LED Recommendations

eddie240 said:
hey fish beard, how much do you think an led diy system will cost for a tank that is 48L X 24W X 30T, i would want to have sps, lps and clams. it will be built into a canopy. Thanks. also do you think it would be hard to set up, because i have no experience, but i have soldering iron.
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I would be really concerned about a 30" tall tank with led. You would need a LOT of LEDs with very narrow optic lenses to get good light penetration, but then you risk having too much light higher up the tank. Conservative price for around 100 bridgelux chips and 8 meanwell Dimmable drivers, I'd guess around 450-500, not including any other parts like fans, dimmer controls, heatsinks, etc... A very viable option would be looking at two Apollo Dimmable fixtures, they have incredible par and with the optics on this latest generation provide better light penetration on taller tanks.
 
Thanks fish beard, i just researched these leds, and i figured out that they are the best kind of leds someone can buy. i was trying to look for the best, cus when i buy something, i try and get the best out of that type of item. thanks again.
 
Given the 30'' depth of your tank i would look into getting the higher output led's such as the cree XM-l or any 5w star that has 250+ lumens per led,this way there are no questions about keeping clams on the sandbed.I'm doing an LED build for my LFS,this will go on a shallow 14'' frag tank 6'x3' and will have mostly LPS and clams in it.One of their customers wants me to give him a quote on a setup for his 220g tank which is 72lx24dx30t,so i will have to use the 5w leds instead of the norm.Satisled.com is where i'll get them from,since the cree brand will be way out of price range i'm sure.Either way i'll quote both,if you want to get in on the order lmk,save a few bucks.
 
5w is overkill for 30" depth, totally unnecessary. 3w chips with optics will do just fine. You would have to be EXTREMELY careful with your coral selections and placement in the upper half of your tank to not do more damage than good. Metal halide would be your best option for light penetration in the 30" range, but I assume you want to go led for the long term cost savings and lack of heat production. I'm also not sold on the satisled stuff, like the reef led vendors say, they sell LEDs, not reef lights, other vendors are selling lots and bins of led lights that have the correct luminosity and spectrum to promote coral health in an aquarium, led vendors sell diodes that light up, leaving you guessing if what you are buying really is the best option for your reef.
 
I don't see why the concern about the 5w leds?Have you any experience with them?I beleive that using the 3w leds is just the beginning for our aquariums,i have already done 2setups with the 5w leds and everything is growing and i see no downsides to using fewer higher output leds?I did a 72led setp over a 125 last year and it's a very solid light setup.I beleive there are 18rows and only 4 leds fron to back and the tank is doing better than when it had 3x250W halides.Here's a pic:

johnstank.jpg
 
FishBeard said:
5w is overkill for 30" depth, totally unnecessary. 3w chips with optics will do just fine. You would have to be EXTREMELY careful with your coral selections and placement in the upper half of your tank to not do more damage than good. Metal halide would be your best option for light penetration in the 30" range, but I assume you want to go led for the long term cost savings and lack of heat production. I'm also not sold on the satisled stuff, like the reef led vendors say, they sell LEDs, not reef lights, other vendors are selling lots and bins of led lights that have the correct luminosity and spectrum to promote coral health in an aquarium, led vendors sell diodes that light up, leaving you guessing if what you are buying really is the best option for your reef.
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BADGUS said:
I don't see why the concern about the 5w leds?Have you any experience with them?I beleive that using the 3w leds is just the beginning for our aquariums,i have already done 2setups with the 5w leds and everything is growing and i see no downsides to using fewer higher output leds?I did a 72led setp over a 125 last year and it's a very solid light setup.I beleive there are 18rows and only 4 leds fron to back and the tank is doing better than when it had 3x250W halides.Here's a pic:

johnstank.jpg
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The concern is that they are still double the price of their similar 3w versions, there is no cost saving justified for the lesser quantity of ballasts to drive them, my math seems to put them about 25-35% more expensive overall to achieve similar results from using 3w led. Im not saying anyone shouldnt use them, I dont see the value in spending more for the same thing. Another concern is the ease of over-doing it with DIY LED and supplying far more light into your tank than necessary. Your picture reinforces one of my concerns, the way I see it, a vast majority of those corals are placed in the lower half of the tank, just like I said would probably need to be done before you even posted that picture (even with that insane amount of saturation added in postproc). It could just be coincidence, but I would be very interested to see how well those corals do raised up 6-8" from where they are now. That's great that the 2 fixtures you have built are working out so well, perhaps once prices come down, more people will experiment with them.
 
That led build looks nice Gus. And I don't see the problem with 5w LEDs. Doesn't the radion have them and ppl r using them smaller tanks. So y not use them. Also from that pic the tip part of the tank is full of corals so it looks like no problem.
 
Exactly,Corals are everywhere and all are fine.Just to clarify its not my tank,just a fixture I made for a fellow reefer.
 
The reefer said:
That led build looks nice Gus. And I don't see the problem with 5w LEDs. Doesn't the radion have them and ppl r using them smaller tanks. So y not use them. Also from that pic the tip part of the tank is full of corals so it looks like no problem.
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8 of the white diodes in the radion are 5w white Cree LEDs. All the rest are 3w LEDs of various colors. The radion would be a horrible fixture to use over a 30" tall tank. Even on a 24" tall tank it has a very small footprint of useable light (for an sps dominant tank) that reaches the bottom.

Regarding coral placement in that pic, yes there are some corals up higher, but a good majority of corals where most of the useable light overlaps, there is a huge void of empty space in the top half of the tank. The picture speaks for itself.
 
The corals are filling all that space quite nicely,i asked for an updated pic.Alot of the SPS that are up top have to be trimmed constantly due to them growing out of control.
 
Like Gus said that space is basically growing room and another reason is that his aquascape doesn't go that high on the right side. But look how high the coral is on the left. Basically almost to the water line.
 
The reefer said:
Like Gus said that space is basically growing room and another reason is that his aquascape doesn't go that high on the right side. But look how high the coral is on the left. Basically almost to the water line.
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And your point is? Yea, LOTS of growing room with all those corals placed so low, and I already commented about the placement on the left being in an area of lower light at the end of the tank. I don't see corals inches from the surface in the middle of the tank. How about instead of sending the discussion into a continual loop we get your input on the price difference? Not everyone has deep pockets to justify paying more for the same thing (or less in some cases) and current pricing shows 5w LEDs to not be cost effective for people on an already tight budget making the change to led lighting. Do you make a habit of overpaying for things? I personally try not to whenever possible.
 
BADGUS said:
I think just the leds were ~$260 which is equivalent to 58 cree leds.
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Is this a vendetta against LED's completely? I can't understand why you argue so heavily against them. Price is an issue, yes, but when anything was new it was expensive. And when you're talking about long term costs, it does actually come rather close, mixed between LED power consumption and no bulb replacement. Did you read the article I linked to in the other post? It showed the LED's having just 20 less par at 30" than halides, but using 3x less energy to get there. And 1/2 the energy of T5. Long term cost is just as important a conisderation when determining the cost of a product. I could by a used Audi for the same price as a high end Ford, but maintenace is 5x more on the Audi. Might be a poor comparison, but it gets my point across.
 
I don't understand your post yogishio?I meant that 72pcs(5w led's) cost $260,which is what you would pay for 58pcs(3w) cree leds.The guy decided to go with 72-5 watt leds to light up his entire tank instead of investing 4x's the cost in a higher end setup.Hope i make sense.
 
yogoshio said:
Is this a vendetta against LED's completely? I can't understand why you argue so heavily against them. Price is an issue, yes, but when anything was new it was expensive. And when you're talking about long term costs, it does actually come rather close, mixed between LED power consumption and no bulb replacement. Did you read the article I linked to in the other post? It showed the LED's having just 20 less par at 30" than halides, but using 3x less energy to get there. And 1/2 the energy of T5. Long term cost is just as important a conisderation when determining the cost of a product. I could by a used Audi for the same price as a high end Ford, but maintenace is 5x more on the Audi. Might be a poor comparison, but it gets my point across.
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I don't think anyone in this discussion has anything against LED technology in general, and definitely no vendettas against them. I'm personally just discussing my views of the pros/cons of the technology. It's always better to not be caught buying into the hype just because others are doing it. LED is great but it's still a very new technology in the big picture and true longevity over its expected lifespan is still to be determined. One of my concerns is that it is very easy to go overboard with a DIY project and provide more light than needed, which also drives up more unnecessary costs up front.

Regarding your article, I did not read anything in it that really swayed my opinion on LED one way or another. The par charts are somewhat misleading when looked at in a glance. And only 2 fixtures are tested in the experiment, I would be very interested to see the same tests performed on a variety of led fixtures, both commercial and DIY home brew to see what the general results look like with a larger assortment of fixtures. The articles focuses strictly on power usage and light output, nothing about light spread, spotlighting, color spectrum (or lack of) or any other aspects that should be considered when deciding if LED is right for what you want out of your own reef.
 
BADGUS said:
I don't understand your post yogishio?I meant that 72pcs(5w led's) cost $260,which is what you would pay for 58pcs(3w) cree leds.The guy decided to go with 72-5 watt leds to light up his entire tank instead of investing 4x's the cost in a higher end setup.Hope i make sense.
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My post was in regards to FishBeard's money argument, not against you. SOrry for the misunderstanding.
 
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