours, 100k hours!
Time will tell. Sorry for the long winded post and rambling.
You should spend some time researching proper light acclimation and you wont have the bleaching and melting problems. Why would you want to melt an LPS on the sand bed?
It all depends on your setup.
I had a 4x24w ATI Sunpower over my 40 gallon breeder and could melt any LPS I felt like on the sand bed. I bleached out a few SPS that were half way down the tank. I kept SPS ANYWHERE in my tank including on the "darker" edges.
Sounds like you have a bad setup
To the rest in this thread:
This thread is a joke. The OP had a great idea and then a few people jumped in here claiming they know everything there is to know about LED technology and more importantly they know EXACTLY what corals need.
None of us have ANY clue as to what corals really need when it comes to light. We can throw PAR, PUR and spectrum out all day. We still have no idea how UV and infrared light plays into the equation.
I am lucky enough to have one of the top marine biologists in this hobby in my local club. A guy who spent 10+ years diving every day and researching corals from Indonesia, Australia and the Caribbean. Some of you in this thread probably have the coral named after him in your tank, Blundell Buttons. Even though they are sold with different names now to jack up the price. We give them out for free while big online sites sell them for $70 a polyp! :hmm3:
Anyways in talking to him, he suggested that we can use ANY kind of lighting over our tanks. We can use incandescent bulbs if we can pack enough over the tank. Might not look great but with the right setup it could be done. Is it practical? NO WAY! Is it a dumb idea? Sure it is.
Kind of like producing these *1000* watt LED's that produce 2,000 PAR at 48". You can go barebottom and still light your refugium below. (Some sarcasm if you can't pick up on it)
Can LED's keep coral? Yes they can. Are they perfect and the end all in this hobby? Not by a long shot. By 2012 people will still be using T5, PC, MH and even VHO.
About 2.5 years ago I kept a small 5 gallon tank under LED's. At that time we had nothing compared to now. I had the Current PowerBrite LED's that were never meant to maintain coral. Yet, I kept mushrooms and zoas no problem. Acans and any other LPS didn't like the light. Wasn't enough power or the right spectrum IMO.
Everyone that complains about price needs to step back a little bit. You are talking about an industry that makes $MILLIONS$ a year. Our little hobby isn't even a penny in their well.
Therefore your little "fly by night" shops are all we have. They take a HUGE risk investing money into this hobby and technology. For now we have to rig things up to the best we can, with what we have. Is it perfect/prime time? No, not in my opinion.
The best combo is LED/T5 IMO. Shimmer, less electricity, less heat and you can run the T5s less and not replace bulbs for 18-24 months.
To everyone else claiming 500lm/w this and 750lm/w that, really? I mean really? Don't get efficiency and effectiveness confused. They are two different things but when working together they can be deadly.
For example, if two of us here decided to go cross country and only had $3000 and 30 days to do it, what method would you take? A plane, bike, car, walking? You could become the most efficient biker on the planet and it won't do you a bit of good if you are not effective. Same for taking the plane, you might have been effective but you weren't as efficient as the guy on a bike.
Bad example sure but the point is there.
We DON'T need more powerful lights. Using less LED's means more spotlighting, fact. We need different spectrum LED's that aren't available. We need a BIG company to produce very "hobby" oriented spectrums. Since it will take quite a bit of time and money in the research, no small time company can afford that.
For those of you that have used T5, think of what happened when KZ released the Fiji Purple. Was it a new technology? Nope. They took what we had though and tweaked it to work just right in our case. Pink grow tubes have been used for YEARS by FW planted hobbyists. They just tended to be a little overpowering for our crowd. Yet, KZ changed the way we looked at T5's. No more 50:50 combo that washed things out. The 50:50 combo has looked like crap for years. It is true in all types of lighting.
Kind of like the LED's today. The reds and even warm whites, are very overpowering. We have to dim them to make them work in our case. I am waiting for that *one* company to tweak an LED just a little bit to work for us.
I am a believer in LED. I have a 7.5 gallon cube sitting here on my desk with a PAR30 bulb over it. Just waiting on some parts and the tank to cycle, then I can add corals.
But is this PAR30 bulb, the "answer"? No way, it has a lot lacking IMO but, it is efficient and pretty effective. If I get 5 years out of it, I will be ecstatic. I think we will all soon learn that LED's won't last 50k hours above our tanks. Kind of like how T5's never came close to the 2 years we were all promised. Now we are being promised 50k hours, 100k hours!
Time will tell. Sorry for the long winded post and rambling.
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