ALL LED ALL THE TIME! :) New Forum!

[ReefLEDLights]

From what i have seen and witnessed. Taking out crap taken care of tanks from friends i have helped come back. And just based on the lights i have noticed. ( and i cant stress this enough. This is an Internet forum. Everyone has their of ideas and thoughts. And this is just from what i have seen )

Radions are over priced crap. My LFS got some and kept bleaching all there sps corals. Leathers loved them though. Finally they changed out one system to vegas and a month later i come walking in and they had vegas on all 8 big coral systems.

I love AI products. Some things are a pain like the wireless controller that HAS to be plugged in to work. But on the part that matters the leds i love them.

Other part i feel it is how they r set to begin with. Most people seem to try and get the tank to look like it did when it had MH over it. What u have to remember is leds only let out the spec of the actual color of that led. So if u have a royal blue led it will only be shooting out the part of the spectrum that is royal blue. Why u see all the diff colors in the new systems not just white and blue now. And make ur % lvls match what the spectrum shows. It will not look like u expect but it will give the corals the right amount and kind of light to help them be healthier. And that is the most important part. If u want to make the tank look more like what u r used to then add a couple t-5 bulbs. But with all leds and matching the spectrum it is going to look very blue in color. My whites at max are only 30% and i just recently turned them up to that a week ago. They were 20% until now.

The 450nm Royal Blue is the grow king. Yes a 5 watt XT-E is much better than a 3 watt Bridgelux knockoff...

Then match this with the Cool White.

Toss in some tertiary LEDs and you can match the mix of any MH,T5 or VHO

The good thing about the right LED Mix is they are brighter than advertised and are very cost effictive.

Finding the right recipe is an art and once done well much better than replacing T5s every 6-9 months.

Bill

 

[navysandsquid]

The 450nm Royal Blue is the grow king. Yes a 5 watt XT-E is much better than a 3 watt Bridgelux knockoff...

Then match this with the Cool White.

Toss in some tertiary LEDs and you can match the mix of any MH,T5 or VHO

The good thing about the right LED Mix is they are brighter than advertised and are very cost effictive.

Finding the right recipe is an art and once done well much better than replacing T5s every 6-9 months.

Bill

I have a hydra 52 can I have everything but the green and white at 100% and royal blue at 60% running mostly zoa lps and mushrooms and sudgestions I'm not a fan of the cool white does it help grow or is it for looks?

 

[Sleeperr34]

For looks i feel personally. The 450nm (royal blue) is the growth. Or most of it. The rest is how u like the look. At least how i feel about it.

 

[ReefLEDLights]

I have a hydra 52 can I have everything but the green and white at 100% and royal blue at 60% running mostly zoa lps and mushrooms and sudgestions I'm not a fan of the cool white does it help grow or is it for looks?

The Cool White in the Hydra has a very nice 450nm spike for growth. How it looks depends on the specific bin as there are 28 different colour Bins of the Cree Cool White ranging from 5-8K

With that Mix, depending on the PAR rating you should be fine. I like to see 100-200 PAR on the sand bed.

Photoinhibition starts around 350-500 PAR with more light causing the corals to develop certain pigments to reflect this excessive light.

Once acclimated Corals do quite well under intense light. The nice thing LEDs have over MH is you can vary the intensity.

Bill

 

[tario]

Good day sleeperr32 I'm in the process of buying a lighting fixture.....but I would like to know whoch is better....the AI sol blue , or thw hydra?.

 

[J77]

Hello all I've been useing LEDs for about 2 years now didnt have much luck with the cheap Chinese fixtures that I had for about a year and a half but then I switched to maxspect razor 160w and man that thing is awsome I have never had such good growth and color

 

[Sleeperr34]

I have never messed with the blue. I know most that have them love them. The hydra is what i would go with just because it does give you a lot more color options. In truth i think the 52s might be a little over kill. But the normal hydra give u most any color combo u will want to go with. Either way i think u will be happy.

But i would say go hydra and if u can hit the extra cash no problem then go 52s. But the hydras r a sweet set up already.

 

[Sleeperr34]

Hello all I've been useing LEDs for about 2 years now didnt have much luck with the cheap Chinese fixtures that I had for about a year and a half but then I switched to maxspect razor 160w and man that thing is awsome I have never had such good growth and color

I have see a lot of good talk about the razor. I think it is a good system by the looks of it. But i went with the ai vega at the time. And been happy ever since.

 

[tario]

Thank you so much....

 

[J77]

Yes the Vegas are very nice to I have a friend who uses them and I got to tell u I hear an awful lot of good thing about radions too. I think if if the LEDs are a little more on the higher end of things such as useing Crees and whatnot instead of cheaper parts u really can't go wrong but I'm by no means an expert on subject

 

[nrbelk]

I'm going to do a Rapid LED order, maybe I should ask here before I pull the trigger.

I would like to add to my light "footprint". I currently have three radions over my tank, but since my tank is a Marineland 300 DD (6ftx3ftx27inch tall) the front and back lack some light (the radions are centered in the tank). I would like to grow coral on the back wall as well as place clams in the front.

My plan is to do this twice, one for the back, one for the front.

26 LEDs - 16 Royal Blue - 5 Cool White, 5 neutral white.

The LED pattern is Blue, neutral white, blue blue, cool white, blue, neutral light, blue, blue.... (etc, until the lights are used up).

I'm planning on getting the 80 degree lenses and the lights will be 5 inches (+/- 2 inches) off the water (its what I have to work with with my current fixture thing).

What do you think? I don't like the windex blue look but I do like cooler colors than yellow.

 

[Sleeperr34]

If they r doing good with the radions it should work just fine. And like u said give u the bigger footprint. Prob the only down fall i have about my vegas is the same. Was thinking of doing similar but Didnt want to change what is working. Long list of other things i want to finish getting first that i need more.

 

[J77]

Question if anyone can answer, my lights on one channel are blue 465 485 nm royal blue 450 465nm and super actinic 410-420nm then there's other channel wich has cool white 8k and warm white 3k wich channel would u think is more crucial for sps growth.

 

[Sleeperr34]

The 450 is were most of the growth comes in.

 

[Railcar79]

One thing no one addresses, LPS. There is a known, documented history of color morph on acans under LED lighting. I would consider the LEDs but I have questions, what mix do I need for a LPS tank that will not morph my acans, what leds can accomodate my canopy, and last, what leds will siut my needs at an economic price.

 

[Sleeperr34]

I have heard that. As well as some chals as well. I just recently got some acans and chals so see if my set up does anything to them. Only had them for a couple weeks and so far no change yet. But still so early to tell.

 

[ReefLEDLights]

Question if anyone can answer, my lights on one channel are blue 465 485 nm royal blue 450 465nm and super actinic 410-420nm then there's other channel wich has cool white 8k and warm white 3k wich channel would u think is more crucial for sps growth.

The 410-420 are not as bright as the Cree XT-E Royal Blue The Blue 465-485 offer less than the 450nm Royal Blue.

It would depend on exactly which bins of Cool White you have and the number of Royal Blue/Blue if they are Cree the Warm offers a bit less of the grow spectrum. Watt per watt the Royal Blue theoretically would offer more grow light than the Cool White.

I've grown SPS frags just using Royal Blue with great results. They can and will adapt to different light spectrums. For us its finding the most efficient and good looking mix.

I would adjust the lights to the look you like then do a PAR measurement. Corals of the same species are found thriving at varying depths with the shallower receiving more greater than 500nm and the deeper receiving mostly less than 500nm.

Bill

 

[PherPhace]

One thing no one addresses, LPS. There is a known, documented history of color morph on acans under LED lighting. I would consider the LEDs but I have questions, what mix do I need for a LPS tank that will not morph my acans, what leds can accomodate my canopy, and last, what leds will siut my needs at an economic price.

I have 50/50 cool white - royal blue LEDs and I CA attest to the color morph. I got One that was purple and red that is now red and orange. One red/pink that is now neon red and neon pink and one that was a dull green/yellow center that is changing to an orangey green and developing yellow stripes. They seem to intensify red/orange/yellow. I'm not complaining. They really glow under the blue light now.

 

[PherPhace]

... The morph was really noticeable after only about a month

 

[Sleeperr34]

Good to know. I'll have to keep and eye on it and see what it does. Will be an interesting test to see and good to know what you have for led colors. Not just i have leds.

One thing im interested in someone testing in a controlled system is a led vs t5 vs Mh for color/growth. If i can get my stupid man cave cleaning out finally i might try it out. Have 4 10g, a 20g, and 36g spare tanks. As well as the old filter i used to use on my 210 before i decided to do my DIY set up. As well as extra t5, and my old MHs. So i have almost everything i need just need to build and put it all togeather. I'll see what time i can get over the next month or so.