Switching from LED to Metal Halide

[Centerline]

MH have unique in that regardless of the type of coral you place under them they thrive (assuming husbandry skills are in line and you are not using crazy wattage). I use everything. Gen4 Pros on a mixed reef at my office, T5 over my chalice tank, Hyrdra 52 HDs on a couple of tanks in my home office and a Spectra fixture with Radiums, T5s and XHOs over my reefer 525 connected to the hydra tanks. I just scored a ATI T5/LED 8 bulb powermodule to go over a new RedSea 750 I have for a new building for my business (moving my chalice collection to it) I love them all - but the quality and spread of the MHs are in my experience remarkable. Plenty of argument for not using them and I am in no way looking for a LED/T5/MH lighting fight (nor will I engage in one so if inclined dont bother) but unless you have used them for a good while you dont know what your missing. With respect to the 250s over a tank that size? Maybe if its up high enough but other wise you will boil or bake the corals. A single 150 seems more than enough to me. Maybe a couple of supplemental LEDs or T5s so you can keep the photo period with the MH down to 5-6 hours a day.

 

[james deed]

I am new to this hobby and I have just started setting up my fish tank 3ft by 2ft, around 3ft deep. I had my cousin helped me to fix it. He told me that LED is more efficient and most people are using it, but I still prefer MH and I was reading a magazine saying that the higher kelvin will bring better performance for SPS corals. I would like to know more info from the experts before I decide on my lighting fixtures. The magazine was saying that 17k -20k Metal Halide would bring the best result, any comments?

 

[jda]

LED are only perceived as more efficient because people truly did have too much MH over their tanks in years past. Some would use multiple 400w Metal Halides and have replaced them with 150 watt LED fixtures when there were 150w Metal Halides as well that would have been more than enough for them. Dell Aquila below has a few minutes on how all reef light sources are truly about the same in efficiency once you compare them apples to apples.

You can get good performance from 5500k to 20k MH bulbs. Personal preference is key here. Most people do not like the yellow color of 5500k and 6500k bulb, so you tend to see the range from 10k to about 20k with even more in the 14 to 20k range. The two most popular bulbs (arguably) are the 14k Phoenix and 20k Radium and both look pretty similar in the 14-15k range.

Here is a good video about lighting... no arguments, just mostly facts.

 

[klesel]

Iv got a mix tank mostly sps but do have lps n sofftys but I have a 125 with 2 t5 2 ai sols and 3 250w metal halide 20 k like each light for a purpose iv used ea separate but like the combo the sol as a main light sun rise n set and main t5 as supplement and soften the led and metal halide as the growing power only run mh 4 hours a day but when there on only time during the whole light cycle dose the tank look natural and true reef shines though . This is after 30 years of using every combo every type of lighting . But what works for me might not work for others .on the heat note I do have a chiller but only kicks on a hour or so almost after the mh are fixing to turn off dose it kick in .

 

[cracker]

Real hard call with such a shallow tank. ,I suggest the 150's he can always hang them high . We all know that in the future he (OP) will want to try the sps. Then he just lower them .

 

[Jay Norris]

LED are only perceived as more efficient because people truly did have too much MH over their tanks in years past. Some would use multiple 400w Metal Halides and have replaced them with 150 watt LED fixtures when there were 150w Metal Halides as well that would have been more than enough for them. Dell Aquila below has a few minutes on how all reef light sources are truly about the same in efficiency once you compare them apples to apples.

You can get good performance from 5500k to 20k MH bulbs. Personal preference is key here. Most people do not like the yellow color of 5500k and 6500k bulb, so you tend to see the range from 10k to about 20k with even more in the 14 to 20k range. The two most popular bulbs (arguably) are the 14k Phoenix and 20k Radium and both look pretty similar in the 14-15k range.

Here is a good video about lighting... no arguments, just mostly facts.

The only trouble with M/H is the heat they give off, causing my chiller to run a lot more, the A/C in my fish room to run more, thus drastically increasing my electric bill, one other thing you cannot dim them without shortening the life span of the bulbs. So this upcoming year, I am changing out my M/H-VHO light rack, to all Mitra 7206 LED lights, and never looking back

 

[jda]

Florida is probably tough, for sure. Here in Colorado, even on the 100 degree days, the humidity is like 20% and fans can keep the temp from budging at all. The rest of the year, I will pay for heating with heaters or lights, so it makes no difference. Not everybody lives in Florida or the Mojave and for most folks, fans can keep the heat at bay plenty well.

Don't say "never." Since you know what MH can do, you might not like the Mitras. They will be different and some people love the differences and some people hate them. If you hate them, then you might want to give lower wattage MH a hot - 150w HQI is more than enough light for most people and are not all that hot. If you love them, then you are all set. It will take 2-3 months to really see the color shift and stuff.

 

[Jay Norris]

Florida is probably tough, for sure. Here in Colorado, even on the 100 degree days, the humidity is like 20% and fans can keep the temp from budging at all. The rest of the year, I will pay for heating with heaters or lights, so it makes no difference. Not everybody lives in Florida or the Mojave and for most folks, fans can keep the heat at bay plenty well.

Don't say "never." Since you know what MH can do, you might not like the Mitras. They will be different and some people love the differences and some people hate them. If you hate them, then you might want to give lower wattage MH a hot - 150w HQI is more than enough light for most people and are not all that hot. If you love them, then you are all set. It will take 2-3 months to really see the color shift and stuff.

Ok, maybe never, but I have seen the Mitra's and Radions in person, and I love the dimming ability of the LED's and their other programing abilities. Believe me I would not spend 0ver $4000.00 on lights unless I did a lot of research on the Mitra's, as LED's are really a cool new light technology.

 

[james deed]

LED are only perceived as more efficient because people truly did have too much MH over their tanks in years past. Some would use multiple 400w Metal Halides and have replaced them with 150 watt LED fixtures when there were 150w Metal Halides as well that would have been more than enough for them. Dell Aquila below has a few minutes on how all reef light sources are truly about the same in efficiency once you compare them apples to apples.

You can get good performance from 5500k to 20k MH bulbs. Personal preference is key here. Most people do not like the yellow color of 5500k and 6500k bulb, so you tend to see the range from 10k to about 20k with even more in the 14 to 20k range. The two most popular bulbs (arguably) are the 14k Phoenix and 20k Radium and both look pretty similar in the 14-15k range.

Here is a good video about lighting... no arguments, just mostly facts.

Hi jda, really thanks for the advice! With this video, I will convince my cousin that my decision is correct!

 

[Velcro]

Halide isn’t just for acropora... it also looks way better to me. Brighter tank, natural looking shimmer. Most led fixtures on whiteish setting look way too artificial for me.

 

[DesertReefT4r]

Not wanting to get into a which light is better here just want to say 250w mh is not too much for a 40B. This is my old 40B mixed reef light with a 250w MH Phoenix 14k fired by an old Icecap ballast was a nice blue and grew everything really well. Was in no was too much light for the tank.

 

[Crabs McJones]

Not wanting to get into a which light is better here just want to say 250w mh is not too much for a 40B. This is my old 40B mixed reef light with a 250w MH Phoenix 14k fired by an old Icecap ballast was a nice blue and grew everything really well. Was in no was too much light for the tank.

I've currently got a 250 watt halide with 4 t5s over a 40 b, and sometimes i think that's not enough lol

 

[Velcro]

2x150 watt makes a lot more sense for better (more even) coverage.

 

[Jay Norris]

Hi jda, really thanks for the advice! With this video, I will convince my cousin that my decision is correct!

LED's are a lot more efficient if you live in a warm climate, since 95% of the people who have metal halides in warm climates will need a chiller, and big chillers and hot M/H's are sure fire energy users.

 

[Velcro]

LED's are a lot more efficient if you live in a warm climate, since 95% of the people who have metal halides in warm climates will need a chiller, and big chillers and hot M/H's are sure fire energy users.

That’s a gross exaggeration of people needing chillers. If you have air conditioning and aren’t putting halides in a canopy a fan is all that is needed.

 

[Jay Norris]

That’s a gross exaggeration of people needing chillers. If you have air conditioning and aren’t putting halides in a canopy a fan is all that is needed.

Not really where I live, and all the people I know who use to use M/H's as there main lighting source, with some form of supplemental lighting. If I did not have a external chiller (outdoor) my tank would get up past 90 degrees, and I have my tank in wall, in an A/C fish room, with no hood and only an aluminum light rack. I will let you know how much my electric bill drops, by the end of next month, as the chiller and the fish room A/C will not need to work as much. I also love the dawn/dusk effect.

 

[Jonathan Troutt]

I have been thinking about trying MH. The few tanks I’ve seen running MH I really like. I would be interested in hear all the reason you are switching to MH. I know you gave a couple a few responses back but if you could express all of them I would appreciate that.

I am moving to a 75gal here soon and looking at options. I have LEDs that will work currently.

 

[Katrina71]

I was just talking to a friend about MH the other day. I'd kinda like to try one of the old Biocube hoods. Just to see.

 

[jda]

On 105 degree days in Missouri during the 90% humidity summers, fans were enough to keep about a 1.5 degree swing. ...the tank rarely hit 80. This was only for 2 months of the year, though. I used a Vornado blowing over the top of the tank, not some 80 CFM computer fan in a hood.

It might be good if you caveat your posts with where you live. I try and remind people that I live in Colorado since details matter and my current experiences do not apply to everybody... your chiller posts might be good for Miami, but for much of the rest of the country, good fans can work well if this is a problem that you actually want to solve. Outside of Florida or the Mojave, most people are either using computer fans or just don't want to solve the problem.

Other than chiller costs, if you save money on LED, then you were running too much Halide. This is quite common where people running 400 watt halides could have been using 150w... this is not more efficient, this is better sizing choices. Dell Tullio's talk at MACNA in San Diego (you can watch the video) lays this out pretty well were no light source is really all that more efficient than another when measured properly. Heat can be quite different depending on where you live - bad for you in Miami, but any heat from lights and pumps saves me money in Colorado... Dr. Joshi talks about his heating costs rising which canceled out any of his savings from not running a chiller (he is in Pennsylvania).

 

[Jay Norris]

I do agree with you, If I lived in a colder climate I would think about Halides and T5" or LED strips, after all I have been using M/H-VHO combos for thirty years or more. They are great lights and very easy to use. With LED's, the dawn/dusk cycles are a wonderful thing to watch, and are less stressful on my fish, and I can also set the lights to almost any color I want. I do prefer the 14k to 20K range of M/H bulbs, so I try to do the same with LED"s, and if you have good LED lights you still get the shimmer effect M/H offers. Do you use the DE bulbs or the SE bulbs, because I notice the color choice of SE bulbs is getting smaller. I loved the SE Phoenix 14 K bulbs, and now they are no longer made, as this is another reason I switched to Mitra's,