SPS dominate LED users

Abbass · Jun 9, 2015

hi guys , did someone try usa current marine led ??? is it good or just waste of money

mattvisocky2003 · Jun 9, 2015

Still love my Hydra 52's!!!

ImageUploadedByREEF2REEF1433892313.883055.jpg

fredro · Jun 9, 2015

Abbass said:
hi guys , did someone try usa current marine led ??? is it good or just waste of money

IMO and from what I've heard, it may be okay to light a FOWLR tank, but I wouldn't expect it to grow or sustain any corals.

gcarroll · Jun 9, 2015

hart24601 said:
I couldn't agree more. I really liked my reefbreeders, but a word of caution to anyone with them or similar LEDs, you might not want to run them at 100%, as I said earlier the blues in 2 of my 3 units burnt. They are now for freshwater plant tanks, lol. I don't know if reefbreeders uses the same LED diodes as other Chinese fixtures, but I do want to let people know it can happen so either use more fixtures or optics to get the PAR you need, don't run them at 100.

Have you considered sending them back to Reef Breeders. I know they have a pretty good reputation for good customer service.

gettaReef · Jun 9, 2015

+×4w

NoStRaThOmAs · Jun 10, 2015

What is the best DIY LED lighting set up that has produced the best results?

Louie661 · Jun 10, 2015

I'm running AI Vegas color And sols ill see if I can post a pic shortly

billwill · Jun 10, 2015

I ran 250W Radium MH for a couple years with awesome results with SPS. Went to Taotronics non dimmable and fried most everything because at the time I didn't know better. Went back to MH for a time then went to dimmable OR IT2040's. These worked quite well for almost 2 years for me, ramping up to a final 90% blue/80% white. I got the itch to try something new, only because of literally one or two tiny spots in my tank that I could visually see just a red led spot beam. Now I'm running Kessil A360W's with (4) T5's. Colors and look in general are pretty awesome I think. Growth isn't really any different than the OR lights, but neither LED's grew SPS as fast as my Radium Metal Halides. Growth is still good though, and I still need to frag stuff to keep the peace between colonies.

Louie661 · Jun 10, 2015

3 Vegas and 2 Sols

Louie661 · Jun 10, 2015

MikeCizzle · Jun 10, 2015

Abbass said:
hi guys , did someone try usa current marine led ??? is it good or just waste of money

I used the Blue Current LED Pro strips to supplement my T5's but that's it. They won't do the job by themselves unless you only have softies.

hart24601 · Jun 10, 2015

gcarroll said:
Have you considered sending them back to Reef Breeders. I know they have a pretty good reputation for good customer service.

I had been running them for about a year before the LEDs burnt, so I didn't even try contacting RB after that amount of time. He does give fantastic service, but for the PAR I wanted I have to run them at 100% and I just don't think the heat sink in those are up to it, so I sold them and got hydra 26s. I would bet he would have given me replacement diodes or something, but I don't want to do that process every year.

diablomaster9045 · Jun 10, 2015

CastAway said:
Just to set a bookend, I'd suggest researching the Orphek Atlantik fixtures.

Have any pictures to back this recommendation up? I have only seen 1 tank lit with these and it looked awful. He had them for 8 months and all the sps was brown.

diablomaster9045 · Jun 10, 2015

And just an update on what I picked for the time being. I had a buddy tear down his tank and he had a bunch of new phoenix bulbs and I bought them up and picked up an icecap 660 ballast. So now I am running 2x 250w phoenix HQI's, 2x 46.5in VHOS(1 aquasun and 1 super actinic), 1 4ft reefbrite blue strip, and 2x 50w blue ebay chips. The color and growth is fantastic. I guess i will revisit the LED side in 4 years when I run out of bulbs.

pjr · Jun 19, 2015

I moved to LEDs in mid-2009 by implmenting the Sunbrite T-10 tubes over my 6 foot 135g SPS tank. I eventually upgraded to the Gen 2 and finally the Gen 3 tubes, which were Cree-based. I successfully used three of these tubes for about three years, until one of the tubes began to fail last fall. Since Sunbrite is no more, and I wanted to keep the canopy look of my tank, I replaced the tube with a 6 foot fixture from Build My LED. The product is very well made, results have been very good! Just wondering if there are more BML users out there....

Eckolancer · Jun 19, 2015

I've been using leds for like 8 years now. For the last year I've been using kessils with great results. Wish tap stalk let me upload pics will try from the web later.

Eckolancer · Jun 19, 2015

MikeCizzle · Jul 10, 2015

billwill said:
I ran 250W Radium MH for a couple years with awesome results with SPS. Went to Taotronics non dimmable and fried most everything because at the time I didn't know better. Went back to MH for a time then went to dimmable OR IT2040's. These worked quite well for almost 2 years for me, ramping up to a final 90% blue/80% white. I got the itch to try something new, only because of literally one or two tiny spots in my tank that I could visually see just a red led spot beam. Now I'm running Kessil A360W's with (4) T5's. Colors and look in general are pretty awesome I think. Growth isn't really any different than the OR lights, but neither LED's grew SPS as fast as my Radium Metal Halides. Growth is still good though, and I still need to frag stuff to keep the peace between colonies.

Beautiful tank. Wow love it.