I've had several conversations with OVAS members lately about LED lighting and I am always referring to an article which discusses several of the brand names and compares their relative abilities. So, perhaps it's time to start a thread on this topic by offering the link. I read this article some time ago and acted on it by purchasing the TMC Grobeam 500 and 600s for fresh water aquariums. I'm very pleased with the performance and since these lights are now available in Canada, I will purchasing them exclusively for all my tanks as the need arises. I prefer metal halides but the energy costs and heat produced are problematic. I also like the shimmering effect from both, and although I have no problems with the results of CFs and HO-T5s, will continue to replace lights with LEDs, and for deep tanks, metal halides supplemented with LEDS. Enjoy the read. If you are considering a lighting purchase in the next while, this should be helpful. Cheers.
http://aquarium-digest.com/2010/06/30/led-light-review-tmc-xg-1500-maxspect-more/
Sent you a PM.
The Canadian supplier is http://www.jlaquatics.com
Sorry, should have added that.
What size tanks have you been using the 500s and 600s on (in terms of depth in inches)?
Gotta love advertising and biased reports. Not saying TMC doesn't make good stuff but when I contacted jlaquatics last year they were discontinuing TMC because of quality issues That was according to them Lots of led options today and I found, several brands at better prices with more flexibility
Please share the names of those other name brands. I agree there are tons of LED options available today, but few of them are capable of producing more than low-med PAR values for decent plant growth, in a non-marine colour spectrum.
I think from personal experience, I really like the Current Satellites for a lower light option - they are working on another model that provides higher PAR values. For higher light, I've heard great things about the Finnex lights - they just released one with red leds as well for that red spectrum for planted tanks (debatable as to whether its necessary to some). Finnex also has an option for low-medium light fixture. As far as cost effective solutions, those seem the best. I have also tried the marine double bright fixture and you can tell that LEDs have come a long way since they were first introduced.
I'm a fan of buildmyled.com. I have had good luck with their 10000k led.
Quote from: exv152 on December 04, 2013, 02:41:43 PM
What size tanks have you been using the 500s and 600s on (in terms of depth in inches)?
I am using them on shallow tanks only: up to 12". Tried two 500s on an 18" deep tank several years ago but they didn't do well. Technology has improved since then and I intend to try a single 600 on a 16" tank early next year. My experience is consistent with the general consensus from the Hydroponics people I've talked with. They maintain that LED lights don't penetrate dense foliage well enough yet to be considered over MH and HO-T5s.
I have been following the progress of the Finnex Ray 11 for a bit now, there have not been too many complaints about them, the biggest peeve I have come across is the build quality of the legs.
I will admit I have not done a ton of research on other affordable options, but I'm sold on the Finnex, the price point is right for me & the end result is they do the job they are intended for, I hope Santa remembers to pack the one for my 15 gallon tank so I can have first hand experience with it.
Errol
Quote from: Al on December 04, 2013, 07:39:59 PM
Gotta love advertising and biased reports. Not saying TMC doesn't make good stuff but when I contacted jlaquatics last year they were discontinuing TMC because of quality issues That was according to them Lots of led options today and I found, several brands at better prices with more flexibility
I have been buying my LEDs from jlaquatics and have spoken to them on the phone in the last couple of weeks and they've said nothing about discontinuing. In fact I am waiting for a single power supply they have ordered for me, and have told them that when it arrives, I want them to ship it with another Grobeam 600. And yes, scepticism is important and so are options. I've tried Marineland and TMCs only. The Marineland were not good enough for plant growth, but may also have improved over the last couple of years. I would like to test out other lights but they are expensive and I've decided to go with what works for me. I mainly want to have good plant growth and enjoy the shimmering effect of MH, which only LEDs replicate. I've done a ton of on-line research and am comfortable that what I have read about the TMC emitor quality. As for the design, reliability, and the workmanship of the TMC hoods I cannot comment beyond my own 2 plus years of experience.
Quote from: charlie on December 05, 2013, 06:30:48 PM
I have been following the progress of the Finnex Ray 11 for a bit now, there have not been too many complaints about them, the biggest peeve I have come across is the build quality of the legs.
I will admit I have not done a ton of research on other affordable options, but I'm sold on the Finnex, the price point is right for me & the end result is they do the job they are intended for, I hope Santa remembers to pack the one for my 15 gallon tank so I can have first hand experience with it.
Errol
Are there any Canadian suppliers of Finnex? Sounds interesting, though.
Yes there is ,a sole Canadian distributer
http://finnex.ca/
I did find this compendium on LED lighting, comparing PAR values, and the grobeam TMC 1000 & 1500 have incredible PAR values even at greater depths. Apparently even better than the finnex ray2. The trade off is the TMC light is an eight by eight inch tile, and the finnex is a longer more narrow fixture.
http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/showthread.php?t=160396 (http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/showthread.php?t=160396)
I found this one the J & L Aquatics web site that I hadn't seen before. These are the spectrum charts for the TMC Grobeam 1000 'ColorPlus, and the TMC Grobeam 1500 'Natural Daylight' LED tiles. I would like to see spectrums for the other LEDs on the market. Does anyone know if there are any posted? From the compendium of the PAR values on the planted tank forum, Kessil looks to be good comparison wrt PAR at distance (except they only provide PAR values through air only).
The spectrum for the TMC 1000 has less green and yellow than the 1500. This would seem to be an advantage to reduce algae, yes?
Hey Greg, Here is a link i found on J&L's site showing the colour temperature of the grobeam 1500. You'll notice tons of blue, some green and yellow, and virtually no red. This is the issue I've noticed with all LEDs. Even the ones strong enough to grow plants, they have great intensity but poor red colour temp. You'll notice too that most planted tank pics with LEDs tend to only contain green leafed plants, not many reds or yellows.
http://www.jlaquatics.com/manuals/aquaray/grobeam1500_spectrum.pdf (http://www.jlaquatics.com/manuals/aquaray/grobeam1500_spectrum.pdf)
OMG. I just realized that I hadn't included the links for the pages I wrote about. Eric, you got one of them. And the other one for the 1000 is here: http://www.jlaquatics.com/manuals/aquaray/grobeam_colorplus_spectrum.pdf
Notice there is red in the 1000. And the colour temperature is near 9000 degrees v the 1500 which is listed as 6500. The PAR and Lux readings listed are at 15.7 inches (400 mm = 15.7"). I'm so close to purchasing one of the 1000s. I'm trying to be frugal, but......
Yes, the red LEDs are nice but the two cree green LEDs are virtually useless for planted tanks. So you're really only getting the benefit of eight emitters, rather than ten (like on the 1500). Plus the PAR readings are better on the 1500. The link up top to the LED compendium suggests the 1500 is closer to high intensity, whereas the 1000 is medium intensity. This article describes the grobeam 1500 as the best planted tank LED bar none. Scroll down near the bottom 3rd of the page.http://aap.atrixnet.com/?p=338 (http://aap.atrixnet.com/?p=338)
Just received a Finnex Ray 2 light and I'd like to confirm the comment about the legs. The included plastic mounting legs are flimsy and slip very loosely through the mounting rails/tracks. So much so that if you happened to bump the light (which is extremely lightweight) I'm concerned it could shift right off the legs and plop into the tank. The legs are also composed of a very brittle plastic.
Another problem is that my tank is 39" wide so I ordered the 36" light. The 36" Coralife compact fluorescent setup I have now has fully adjustable legs and was no problem to mount, accommodating 1.5" easily on either end. The Finnex casing is actually 35.5" long (the LED strip is 33") and the legs barely extend 1 inch from either end. Any further and they risk falling out of the mounting rails on the body of the light. Plop.
All this means is that I'll have to rig up a hanging bracket or get a glass top, which I hadn't anticipated.
Although the Finnex has better light quality, I would say both the Current USA Satellite LED+ and the Fluval Aqualight seem to be better build quality.
The ray2 may be flimsy but it's far superior in performance. What really matters more for plants is the PAR values. Current satellite LED+ only puts out 28 at 18", and not sure about the fluval, but the ray2 puts out a PAR of 55 at 18". Everything I've read about the fluvals is that it puts out low light. The ray2 are an excellent option for anything under 18 inches in height.
Well yes, I did choose the Finnex Ray2 for its emission specs. But it is worth it to set expectations regarding hardware. I have oddball dimensions on this tank (39Wx16Lx19H) and I'm looking forward to see if I can get some carpeting going with the Ray2. I may require a second unit, we'll see.
I ended up picking up some Lexan at Lowe's and siliconed together a little bridge. Adequate for now. Prior to that I used a couple of clip-on, bendable lights to support it. The Ray2 is extremely light, probably only 1lb, and gets barely warm to the touch.
Incidentally, the Ray2 (36" model) was $123 on Amazon with free shipping. Took 3 weeks because they were out of stock, but that's fine.
On the topic of LEDs for planted tanks....Finnex is currently developing new LED fixtures to address some of the planted tank concerns. They're coming out with a fixture that has more PAR than the ray2, has a timer, dimmer, full sunrise sunset and night light functions, as well as a hanging kit. Apparently the new PAR readings are 20-25% higher. But it'll be another six months min before they hit the market.
???
I recently purchased two Finnex led strips. One is the ray 2 DS the other fugeray planted +. Both 36". They are being used on my 24" high plated tank. So far the results are excellent, there is far more growth than with my DIY t8 hood I created, and with the planted + the red wave length makes the tank look far nicer. I purchased the strips through amazon.ca, substantial savings over the Canadian distributor.
Quote from: wolfiewill on December 03, 2013, 01:33:01 PM
......... I... will continue to replace lights with LEDs, and for deep tanks, metal halides supplemented with LEDS.
As you can see, there are many LED fixtures to date that can provide enough PAR
even for deep tanks, you might need to employ more than one fixture, especially if the tank is wide front to back, but the use of MH is so outdated, not necessary and a total waste of energy, something we should be aware of these days. From researching and seeing for myself, brands like BML and Finnex seem to take the lead, Finnex for value. You might find BML to be even more effective than MH. Even for deep tanks.
I found an article that tries to address the issue of power vs quantity of available light. Go down the page about half way, to the comparison chart entitled "Aquarium LED Comparison". The author states that the values and information in the chart comes from the manufacturers'. Notice the top row indicating 'Power Consumption Per Unit Carbon Foot Print'. The TMC Growbeam is lower and still provides comparable PAR. Also notice the cost to operate per year/per 5 years. Perhaps we're being fooled when we assume if the light is an LED that the will be a cost saving over HOT5 and MH?
Too bad Finnex aren't included. I saw zolta's tank this week and was really impressed with the colour and health of his plants under the Finnex lights.
http://aquarium-digest.com/
Thanks for posting this Greg,
The one thing about the TMC's is their grobeam like many of the other LED's are high in the 400-450nm range which is blue, which of course if good for all growing things in the tank, including algae. However I have read that lights in the 650 nm range which is red is really good for plants but not so good for algae. The Planted Tank posted a review of LED's a while ago, (link below), in it there is a brief discussion of the various light wavelengths and what they do.
As for cost savings per year for power consumption, even if yearly operation cost is similar to HO fluorescents or t-8's as was my case the fact, for me anyway, is I do not have to replace the bulbs too frequently which is where I see the cost savings with LED's.
http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/showthread.php?t=160396
Greg, I don't understand? Sorry, do you mean MH uses the same amount of electricity as let's say EcoTech or Evergrow? Or were you referring to TMC? As for comparable PAR, I don't know how they would diminish penetrating through a certain water depth. TMC's PAR might (idk) be far less than Kessil's at 18" in depth. It has to do with LED intensity and quality, beam angle, ect. To be honest, I cannot compare the results of using LEDs vs. MH, I have never used MH, but I will say that at 140w per unit footprint is an insane amount of light in reference to LEDs, and imo, would have a better purpose for saltwater/reef. Thank you for the article though, I hadn't seen that one yet. Maybe I missing something completely?
Quote from: zolta on April 20, 2014, 03:02:22 PM
The one thing about the TMC's is their grobeam like many of the other LED's are high in the 400-450nm range which is blue, which of course if good for all growing things in the tank, including algae. However I have read that lights in the 650 nm range which is red is really good for plants but not so good for algae. The Planted Tank posted a review of LED's a while ago, (link below), in it there is a brief discussion of the various light wavelengths and what they do.
As for cost savings per year for power consumption, even if yearly operation cost is similar to HO fluorescents or t-8's as was my case the fact, for me anyway, is I do not have to replace the bulbs too frequently which is where I see the cost savings with LED's.
I've got the TMC grobeam 1500 ultima ~ natural daylight, and love it. The PAR rating is high for a tank in the 16-21" depth range (148 at 40cm), which is why I chose it. This is one of their newer models, not listed in the LED compendium. For me the major bonus is the fact that they use about a third of the wattage compared to a similar intensity T5HO fixture, plus the fact that they're designed to last up to 50,000 hours (like 17 years at 8 hours a day) without having to replace any bulbs is a major bonus.
Quote from: angelcraze on April 20, 2014, 03:23:37 PM
Greg, I don't understand? Sorry, do you mean MH uses the same amount of electricity as let's say EcoTech or Evergrow? Or were you referring to TMC?
Sorry for not getting back to respond 'till now. The issue I was trying to illustrate was that if we compare the different LED brands, TMC v Maxspect v Ecotech etc, with respect to 'Power consumption per unit Carbon foot print' and PAR (the first and second row of the chart) it appears that there is a high degree of variability between the group in the chart with respect to the amount of wattage consumed by the light, but not with respect to the PAR readings. This suggests that the TMC is the least costly to operate yet has a comparable quantity of light available for plant growth compared to the others (PAR). It also suggests that despite the brightness numbers of some of the brands (the lower number in the second row with the 'lm' or lumens units), they don't provide anymore light for plant growth (PAR) than does the TMC AquaRay.
Quote from: angelcraze on April 20, 2014, 03:23:37 PMAs for comparable PAR, I don't know how they would diminish penetrating through a certain water depth. TMC's PAR might (idk) be far less than Kessil's at 18" in depth.
There is a forum post that has attempted to gather all of the available PAR values for as many LED lights as possible - http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/showthread.php?t=160396 - and in it Kessil and the TMC 1500 are listed as are several of the others referred to in the above article. It is interesting to note that the numbers generally come from the manufacturers themselves and the only manufacturer to provide numbers which simulate an aquarium (light traveling through air and water) are the TMCs. All of the rest provide numbers at a distance away from the light source through air only. And the values for the TMC lights are still compare favourably to the others. I have a spread sheet with only the relevant numbers from this post if anyone wishes to see it (however since it's in QuatroPro, so y'all will have to come into Got Fish to see it 'cause I know none of you still use QuatroPro, eh). The point being that the TMC manufacturer has got it right, and they address concerns about loss in the water column that the others don't address, and they still come out as good or better than the others for planted tanks at 7 inches of air above the water surface and to depths of 25 inches of water.
Quote from: angelcraze on April 20, 2014, 03:23:37 PMMaybe I missing something completely?
And, hey, we're all feeling the same way in this regard. There is soooooo muuuuch information out there that no one can find and consume it all. And, we've got to help each other out in this area. There is too much BS coming from the light suppliers and it's hard to be sure who to believe, or where to look for quality information.
Greg,
Have you measured the TMC with your light meter? I would be curious to know what your readings are for the TMC and compare them to the reading we got when you measured the Finnex on my tank.
we have led strips that we would like some of you to try on your planted tanks for few weeks and tell us how they did, available in all white and white/green, lmk if anyone want to test it and tell us how it did compared to what you have right now. thx.
Quote from: zolta on April 23, 2014, 08:20:17 AM
Greg,
Have you measured the TMC with your light meter? I would be curious to know what your readings are for the TMC and compare them to the reading we got when you measured the Finnex on my tank.
Using a lux meter is not exactly reflective of what the plants need, in fact it's only a measurement of what the human eye perceives (as it's a unit of lumens in a sq meter). You'll notice that some plants respond better to a lower lux fixture, and this is because lux is not an important reading in terms of photosynthesis, compared to PAR. I've had this happen with glossostigma. I tried growing it with strong 4x T5HO bulbs, and tried growing it with the TMC fixture, and the colour and compact growth was better with the LEDs, even though the lux was lower on the TMC fixture. I measured the lux on my TMC 1500 ultima (ND) and recorded the readings at home, I can post it later tonight.
Quote from: zolta on April 23, 2014, 08:20:17 AM
Greg,
Have you measured the TMC with your light meter? I would be curious to know what your readings are for the TMC and compare them to the reading we got when you measured the Finnex on my tank.
Ok, so I tested at one spot in my 25 g tank directly below a pair of TMC Grobeam 600 Ultima and I got an average of three consecutive readings of 3080 lx. That is below 2" of air, and 12 inches of water (and a few Silvinia floating by occasionally). What were the readings I got in yours? I vaguely remember them being in the 4000 range?
Quote from: az on April 23, 2014, 09:18:54 AM
we have led strips that we would like some of you to try on your planted tanks for few weeks and tell us how they did, available in all white and white/green, lmk if anyone want to test it and tell us how it did compared to what you have right now. thx.
az, I'll take you up on that. I would like to see them operating first. Do you have a planted tank using them now in operation? And when and where do I pick them up?
Quote from: wolfiewill on April 23, 2014, 07:31:20 PM
Ok, so I tested at one spot in my 25 g tank directly below a pair of TMC Grobeam 600 Ultima and I got an average of three consecutive readings of 3080 lx. That is below 2" of air, and 12 inches of water (and a few Silvinia floating by occasionally). What were the readings I got in yours? I vaguely remember them being in the 4000 range?
No, not that high. With both strips on the reading averaged out to 2520 LUX. This with about 3 inches of air space and about 22 inches of water. With just the ray 2 on the reading was 2050, and with just the Planted+ on the reading was 1450.
When you took a reading roughly halfway from the top of the water level the reading was 3600. It is difficult to compare due to the different heights of tank etc. However it is interesting. It is interesting how the planted + strip is almost half that of the Ray2 . The red spectrum that it provides clearly is not that bright.
Quote from: wolfiewill on April 23, 2014, 07:33:14 PM
az, I'll take you up on that. I would like to see them operating first. Do you have a planted tank using them now in operation? And when and where do I pick them up?
come by the store bet 1 and 6 today, what length is your planted tank?
Quote from: wolfiewill on April 23, 2014, 07:31:20 PMOk, so I tested at one spot in my 25 g tank directly below a pair of TMC Grobeam 600 Ultima and I got an average of three consecutive readings of 3080 lx. That is below 2" of air, and 12 inches of water (and a few Silvinia floating by occasionally). What were the readings I got in yours? I vaguely remember them being in the 4000 range?
I think I got similar readings with the TMC 1500, which would make sense since the 1500 has ten cree diodes, just like two 600's, just in a slightly different configuration. Greg, you're welcome to try your lux meter on my fixture. I'm fairly certain your meter is better than mine.
Quote from: az on April 24, 2014, 09:22:09 AM
come by the store bet 1 and 6 today, what length is your planted tank?
Today's not good. How about tomorrow? I'd put it on a 24" long tank with 11" of water depth to the substrate.