LED lighting

[runninwoof]

ok, i needed a light for my 29g (going med light) and was lookin at dfs and they had Aquarium Lighting & LED Lights: Marineland LED Double Bright Lighting System on the front page. thats the first led fixture ive found. ive been looking into LEDs and i cant tell how they do compared to t-5.

the intensity is the same?
energy used and temperature are less on LEDs.
am i able to adjust the kelvin rating? (i dont know if i used that right, but im talking about the temperature)

the one i linked says it has blue lights. would i be able to make them white?

i find on sites that people say they are too expensive but the price will drop in the future. most were writtin about 2 years ago so is it the bees knees now? how would 6x1watt leds compare to a 65watt pc or 2x24watts of t5. most sites i find are LED companies so any info from some one with experience with them would be great!

 

[Phazeshyft]

The prices have really come down a lot on LED lighting in the last two years. The cost on that unit you linked looks great.
I myself am building a custom LED setup because for the cost I could put a lot more lights in. The only thing I am questioning is their spectrum of light and how plants would respond to it. I can add any color in there but I am not sure of the true energy of the light. So i am going to experiment a little. I will post pics and results here.

You cannot make a white LED blue or vice versa. Just like florescent lights the color is determined by the light itself and not the power source. An incandescent can be manipulated a little but mainly in black body radiation style.

The Lumens on LEDs are much lower than florescent and I am compensating by putting in 72 LEDs into my unit. basically 4 x 18 LED units running off 3.4 vdc and 20 mA this website LED center gives a lot of good info about LEDs and there are conversions for determining the luminosity of LEDs

 

[BigJim]

I can't imagine 6-8 watts of LEDs comparing to 48 watts of T5. I believe my Maglites use 1W LEDS. They're great flashlights, but the light from several of them doesn't compare to the light my 30" 2x18W T5 fixture puts out.

LEDs put out light in a very narrow spectrum. White LEDs are actually derived from blue LEDs and have a very high Kelvin rating. You'd need to mix in some yellow or green to lower the Kelvin rating for plants.

Phazeshyft has some pretty good information. If you search online for LED DIY fixtures, there are a lot of people playing with them. It's more experimenting than money-saving at this point though.

 

[mfdrookie516]

I would almost think those lights you have linked would be more for viewing than plants... doesnt seem possible for 6 little led's to support plant life. All the led's i've seen for reef setups were massive amounts of led's

 

[jsoong]

I was researching the LED's a while back. The general consensus is that the LED's are still not ready for prime time in a planted setup. <The info is mainly from people with indoor land plants ... but I assume that this is even more true for aquatic plants.>

Basically, the LED's don't have enough intensity to support plant growth. There is supposed to be a "super LED" (? 5W) coming down the pipe that is high intensity. Haven't seen any yet.

Most of the hobbyist experimental fixtures requires 60-100 LED's (or more.) Not only is this more expensive than a good T5, it also uses more electricity.