T5 vs. MH vs. LED

[t57spikes]

Well the title says it all...which do you prefer, and why?

Which lighting have you seen the best growth from?

I know most people love LED, but in my quest to find the best lighting a lot of people are using T5 and MH mixed, and hate LED.

I was looking at the Hydra LEDS but it seems like T5 has better growth from what people have said that I've asked.

Pictures would be appreciated.

 

[Sniperhank]

My reef tank runs fully off of LEDs. Great growth without issues. With wide optics, LEDs will have the same coverage as bulbed units.
That said, there isn't anything wrong with t5ho besides needing 6-8 bulbs to support high intensity corals and anemones.
Then there is mh. Great growth, but run hot. People run fans and even chillers to keep their tanks cool enough from turning into a sauna.


Sent from my iPhone using Aquarium Advice

 

[t57spikes]

My reef tank runs fully off of LEDs. Great growth without issues. With wide optics, LEDs will have the same coverage as bulbed units.
That said, there isn't anything wrong with t5ho besides needing 6-8 bulbs to support high intensity corals and anemones.
Then there is mh. Great growth, but run hot. People run fans and even chillers to keep their tanks cool enough from turning into a sauna.


Sent from my iPhone using Aquarium Advice

Yes, heat is an issue with T5 and MH, have you had any issues with hair algae or anything because of the LED?

What brand LED are you using?

 

[mr_X]

The people that say metal halides and t5's are the best lighting are simply not educated on LEDs. Replacing expensive lamps, heat, much higher electricity costs, and spectrum shifts are what you get from halides and T5s.
PAR is PAR, no matter what light source you are using. If you have enough PAR, corals will grow. The speed in which they grow depends on multiple things. In my experience, my corals have grown the same under all three light sources. I also use a PAR meter regularly, so maybe this is what the trouble was with the folks who "hate leds".
The bottom line is that many companies are putting all their resources into LED technology, and putting the other, inferior lighting on the back burner. This isn't just with the hobby, it's with every type of lighting, from street lights to refrigerators to autos...the list is endless.

 

[t57spikes]

The people that say metal halides and t5's are the best lighting are simply not educated on LEDs. Replacing expensive lamps, heat, much higher electricity costs, and spectrum shifts are what you get from halides and T5s.
PAR is PAR, no matter what light source you are using. If you have enough PAR, corals will grow. The speed in which they grow depends on multiple things. In my experience, my corals have grown the same under all three light sources. I also use a PAR meter regularly, so maybe this is what the trouble was with the folks who "hate leds".
The bottom line is that many companies are putting all their resources into LED technology, and putting the other, inferior lighting on the back burner. This isn't just with the hobby, it's with every type of lighting, from street lights to refrigerators to autos...the list is endless.

I see it the same way, PAR is PAR, no matter what source it originates from. T5 and MH are just as expensive to start up and the continuos 6 month bulb replacment would get old fast, which is why I never wanted to mess with that type of lighting.

So, it is seeming as LED is the way to go, no matter what some say, just the bulb replacment makes me want to go LED.

What brand LED is the best? I've been looking at the Hydras, any reviews on them?

 

[mr_X]

I don't have any experience with them yet, but a friend of mine bought a few of the SOL Super Blue units a few years ago and he loves them.
I do think Ecotech radion is the best though. Not personal experience, but know some folks that have them.
I'm a price shopper myself, so I use the Ebay hoopty fixtures. They can't be beaten for the price, and they grow coral quite well.

 

[t57spikes]

Are you talking about then165 W for 60 on eBay?

 

[mr_X]

Yes. I didn't see them for 60 though. Usually around 90-100 bucks or so shipped.

 

[Sniperhank]

God I do love my Radions...Pricey though. The taos are a great priced option.

 

[jeffaquarius]

LED may have lots of advantages but when it comes to simplicity and the visual effect I still prefer T5. You need to pick the right LED brand since they are not created equal.

 

[Ingy]

The problem with the super cheap led units is their LEDs are 3 or more generations old and binned wayyy out. That means their color is not as advertised and the efficiency is dismal. I saw one rated at 3500 lumens for a 120 watt fixture. That's less that 30 lumens per watt. And that is terrible.
Compare that to the Kessil brand LEDs. They are pumping out over 120 lumen per watt for a 90 watt fixture. That means a single Kessil A350 will pump out as much light as 3 cheap Chinese 120 watt fixtures. And that makes sense as Kessil is part of DiCon who specialize in optics and led manufacturing. No buying of a third party's discount, barely effective LEDs.

All that being said, perhaps 3500 lumen are all you need for your tank, and $60 is better than $450.


Sent from my iPhone using Aquarium Advice

 

[mr_X]

Nonsense. You can't use 1 kessil over a tank that takes 3 cheapos to cover, because they simply don't have the coverage-it's more like 6 kessils.
I'm using three 120 watt units over my 6' x 3' x 27" tall tank at the moment and I'm growing sps on the sand bed 30" away from the fixtures. Barely effective? Sounds like the place you got that info from has expensive lights for sale, or at least is sponsored by kessil/ecotech/AI...
No one measures lumens- we measure PAR.
Lastly, color is up to the human to like or not like, for you can grow corals under any color as long as you have enough PAR. So, it makes no difference if these "ancient" leds aren't at exactly 450nm. All you need is something you like to look at. If this is even true.
I have found quite a bit of false info on the net about these fixtures, but Proof is in the pudding.

 

[PB_Smith]

you could put together your own LED unit and have it exactly what you want and maybe even save a few $$$;
Rapid LED


and here is some info about what is needed for differing sizes.
LED University

 

[Maridia]

I use a Kissel 360W for my 55G reef tank. I love the light options, how you can adjust the lighting spectrum/intensity and it's given my SPS nice growth. They are pricey, but I love it. You would need two to cover that length, so you're good with 2 Kessil's for up to 90Gs before you need to consider getting a 3rd.

 

[Ingy]

Although I never said 1 Kessil can cover a 6' tank, I did say they will output 3-4 times as much light. Of course it is down, and only a fool would use 1 light over such a large tank.

As for using PAR, instead of lumens, that is stupid. PAR is a dangerous term that means nothing. PUR is the value you should be recommending. If the frequency/wavelength of light is wrong (ie green) all the par in the world won't satisfy corals. PUR is the narrower part of the wide PAR band (PAR IS EVERYTING FROM 400-700 nm) that photosynthesis occurs. Other than the fact that PAR meters are much cheaper than PUR meters, they can lead to a dangerous misunderstanding of light received.

As for nobody using lumens, that's absolutely wrong. Just your misunderstanding of what lumens is. Lumens is the amount of light radiated by a fixture. And that was the correct context I was using it. It has nothing to do with light on the sand bed or anywhere else. And the useful rating of lumens per watt tells everybody how efficient a transmitter is at converting expensive electrical energy into light energy.

A lighting unit rated at 30 lumens per watt will swallow 4 times the electricity as a 120 lumen per watt fixture, all else being equal. Of course Kessil, producing their own LEDs, and other companies like radion that get the newest edition LEDs from the first bins will NOT be equal to cheap units that get the bulbs from what we refer to as the garbage bins.

Lumens - good rating for fixture's transmission
PUR - good rating for light received by corals
PAR - bad rating for light received by corals


Glen
Electronics Technologist
Communications specialist

 

[Gregcoyote]

I don't often see somebody flashing their "credentials" but now you've done it.

First, being a communication technician gives you little authority of opinion in this field than many others would have. I know because I employ communication technicians. (www.orbitaldata.net) Mr_X has an enormous amount of experience as I have had and many others on this excellent forum. So let's all lighten up and let's be courteous.

All lights make photons. Period. Some make more photons for the energy usage and some make broader spectrums for the energy they consume. Some produce large amounts of waste heat. They all grow coral if strong enough. My basement full of 25 years of burnt out bulbs, both MH and T5 prove that. My chiller also proves MH are expensive to operate because of waste heat generation.

There are just a few emitter manufacturers, Kessel doesn't make their own, few of them do as I am aware. The best emitters are Cree IMO. Kessel uses DiCon dense matrix emitters. These are efficient and tiny but can be prone to failure in some applications I've used them in. But they are elegant and work well. Not sure of any fixtures using "garbage bin" emitters. Not a productive comment as no one wants to be told their light is garbage.

This is a old beaten up topic that I thought was put to bed years ago. The proof in the pudding is the thousands of photographs of highly successful SPS reefs using all varieties of high output LEDs. Especially cheap Chinese panels. The Chinese product have lousy drivers but grow just fine. Again, JMO as I imported about 100 of them.

Just for reference:


PAR, or Photosynthetically Active Radiation designates the spectral range (wave band) of solar radiation from 400 to 700 nanometers that photosynthetic organisms are able to use in the process of photosynthesis. This spectral region corresponds "more or less" with the range of light visible to the human eye.

PUR, or Photosynthetically Usable Radiation is that fraction of PAR that is absorbed by zooxanthellae photopigments thereby stimulating photosynthesis.Photosynthetic zooxanthellae in corals and some other marine invertebrates utilize light in the 400 to 700nm range in different ways.

PAR will always be a greater value than PUR.

The lumen can be thought of casually as a measure of the total "amount" of visible light in some defined beam or angle, or emitted from some source. The number of candelas or lumens from a source also depends on its spectrum, via the nominal response of the human eye as represented in the luminosity function. (Wikipedia)

So lumens is appropriate for measuring energy delivered to your eye or thru a camera lens where the breath of the bandwidth absorption is much greater than with plants or corals. But it can still be used as a relative measurement of lighter vs darker areas.

One other note, any amateur PAR meter used to measure LED output needs to be corrected for the narrow spectrum spikes. These correction factors are available on the Quantum web site.

Whew. That was the longest post I've done in a while.

Happy reefing and peace brother.


Sent from my iPhone using Aquarium Advice

 

[Ingy]

I'm not a technician. I'm a technologist. Technicians work for technologists. I was involved in design, not soldering. And my area of expertise is communications. The transfer of energy from a to b. Microwave specifically, but science doesn't care about the difference between microwaves and visible light.
Lumens ratings for a transmitter does not take into account lenses etc. it is simply a rating of total visible light TRANSMITTED, when applied to a transmitter. So for others to say nobody uses lumens is incorrect. It is an important rating manufacturers use.
And as these cheap units drop in price, they can do that when they buy LEDs from the far out discount bins. That means the light the bulbs are listed as, will likely be quite far off from that. A 455nm bulb may in fact be 470nm if it is cheap enough. And as well, all the energy that is not put into light (and at 30 lum per watt, there is much left over) goes into heat. More heat means a shorter lifespan.
More expensive lights cost more because they use higher quality bulbs that cost more.

All of that is simply information. PAR is not the end all be all rating. Lumen per watt is an important rating for a transmitter. And people should be aware that the cheaper these units get, the cheaper they are. Cree does not sell quality bulbs at 2/$1.


Sent from my iPhone using Aquarium Advice

 

[Maridia]

I don't often see somebody flashing their "credentials" but now you've done it.

First, being a communication technician gives you little authority of opinion in this field than many others would have. I know because I employ communication technicians. (ODN - Emergency Communication Management) Mr_X has an enormous amount of experience as I have had and many others on this excellent forum. So let's all lighten up and let's be courteous.

All lights make photons. Period. Some make more photons for the energy usage and some make broader spectrums for the energy they consume. Some produce large amounts of waste heat. They all grow coral if strong enough. My basement full of 25 years of burnt out bulbs, both MH and T5 prove that. My chiller also proves MH are expensive to operate because of waste heat generation.

There are just a few emitter manufacturers, Kessel doesn't make their own, few of them do as I am aware. The best emitters are Cree IMO. Kessel uses DiCon dense matrix emitters. These are efficient and tiny but can be prone to failure in some applications I've used them in. But they are elegant and work well. Not sure of any fixtures using "garbage bin" emitters. Not a productive comment as no one wants to be told their light is garbage.

This is a old beaten up topic that I thought was put to bed years ago. The proof in the pudding is the thousands of photographs of highly successful SPS reefs using all varieties of high output LEDs. Especially cheap Chinese panels. The Chinese product have lousy drivers but grow just fine. Again, JMO as I imported about 100 of them.

Just for reference:


PAR, or Photosynthetically Active Radiation designates the spectral range (wave band) of solar radiation from 400 to 700 nanometers that photosynthetic organisms are able to use in the process of photosynthesis. This spectral region corresponds "more or less" with the range of light visible to the human eye.

PUR, or Photosynthetically Usable Radiation is that fraction of PAR that is absorbed by zooxanthellae photopigments thereby stimulating photosynthesis.Photosynthetic zooxanthellae in corals and some other marine invertebrates utilize light in the 400 to 700nm range in different ways.

PAR will always be a greater value than PUR.

The lumen can be thought of casually as a measure of the total "amount" of visible light in some defined beam or angle, or emitted from some source. The number of candelas or lumens from a source also depends on its spectrum, via the nominal response of the human eye as represented in the luminosity function. (Wikipedia)

So lumens is appropriate for measuring energy delivered to your eye or thru a camera lens where the breath of the bandwidth absorption is much greater than with plants or corals. But it can still be used as a relative measurement of lighter vs darker areas.

One other note, any amateur PAR meter used to measure LED output needs to be corrected for the narrow spectrum spikes. These correction factors are available on the Quantum web site.

Whew. That was the longest post I've done in a while.

Happy reefing and peace brother.


Sent from my iPhone using Aquarium Advice

Under what "applications" or situations have your Kissel lights failed? I'm using them to grow my corals, I want to know if you are meaning a "what not to do" scenario with these lights.

 

[PB_Smith]

And as these cheap units drop in price, they can do that when they buy LEDs from the far out discount bins. That means the light the bulbs are listed as, will likely be quite far off from that. A 455nm bulb may in fact be 470nm if it is cheap enough. And as well, all the energy that is not put into light (and at 30 lum per watt, there is much left over) goes into heat. More heat means a shorter lifespan.
More expensive lights cost more because they use higher quality bulbs that cost more.

makes sense.
sounds the same as micro-processor/memory production. do a production run, plug em in, then stamp the speed on the it. On any type of manufacturing, especially things like processors and leds, where small variances in the architecture can result in variations in the final products even though they came of the same die.

I knew a guy eons ago who would hit the "swap meets" in Hong Kong and buy memory modules by the crate for pennies because they were not 100% up to spec, but in most everyday use the end user would never know the difference.
He would bring them to the states and make a ton of $$$$ selling memory for half retail.
I imagine the exact same thing applies to led manufacture as well.

If the end user doesn't have the proper test equipment, then they will just accept what is written on the packaging.

 

[Gregcoyote]

Under what "applications" or situations have your Kissel lights failed? I'm using them to grow my corals, I want to know if you are meaning a "what not to do" scenario with these lights.

In my case, I didn't keep the emitter cool enough. My fault really as I had no idea how hot they got compared to a regular LED. Stupid mistake as I was using 100 watt matrix LEDs in my home made lights and on flood lights we put in big buses. Needs a very effective heat sink. Kessle has designed a nice light and I am sure it will serve you a long time!


Sent from my iPhone using Aquarium Advice