# Affordable LED Grow Lights-When?:confused:



## avguy (Jun 26, 2006)

I am verse from readings here and elsewhere about the necessary lighting elements to the aquatic plant lighting arena. Heck, I studied plant physiology in college for awhile, too as a misguided (briefly) range conservationist.

Anyways, my dilemma is not unusual. I grow plants well(and algae!) with the standard CF over my 55g:-x of the 48" with CO2 via cannister/needle control valve/disc diffusor. I enjoy a community of Kribs, Fp. Gardneri Nsukka Killi males, platies, Cross. Siamenisis, and one Clown Loach. Plants-favor rooted crypts,swords, and anubias, and Java ferns on wood.

Trouble arises every Arizona summer when our house gets warmer for the tank - it means we get 84 deg. in there! I am also tired of burning over 200 watts of power for 10-11 hrs/day. No to T5 as well.

I saw the light of salvation for us all here - it is indeed LED. The problem is that we are at the market stage equal to the invention of DVD Recorders. Remember how they all were initially over $1k? Plasma TVs also are in this dilemma.

With the LEDs, there are few market options out there to actually help us aquatic plant growers. Seems that Solar Oasis has the innovative leader out at $255-305 just to cover 12-18w x 24l in. of planted tank. Thats not good news to some of us checking our mailboxes for the Bush tax rebate to pay off our other debts!

Looking further into the market, you can see that a vendor site such as http://www.fuzzlight.com/ledgrowlights.html is offering the apparent fix in the way of 3 diff. length aquaria grow tubes which have an = no. of red/yellow/blue LEDs. No nm data given for the tubes. They are a China import, but the 1.2m $140 model is tempting for my patience.:doh:

Some of the concern about LED lights only in a PAR spectra are cosmetics. I'm going to work around that one and go with a couple of the white (plant useless) 30 in. LED bars that put out the = of 75w on ebay for just $13 ea. They are only for my viewing of the tank, photos, etc. Hopefully, this light, being blue LEDs w/phosher coating, will not affect plants at all. They aren't going over the tank until I acquire some lighting in the PAR spectra first.

These tubes are constructed in a way that the fuzzlight grow tubes appear. It's a linear circuit board in a water-resistant sealed glass tube with an even array of white LEDs.

I think the best design answer to aquaria LED grow lights will be one tube to solve both areas. It will have linear arrays that are Sunlight Visible RGB LEDs. On http://www.ledtronics.com/ds/DIS1024/default.asp , look at the model LED DIS-1024-107. This is a full spectrum, 3-chip (yeah! Your tank would look nice in the white!) with reds @ 660nm, blue @ 468 nm. The price ea. at over $20 is the eek factor.

Finally, I want to save energy, limit heat, and grow my plants better now and later when I can step up to a 75G or more tank of the same length. I know the technology for this is there with LEDs, but nobody has a reasonable acquisition cost for us.


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## NoSvOrAx (Nov 11, 2006)

I've been watching these products for awhile too.
Just thought I'd pass on some links.
This looks pretty good.
http://www.homegrownlights.com/14wled.html
I know an engineer from this place, and I'm trying to wrangle a sample to test it. It should be noted that the people the previous link are talking about is ledtronics. They even use the same pic, so I think someone is gonna get sued. 
http://www.ledtronics.com/ds/plantbar-aq/default.asp
There is a bunch of stuff on ebay. Not sure I'd believe all the hype, but even underestimating I think some of these would save my electric bill. Just an example.
http://stores.ebay.com/High-Tech-Garden-Supply_L-E-D-GROW-LIGHTS_W0QQcolZ4QQdirZ1QQfsubZ16268213QQftidZ2QQtZkm

I one am pretty excited about how fast the products are developing. Now that they are rapidly decreasing in price we can start buying and testing them.


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## avguy (Jun 26, 2006)

The flat panel 12x12 in. for about $70 ea. on the ebay store might actually be useful! I may go with 3 of them, plus my current two 30 in. white LED tubes. They draw 11w ea.!

For tank access, I can quickly remove the R & B grow panels, as I would still have illumination from the rear mounted white tubes. 

Seeing the limited responses but numerous views here, I sense market infancy, competitive attitudes among the vendors, and user unfamiliarity. I want to try these now. I can always go back to my CF hood. I already backed it down to just one bank for 130 w and increased the noon siesta from 2.5 hrs to 3.5 hrs.

I might need a clear mylar tray for each panel, any suggestions on to where and how?


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## NoSvOrAx (Nov 11, 2006)

I'm thinking 3 of those square foot panels would do pretty good over a 36" 40g. I have a couple of them running 2x96w cf and a couple running 4x and 6x 39w t5ho so I should be able to get idea of how good they actually are.


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## lauraleellbp (Jan 31, 2008)

They are VERY new on the market, and from my (limited) research looks like the majoriy of the development so far has focused on SW reef applications?

Patrick Ormiston, who developed the Solaris fixture, actually has a really good article on LED fixtures in the May 2008 Freshwater and Marine Aquarium magazine...


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## avguy (Jun 26, 2006)

I ordered two of the 12 X 12 in. 225 R & B glow panels from the ebay vendor that sells alot of them in different - all red, all blue, mix, etc. They are the glow panel.com version. I also ordered a 12 in. tube of 24 Red & Blue equal mix hi power 5mm LEDs. It is glass, fully submersible. As partially eluded to before, here's the plan for that 55g. (By the way, $140 total w/shipping!):heh:

My biggest challenge is that dang narrow top! I've hated the 12 in. front-back since I started investigating the aquascaping more. Now, I'm going to off center the two panels to the stage left side of the tank as my out take and intake from my eheim on the other side in the back combined with the glass tank lid handles will prevent even centering. The bigger gap on the left side I will attempt to fill in with the 24 LED 12 in. bar. 

All these devices will merely lay atop my center divided glass tops. Both handles and the cutouts in the rear for filter and CO2 and air pump lines (I run an airstone at night) are obstacles. I already have two 30in. white LED glass tubes which now must lay atop the back side of each panel. Will strap them together, and stretch them off-center to 48 in.

I plan on the same light timers for the whole rig as before w/ CF Catalina 4 x 65 w. I may experiment some and leave on the white LED tubes longer w/o the grow panels & grow tube for viewing only later at night - want to see if that part of my new lighting source will affect the 'scape (algae?).

I do have a nice wood canopy to hide this mess in. I am not looking forward to moving the panels around for tank access, but until I can upgrade into a 75G with more width, .


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## Jeff.:P:. (Nov 20, 2007)

Check these out...very impresive.
http://www.news.com/1606-2_3-6234653.html?tag=nefd.also


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## NoSvOrAx (Nov 11, 2006)

I'm days away from buying lighting for several tanks and I'm thinking I'm gonna try these same leds. So be sure to post some updates when you get them installed. 

I like that bulb Jeff, just wish I could find somewhere to buy some.


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## trag (Jan 9, 2008)

Don't get too excited guys. The state of the art LEDs are still less energy efficient than plain old fluorescent lighting. If you actually get the datasheets for the LEDs from the companie's which invented and manufacture the LEDs, not the light fixtures, and read the specs, you'll find that the light output vs the power input is lower than for most other aquarium lighting options.

There has been a lot of marketing hype about its efficiency, but it is just that, hype. LEDs are not cooler, nor more efficient than fluorescent or even MH. You will not save money in electricity for the same level of lighting, nor will you solve your heat problems.

At this point in time LED has exactly two advantages in fishkeeping. The first is that in theory, one can achieve a higher intensity of light, (light per unit area) than even with MH, although fixtures on the market do not do that because they do not contain enough LEDs. The other is that the rated lifetime of the LEDs is much longer than other light equipment. However, that lifetime data is all predictive and probably fudged and doesn't mean much when you're paying ten times as much for the same amount of light.

Don't get me wrong, I was just where you are two years ago. Then I did the research and read the datasheets and I've been keeping up with the new releases, but they just aren't there yet. I think they'll get there eventually...


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## NoSvOrAx (Nov 11, 2006)

http://news.thomasnet.com/companystory/488110
http://news.thomasnet.com/fullstory/523440

I wasn't excited 2 years ago because they weren't cranking out leds like these.


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## trag (Jan 9, 2008)

NoSvOrAx said:


> http://news.thomasnet.com/companystory/488110
> http://news.thomasnet.com/fullstory/523440
> 
> I wasn't excited 2 years ago because they weren't cranking out leds like these.


Yes, they're getting there... Now try to buy those particular LEDs in quantity... Also note that the second article does not mention the actual power consumed, only the current. Is that with a Vf of 3.3 or 4.7 or what? It makes a big difference as to what the wattage consume is vs. that 100 lumens.

Finally, the LED fixtures you can buy commercially do not use those LEDs. They use Luxeon LEDs and not even the Rebel or K2s with the best output. They use some earlier lower output model.

And really finally, the capital cost just for the LEDs is about $20 per 430 lumens. That doesn't account for power supplies, reflectors, wiring, fans, etc. So the equivalent of a single T5 HO 54 watt bulb and fixutre would require $250 worth of LEDs. The latest available LEDs cost about $40 per 540 lumens...


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## DonaldmBoyer (Aug 18, 2005)

I really wish that someone would just simply make one light for the planted tank, and have all of this simplified!!! I hear great things and horrid things about the same lighting here, and I still don't know really what to get for my planned 450G tank....one person says one thing, another hates that suggestion and recommends something else, repeat process, etc. 

I just want someone to tell me once and for all what to buy for that size tank. Now we are throwing in possible plasma and LED bulbs? AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


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## jazzlvr123 (Apr 29, 2007)

hey if you want to put the money in it buy a solaris led light fixture a 48" fixture costs around $2000 WAY too pricey for my blood but they have some definite advantages if you want to invest, I think one of the coolest things about this fixture is you can change the color temp with just the turn of a dial:The light can be adjusted from 6.5K to 22K, or anywhere in between, to set the ideal color temperature. Sunrise, Daylight, Cloud Cover, Sunset, and the lunar cycle, can all be set independently. It also has an amazing spread and penetration throughout the tank. 
It uses 40% less energy than the 400W MH 15k fixtures it replaces. The life of the LEDs is approximately 50,000 hours, so it almost eliminates metal halide and fluorescent bulb replacements. All heat is radiated up and away from the tank; therefore, it does not heat the water like Metal Halides or Fluorescents.


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## trag (Jan 9, 2008)

jazzlvr123 said:


> The light can be adjusted from 6.5K to 22K, or anywhere in between, to set the ideal color temperature. Sunrise, Daylight, Cloud Cover, Sunset, and the lunar cycle, can all be set independently. It also has an amazing spread and penetration throughout the tank.
> It uses 40% less energy than the 400W MH 15k fixtures it replaces. The life of the LEDs is approximately 50,000 hours, so it almost eliminates metal halide and fluorescent bulb replacements. All heat is radiated up and away from the tank;


I have some swamp land in Arizona I'd like you to consider...

LED is less efficient than MH. It may use less electricity than a 400W MH, but if so, then it also provides considerably less light than that MH light. One must read marketing hype carefully.

The lifetime of LEDs is unknown and is based on testing which is supposed to simulate long term use. Also, the 50,000 hour figure is 50,000 hours to 70% output. Since many folks insist on replacing MH and fluorescent bulbs at 80 or even 90% output, who is going to be happy with 70% output from their $2000 light? Now, if it takes 50,000 hours to get to 70% that may be okay, but again, the marketing hype doesn't show a time vs. output curve and neither does the datasheet. So is it a linear decrease to 70%, or does it drop to 75% in the first 4000 hours and then decay to 70%, or does it stay at 95% for 45,000 hours and then suddenly decay to 75% in the last 5000 hours? These are important questions with a real bearing on how much of that 50,000 is actually usable time, and there are no answers available.

When those 50,000 hours (or 20,000 hours, depending on the time/intensity curve) are up, you must essentially replace the entire fixture, not just inexpensive bulbs.

The adjustable color temperature is by turning some LEDs off and leaving other LEDs on which are closer to the desired spectrum. So, you do not get full light capacity at all or even many color temperature choices. If you don't mind 10% light intensity capacity, then go ahead and adjust it to that special color output.

The ability to mix different color temp. LEDs in a fixture is very nice. However, one needs to understand the limitations of this feature before plunking down a month's income.


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## trag (Jan 9, 2008)

DonaldmBoyer said:


> I really wish that someone would just simply make one light for the planted tank, and have all of this simplified!!!


There is no one right answer, because it depends on many variables, including the subjective judgement of the person choosing the light fixture. However, to make it easier to make *your* subjective judgement, I suggest that you read this
http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/...49-proper-wattage-aquariums-3.html#post368021

That will at least give you a feel for the relative energy efficiency and light intensity of different lighting systems available today.

Go to local fish stores and look at the lights used there. Many of the non-chain stores around here have some display tanks with T5 HO or MH lights on them. That can give you a feel for what the different lights really look like, if your local stores are similar.

Don't assume that you need the most expensive light bulbs around. I see a lot of folks recommending the Giesseman (sp?) bulbs which tend to be $30 per pop. Looking at the datasheets and the spectrum charts it sure looks to me like I'd be just as happy with a $6 GE brand light bulb as a $30 Giesseman. If we were doing reef tanks I might have a different opinion, but for planted tanks, I don't think there's any need to spend so much on bulbs.

Shop around. Do Google searches to get a feel for pricing. I like 54 Watt T5 HO bulbs because you *can* find the various spectra at $6 - $8 per bulb if you do some hunting. I'm not sure if the same is true for MH.

Keep in mind that PC or Power Compact fluorescent is the same technology as T5 HO, so if you see folks arguing about PC vs. T5 HO, you can set your mind at ease and ignore that conflict. The main differences are that there are some different size/shapes available between the two, and the PC bulbs are slightly less efficient because of their folded topology, and the PC stuff is more expensive than T5 HO for the same light intensity.

I remember your thread about the 450 gallon tank. Because you are not I'm-looking-for-ways-to-spend-all-this-money wealthy, you can happily ignore LEDs for now. Oh, if you want moon lights, you might add a few for that purpose, but overall LED lighting is out of your price range. The equivalent of 500 watts of T5 HO lighting from LEDs would cost something like $3000 - $4000 if you built your own fixtures and more if you use the Solaris thing.

So, really, your choices are between/amongst T5, T5HO and MH. I don't see any reason to do T8 if you can do T5. The T5s are more energy efficient and use less space on top of the tank. Oh, you can throw Power Compact in there if you like, but it will cost you more. On the other hand, the kits from AHS are very nice, mainly because of their very fine reflectors. Getting good reflectors is important and can be difficult.

T5 and T5HO are basically the same except than T5 HO fixture/bulbs are brighter and less energy efficient. So where a 46.5" T5 bulb will use 28 watts and deliver about 2700 lumens, a 46.5" T5 HO bulb will use 54 watts and deliver about 5000 lumens. The bulbs sizes correspond between T5 and T5 HO so all the geometrical decisions are the same. The only question is how bright do you need your lights to be? The T5 will be dimmer per unit area, but also more energy efficient and the bulbs are probably (been a year since I surveyed) cheaper.

You have a lot of area on top of your tank, so plain T5 might be a good choice for you. Most folks need T5HO because they must squeeze in as much light intensity into a limited area as they possibly can. This limitation also drives folks to MH.

Now T5 HO comes in many lengths, the most commonly used in this hobby being 24", 36" and 48" (actually, each of those is about 1.5" shorter than that). There are also 6' bulbs available. So you could just cover your 6' tank in 6' long bulbs. However, as you might imagine, the less commonly used bulb sizes cost more proportionately. In general, you'll get the most bang for the buck with the 4' size. This is true for all the fluorescent flavors.

But 4' bulbs do not conveniently cover the top of your 6' X 6' tank. So if you want to stay with the most affordable and available stuff you need to be geometrically creative.

MH comes in different wattages as you know. So for them, it's mainly a matter of picking a wattage and a model of bulb with a desirable spectrum. Keep in mind that MH bulbs have a really short lifetime (~80% of output after 1 year of use). So it's nice if you can find an inexpensive bulb that you like. MH also have some aesthetic qualities that fluorescents lack, so again, it's a subjective decision. You need to look at some in use to decide if it's something you really want.

So really, you're left with picking what geometry of MH and/or T5HO (or T5) you would like over your big aquarium, and factoring in trade offs of convenient size vs. availability and price vs. appearance.

Continuing a thought from above, good reflectors are important because your typical MH or fluorescent bulb radiates more than 50% of its light away from the surface of the aquarium. Further, the shallower the angle of incidence (angle light hits the water) the higher the percentage of that light that gets reflected at the surface. So the ideal is a column of light striking the water at a 90 degree (perpendicular) angle.

A good reflector can recover and redirect a huge percentage of that lost light, making your lights effectively up to two times brighter than a light with no or a poor reflector.

One big advantage of PC lights is that a kit from AHS will come with a really nice premade reflector. And they (AHS) don't make reflectors for conventional T5 HO bulbs. However, I've seen links to sellers who do in threads here. And you can make your own, if you're a little handy with sheet metal, although I would probably order extra material and plan on disposing of your first effort, or practice on roof flashing metal.


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## lauraleellbp (Jan 31, 2008)

Pretty sure the Solaris fixture was developed for reef applications, not FW; I'd worry that they would transfer over well?


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## ruki (Jul 4, 2006)

trag said:


> Don't get too excited guys. The state of the art LEDs are still less energy efficient than plain old fluorescent lighting. If you actually get the datasheets for the LEDs from the companie's which invented and manufacture the LEDs, not the light fixtures, and read the specs, you'll find that the light output vs the power input is lower than for most other aquarium lighting options.


I don't expect expect the aquarium lighting vendors to give us the best LEDs, especially after them selling all those wasteful power compact fixtures 

In certain circumstances, you can do better. I picked up some relatively inexpensive 60 lumen modules to play with for 5 gallon tanks and smaller. This is just to get my feet wet in regards to LED lighting. It's six 10 lumen LEDs in a star config. (http://www.superbrightleds.com/specs/MR11-WHPx.htm) These put out about 33 lumens per watt and that's not bad for something that small compared to other lighting technologies. Still, at $15.00 per unit it's not exactly cheap. These certainly won't scale to large tanks by any stretch of the imagination.



> There has been a lot of marketing hype about its efficiency, but it is just that, hype. LEDs are not cooler, nor more efficient than fluorescent or even MH. You will not save money in electricity for the same level of lighting, nor will you solve your heat problems.


The heating problem is different. It's a bit less than the heat released as a fluorescent tube, but it's coming from a much smaller space, so heat sinking to protect the semiconductor is major issue. But the total heat also has to include the power supply which could bring up the total heat released and lower the efficiency below that of a T5 HO fixture... 

The biggest problem now is that there is too much initial expense now to recoup your initial investment. I think the drop-in LED fluorescent tube option will scale up and get cheaper faster than other options http://www.luxeonstar.com/item.php?id=5529&link_str=1429&partno=EVE25T8-48-S6
To me this means that I replace my $7.00 big box hardware store 32 watt T8 Octron tube with a $150 LED light. For this upgrade I get 20 percent more light generated per watt. Once they start selling millions and millions of these things, the price should drop to around $10.00 each. How many years for this to occur?

I'm really not a MH fan because of the lumen maintenance and spectrum shift with those bulbs. That makes them really expensive to me. You need a large tank and a large bulb replacement budget for MH, if you want to deliver their specified light.



> At this point in time LED has exactly two advantages in fishkeeping. The first is that in theory, one can achieve a higher intensity of light, (light per unit area) than even with MH, although fixtures on the market do not do that because they do not contain enough LEDs. The other is that the rated lifetime of the LEDs is much longer than other light equipment. However, that lifetime data is all predictive and probably fudged and doesn't mean much when you're paying ten times as much for the same amount of light.


Another advantage is that they scale to really small sizes. MH isn't very efficient until you past 400 watts or so. CF makes sense for small sizes, but get them too small and their lumens per watt drops way off.



> Don't get me wrong, I was just where you are two years ago. Then I did the research and read the datasheets and I've been keeping up with the new releases, but they just aren't there yet. I think they'll get there eventually...


The other problem is the apples and oranges comparisons. The Solaris fixtures have fancy features that I don't really want. It's just more things to break down over time. I want a really simple high power LED light. Since it's way too expensive to compete head-to-head with fluorescent, they add extra fancy features making it even more expensive!

How about Cree XR-Es? Wouldn't an array of these be about the same-to-a-bit-better than T5 HO at around 90 lumens per watt? Wonder what the cost would be though... around a thousand US for a 75 gallon tank fixture?

I keep reading about prototype LEDS at 120 lumens per watt plus, but the ones that make it to production are less than 90 lumens per watt, usually much less.


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## hoppycalif (Apr 7, 2005)

trag said:


> There is no one right answer, because it depends on many variables, including the subjective judgement of the person choosing the light fixture. However, to make it easier to make *your* subjective judgement, I suggest that you read this
> http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/...49-proper-wattage-aquariums-3.html#post368021
> 
> That will at least give you a feel for the relative energy efficiency and light intensity of different lighting systems available today.
> ...


This is a great post! I just wanted to see it repeated.


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## trag (Jan 9, 2008)

Thank you, Hoppy.

Jeff


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## trag (Jan 9, 2008)

ruki said:


> How about Cree XR-Es? Wouldn't an array of these be about the same-to-a-bit-better than T5 HO at around 90 lumens per watt? Wonder what the cost would be though... around a thousand US for a 75 gallon tank fixture?


I looked at the Cree datasheets about four months ago. They had some production LEDs listed which were somewhat more efficient than the best Luxeons, but they were also proportionately more expensive. They still weren't better than fluorescent lighting, IIRC. If they're getting to 90 lumens/watt with actual buyable-in-quantity LEDs, then they have surpassed the efficiency of magnetic ballast fluorescent and are now challenging T8 and T5HO for efficiency.

However, another thing you must watch is the current (power) at which they run the LEDs. If they run them at low current, they tend to be much more efficient (like 50% more efficient) but they also have much lower intensity (they're converting less power into light) and so you need many more LEDs at low power to provide a desired light intensity.

If you use the minimum number of LEDs needed to gain a desired light intensity, and run them at high current, then your efficiency falls back down well below T12 w/magnetic ballast and MH.

So get high efficiency and low power consumption for a given light intensity, but buy about twice as many very very expensive LEDs, or buy fewer LEDs, run them at 2 or 3 times the current, and watch your efficiency drop well below fluorescent.


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