LEDs. Forever controversial?

[edosan]

It is mentioned here before my post, but led rocks...the problem now is hight of leds (for some), just check coral labs results...
after apply their founds my corals grow like crazy and my KH is going down!

 

[cb684]

What is it going to take for people to accept LEDs? They clearly work. They clearly work well. Some coral farms are using them exclusively. There has yet to be anything other than anecdotal "<This> works better than LEDs, trust me" and people seem to agree with it!

I'm so tired of getting into all of these threads where people clearly don't understand the lights and don't understand even the basics of photosynthesis. When will it end!?

So let me go back to the original post:

1. What is it going to take for people to accept LEDs? They clearly work. They clearly work well.
I am not sure why you think people do not accept LEDs. Sure, some people have problems with it. But it has been a while that I do not see a post from a reefer that is not a very green one saying that it does not work. In this forum, most of the users are very early into the hobby and that maybe why one might have this impression. But if anybody reads a little about it, there will be no question that LEDs work.

2. Some coral farms are using them exclusively.
That is true, but I have the impression that most are not. That by itself make me wonder why. If long term price is better on LEDs, if controllability is better with LEDs, why there are still a lot that will not use LEDs as the primary light source? That might be exactly the question of the original post. But in terms of hobbyists may perpetuate perception of LEDs as not the best option.

3. There has yet to be anything other than anecdotal "<This> works better than LEDs, trust me" and people seem to agree with it!
That is true, but almost everything I see discussion in this forum is anecdotal. With the range of livestock we keep on our systems it would be really difficult to have a more scientific comparison. So, that also works the other way around: the comparable (or similar) ability of LEDs to grow and color corals at the same level of T5s and MHs is also anecdotal.

4. Other thoughts.
One of the things that perpetuate questions about the ability of the LEDs to grow coral is personal preferences for different LEDs brands/fixtures. In saying that one is better than the other it implies that one does not work as well as the other one. I see this discussion frequently among LEDs supporters, and not only between high end and cheaper ones, but also within each those categories.
That does not happen to the same extent with T5s or MHs. If there is discussion is about the bulb, and those are much cheaper to switch than a LED fixture.

There is also more people having problems to setup their LEDs than with other light sources. For a lot of people, despite the problem is likely not technology related, the message is that results of LEDs are unpredictable.

Understanding the LED technology, or that the optimum wave-length for coral photosynthesis is different from plants should not be a condition for people use the LEDs. Not everybody is interested in putting all this time to learn, or if they are, it will take some time understand that. This time is often far more then they have before choosing what light they will use.

Finally, if one was just starting in the hobby, not really knowing a lot about anything, and read this thread, what would he/she find? From the ones that apparently support LEDs: "people do not understand this technology", "T5 and MH is just plug and play", "some people will not try new things". IMO, those do not sound like great sales pitches.

 

[120reefkeeper]

Same here. It doesn't bother me a bit what someone else uses over their tank and I don't need to shove my preference on anyone else.

I agree. I'm a guy who could have went out and bought a new top of the line LED setup but didn't. Honestly I don't trust myself. I'm pretty tech savvy but the LED market to me isn't very plug and play friendly. It's a personal choice. I've never said LED's don't work or any other light for that matter. I've stuck with my tried and true halides for now. I seem to get a lot of push back from LED users believe it or not . Say things like your "old school" etc etc... Some of those same folks I've seen sell and buy multiple different LED setups over the last couple of years, trying to get just the right one. I've also seen many go back to the old standards.... Or use a combo LED/t-5. The money they have spent on "upgrades" has bought many a frag and bulbs within the circles I run. I don't go for hype. I just mind my own business and enjoy the spectacle of it all. I think there is a place for all these different light combinations in our hobby. I also believe that you can't stress enough how important husbandry is in our hobby. I seen many many similar setups crash and fail not because of a light but because of the individual . Same tank , same light and for all intents and purposes same set up. Some have overwhelming success others have no patience and fail , fail , fail....

End rant [emoji16]

 

[aereaus]

Thats basically the short of it. Different lights, reflectors and housings all produce different spread. Inadequate lighting is just that, fwiw LED is something that tempts many new hobbiest to constantly tweak and that causes a lot of issues. However that is one of the real bright spots with certain manufacturers (ill use ecotech as an example) being able to download and run other peoples light schedule is very handy. For those with patience and correct application of maintenance any of these will do. It should be noted however that no other lights seem to have so many cheap knockoff "solutions" as LED. You are not going to get the same results out of a hundred dollar fixture as you will with far more expensive options that have had hundreds if not thousands of hours of R&D. My two cent.

 

[twilliard]

Can you control any other lighting besides led with a simple tablet ?
Icecap ballasts for instance. (T5's) sure they are dimmable but would wants to spend the time reverse engineering the dimming circuit?
Or the ability to dim a MH to 1 percent?

 

[120reefkeeper]

Can you control any other lighting besides led with a simple tablet ?
Icecap ballasts for instance. (T5's) sure they are dimmable but would wants to spend the time reverse engineering the dimming circuit?
Or the ability to dim a MH to 1 percent?

No and that's the beauty of it. I've got a moonlight/t5/MH combo. It's all just timing. Turn it on turn it off... I'm not worried about dimming or thunderstorms. Cool stuff but is it necessary ?? I say no, but it's cool . Lol

 

[aereaus]

Most of those things dont much matter but i think dimming has cut down on stress in my fish.

 

[mcarroll]

I'm so tired of getting into all of these threads where people clearly don't understand the lights and don't understand even the basics of photosynthesis. When will it end!?

It started with the weird bulb-blends people used with T5 fixtures and called "full spectrum"....as meaningless and misleading a term that was, now it's pretty a consolidated meme in LED lighting.

PS- Anybody knows why my ponape seriatopora is growing towards the bottom of the tank, or why some other SPS will not grow towards the lights?

It's the flow mostly - they grow into the flow.

Also, it's a medium-to-low light stony coral.
http://www.reeffarmers.com/limitedponapeseriatopora.htm

I think it's less important, but how much light is he getting?

A reading with a free [HASHTAG]#lux[/HASHTAG] [HASHTAG]#meter[/HASHTAG] app for your smartphone's camera at the water surface is sufficient. You should see the shadow of your phone over the coral and then angle the phone (carefully!) from that spot at the light to see the maximum reading you can get.

 

[Cayenne1]

In reading this thread, I became curious about the LED's supposed longevity advantage over other light sources.

For the most part, LEDs do last longer than M.H. and T5. But, there's always a "but".

An internet search on LED Longevity reveals a number of interesting articles. LEDs do degrade in time especially if driven hard and/or used in poor quality fixtures. Forget the 50,000 or 100,000 hour specs. There appears to be a conciseness that an LED has reached the end of its effective lifetime at 70% of max lumins, not death of the LED..

So, when might your fixture drop to 70% lumins? It could even be in only a few years for a good fixture. It appears how well the fixture dissipates the LED heat and not driving an LED beyond its mAmp rating are very important.

Summary:

- LEDs should last much longer than T5s/M.H.
- LEDs will degrade in lumin output over time (you cannot see it by eyeballing it.)
- 70% drop is the limit
- you should check lumin output after a few years
- only get quality made fixtures

 

[mcarroll]

actually I turned them to 60% i was at around 160K near 70%. I read you want to be 100-120K is that correct? Thanks

Could be - try to keep surface measurements below 80,000 lux. Most corals are stressed at anything close to 100K lux - some cope better than others. Below 80K lux seems safe.

If I am going to spend all this time and money, I can handle the little added cost of replacing the bulbs.

Little added cost of replacing bulbs??????????????

I think you're under someone's LED marketing spell in terms of thinking how much the technology costs.

Consider this:

For the cost of one set of replacement bulbs for your halide or T5 system, I could build you an LED system.

When the economy tanked, I simply couldn't afford Radiums any more, so I did some research and built a gu10-bulb based fixture. No soldering, no driver madness....just screw sockets into a board, and twist the bulbs into the sockets. Wire up a power cord, and you're all set! (Just wish someone like me was around back then to lecture me on using the [HASHTAG]#lux[/HASHTAG] [HASHTAG]#meter[/HASHTAG] at that time...I still roached a bunch of corals.)

Now consider how much dimming, tablet control, lightning storms, slick marketing, etc must cost.

You must remember that the average led fixture's spectrum is worse than a 2 year old mh bulb. Then people run these things for a year or 2 then realize they need bulb replacements. Bulb replacements on an led fixture basically render the unit worthless...

Hahahah. Very untrue. But funny!

It would help if everyone had an inexpensive lux meter in their tool chest. $15 delivered - why not??

Most people have no idea how bright their lights are and then try to switch to LED. But they also don't know how bright the new LED's are. Pure guesswork - and yet there's some expectation of success? May as well play the lotto.

Speaking from personal experience I believe currently there are too many user controlled variables in the LED systems. Especially for new comers to understand how to properly dial the LEDs in properly. I think if more manufactures would[...]

They certainly haven't helped matters much....info is getting better from all of them, but c'mon it's 2016!

I still run MH + T5 over my tank but everything else is new technology on my system. I'm not too stubborn to change lol. I have not changed over because initial cost is too high on my system to get the same type of coverage[...]

Like a lot of folks, I think you may have bought into the price-hype....for the price of a single set of replacement bulbs, I could build you an LED fixture for that tank. In five years of keeping your bulb replacement money, how much would you have stacked up? (Don't tell me - tell yourself! )

It depends on what type of corals you want to have in your tank. I prefer SPS and LED's are hit and miss with the various species.

Corals simply aren't that picky about light.

It's one thing if you're talking about moving a mature coral to a very different lighting zone - significantly more or less light than a coral is adapted to is known to cause mortality even in the wild.

But it's not possible for some SPS to hate LED's that others like. Either the light is acceptable to zooxanthellae, which all corals share more or less in common, or it's not. The corals only handle the management and byproducts of the process.

 

[cb684]

It started with the weird bulb-blends people used with T5 fixtures and called "full spectrum"....as meaningless and misleading a term that was, now it's pretty a consolidated meme in LED lighting.



It's the flow mostly - they grow into the flow.

Also, it's a medium-to-low light stony coral.
http://www.reeffarmers.com/limitedponapeseriatopora.htm

I think it's less important, but how much light is he getting?

A reading with a free [HASHTAG]#lux[/HASHTAG] [HASHTAG]#meter[/HASHTAG] app for your smartphone's camera at the water surface is sufficient. You should see the shadow of your phone over the coral and then angle the phone (carefully!) from that spot at the light to see the maximum reading you can get.

Thank you for your reply! I was really looking for some explanation. I have other two corals growing with unexpected pattern in the same DT, both Acroporas. The flow is achieved mostly by two Jebaos WP40s on "else" mode, which is supposedly random. The light intensity might be an issue, since it is getting 350 to 400 PAR.
My first thought was that the Radions were responsible for that because before adding the Seriatopora to the display tank lit by the Radions it had a straight growth with similar PAR under T5s. Also because in talking about it with the owner of an aquarium store that uses only Radions on his tanks, he gave me the impression that this is somewhat common (but maybe I misunderstood him.). It does not bother me too much, was just something I could not explain.

 

[mcarroll]

In reading this thread, I became curious about the LED's supposed longevity advantage over other light sources.

For the most part, LEDs do last longer than M.H. and T5. But, there's always a "but".

An internet search on LED Longevity reveals a number of interesting articles. LEDs do degrade in time especially if driven hard and/or used in poor quality fixtures. Forget the 50,000 or 100,000 hour specs. There appears to be a conciseness that an LED has reached the end of its effective lifetime at 70% of max lumins, not death of the LED..

So, when might your fixture drop to 70% lumins? It could even be in only a few years for a good fixture. It appears how well the fixture dissipates the LED heat and not driving an LED beyond its mAmp rating are very important.

Summary:

- LEDs should last much longer than T5s/M.H.
- LEDs will degrade in lumin output over time (you cannot see it by eyeballing it.)
- 70% drop is the limit
- you should check lumin output after a few years
- only get quality made fixtures

That stuff has always been true (these are not much different than CPU's in a computer, and we all should know how heat doesn't mix with those) but it's definitely worth repeating!

Buying one fixture (because two are too expensive) and running it at 100% is a common move to make....and it causes more problems in the tank than just premature degradation and failure of the light itself.

+1

 

[Salty0331]

Again as stated before.....Bravo to all the great points. Remember, whatever we choose to light our reefs with, is well in fact, our business. The decisions we make on wether or not to choose LED, MH, T5's, or combos of there in are just that, our choices.

If one is successful at whatever methods we use, then who has right to criticize, or push their agenda on the others of the community.

If your tank is thriving with your current setup then Hats Off you. Remember we our our own Reef's keeper, not the guy next door!

 

[TaylorPilot]

Little added cost of replacing bulbs??????????????

I think you're under someone's LED marketing spell in terms of thinking how much the technology costs.

Consider this:

For the cost of one set of replacement bulbs for your halide or T5 system, I could build you an LED system.

When the economy tanked, I simply couldn't afford Radiums any more, so I did some research and built a gu10-bulb based fixture. No soldering, no driver madness....just screw sockets into a board, and twist the bulbs into the sockets. Wire up a power cord, and you're all set! (Just wish someone like me was around back then to lecture me on using the #lux #meter at that time...I still roached a bunch of corals.)

Now consider how much dimming, tablet control, lightning storms, slick marketing, etc must cost.

Well that is fine. It isn't worth the added expense to you. It is to me. I don't particularly care for the look of current LED systems, and for a hobby where one of the primary aspects of enjoyment is actually viewing the display, it is worth the several 100 dollars a year to have my display look the way I want. It doesn't make either one of us right or wrong. It is all about preferences and trade-offs. I put ascetics above all else. I will say we are building a rimless system for my brother-in-law, and we will probably use LED because the fixtures look slick. He has only kept freshwater, and after looking at several systems at LFS running different LED fixtures, he liked the Kessil, because they looked more like the MH than any of the puck style fixtures.

 

[Staggs]

I will say we are building a rimless system for my brother-in-law, and we will probably use LED because the fixtures look slick. He has only kept freshwater, and after looking at several systems at LFS running different LED fixtures, he liked the Kessil, because they looked more like the MH than any of the puck style fixtures.

I'm sorta in the same boat as your cousin. I'm a newer reefer and while I'd like to use a T5 + LED setup, but there isn't any setups out there you can do this on (that I've found) that look decent over a rimless tank. My ceilings are high + my wife would not let me suspend them from the ceiling anyway. I'm not handy enough to come out with something on my own either, and while i'd love to do a reefbrite T5/LED setup it just wouldn't look to great over a rimless tank even if I figured out a way to mount it.

 

[aereaus]

Well that is fine. It isn't worth the added expense to you. It is to me. I don't particularly care for the look of current LED systems, and for a hobby where one of the primary aspects of enjoyment is actually viewing the display, it is worth the several 100 dollars a year to have my display look the way I want. It doesn't make either one of us right or wrong. It is all about preferences and trade-offs. I put ascetics above all else. I will say we are building a rimless system for my brother-in-law, and we will probably use LED because the fixtures look slick. He has only kept freshwater, and after looking at several systems at LFS running different LED fixtures, he liked the Kessil, because they looked more like the MH than any of the puck style fixtures.

That has always been my motto as well. Never minded spending extra cash for results i felt i could count on. No LEDs ever caught my eye until i saw the gen 3 xr30w pros. The price initially drove me away but eventually i saved enough and went ahead and bought them. In ways i miss my halides but as for asthetics i couldnt be more pleased with the radions.

 

[TaylorPilot]

I'm sorta in the same boat as your cousin. I'm a newer reefer and while I'd like to use a T5 + LED setup, but there isn't any setups out there you can do this on (that I've found) that look decent over a rimless tank. My ceilings are high + my wife would not let me suspend them from the ceiling anyway. I'm not handy enough to come out with something on my own either, and while i'd love to do a reefbrite T5/LED setup it just wouldn't look to great over a rimless tank even if I figured out a way to mount it.

How large is the tank. These are high dollar but nice.

http://www.bulkreefsupply.com/aurora-led-t5-hybrid-fixture-giesemann.html

I personally liked their MH-T5 hybrid systems. But they don't come with MH ballast because people like to match them to their own bulbs, so plan on adding about $160 per MH bulb.

http://www.bulkreefsupply.com/spectra-metal-halide-t5-fixture-giesemann.html

 

[cjd]

If the cost or expense of replacement bulbs is the reason we turn to leds , just curious how many led users have changed and upgraded their units each time a new and improved version comes out? A 4 foot tank with double the manufacturer recommendation for even coverage. ..... or bulbs? It's whatever works for you and what you want to put your money towards.

 

[john.m.cole3]

this debate is almost the same as asking what is the best salt mix? how come not everyone can accept that red sea coral pro works?... for example.

 

[Kenmx10]

What is it going to take for people to accept LEDs?

The Germans to stop producing the Radium bulb!