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A better understanding of full spectrum lighting

Jeremy Brito

Jeremy Brito

Recently I have been researching lighting, in hopes to get a better understanding of how to provide the best source of light for the corals I host in my tank. Currently my tank lighting is provided by a Current Marine Pro HO LED light bar 48" (not the actual size of the bar but the size recommend for my tank by the manufacturer)
I personally am quite happy with the light bar and love its features but have always wondered if it was providing what my coral needed. A few days ago I had the chance of using a ICE CAP 8 bulb t-5 set up I was repairing for a friend, the system contained 2 led bar t-5 style bulbs and 6 t-5 bulbs of different colors (unfortunately I had no way of telling what color or spectrum the bulbs were as I didn't have there original packaging). After making the repairs I decided to try it out over my tank to see what the difference in lighting was, First I should say that this light system was almost the exact size as the dimensions for the top of my tank but had about a 1 1/2 over hang on each side so of the bat the system was made for a bigger and most likely deeper tank but at the time of this little experiment I was more curious about how the lighting would look illuminating my tank.
I was blown away with how bright it was and how well blended the mixture of different color bulbs were it was almost night and day from my LED set up, I sat in awe staring at it and began wondering if my system was powerful enough or if this system was over powered I couldn't know for sure as I wasn't experienced enough with light and its effects on water and a organic eco system.

So after seeing the light "no pun intended" I decided to hang on to the system for a few days and use it to see how my coral would respond to it. My system currently contains mostly soft coral and a few LPS corals that seemed to be doing fine with my LED set up so for me this was new and untested water the first few days I noticed a hand coral I have seemed more open and its polyps seemed to extend farther then I usually saw them and a large toad stool I had that had been shrinking and not looking to well for a long time had expanded and I could see it to had polyps budding the other corals a Dunkin and a few hammers seemed to behaving as they normal did my zoa's how ever seemed to really enjoy the brightness and the mushrooms remained unimpressed
the only coral that didn't seem to like the lighting was my Kenya trees as they kinda remained slightly closed up.
The lighting stayed on my tank for about 4 days before I needed to return it and go back to my LED system but from that point on I have been researching light and how it works and trying to get a better understanding of artificial light vs sunlight and just how well they compare.
I didn't have time to write a full article tonight like I wanted to because there is just way to much to go over but I will return tomorrow to start giving a run down of what I learned so far in hopes that I may help another out there who isn't as familiar with lighting as well
 
JRWOHLER

JRWOHLER

I would love to get a hybrid with T5 and LED....but they are all too darn expensive. Something with 3 T5 with two rows of LEDs would be great. ATI has the 4 bulbs plus 3 pods of LED but that is barely a savings over the old 8 T5s(plus it is $1800):eek:... think you could build a fixture with two T5s on the outside 1 in the middle with two rows of LEDs say 75 W per row....total W would be 312 for a 48in fixture. Saving you 120w plus only having to change 3 bulbs. If you could get it for half the ATI fixture that would be pretty nice, but at this point all the darn hybrids are upper end fixtures.
 
H

horseplay

NJRC Member
I splurged and got the ATI hybrid with 4 bulbs. Have used it for 3 years. If I am buying a light again I will buy the same fixture. It's expensive but it's well build and looks great. It should last a very long time. Think about how much the AI's and Radions cost it's a bargain. I venture to say you would need at least 3 LED modules to cover a 4' tank and you will have wires all over the place. With Only 4 bulbs the bulb cost is not that high. And I can't remember when I changed bulb last time and it seems to be ok. I have bought the replacements but too lazy to change :)

Having owned the hybrid I would say most of the growth is coming from the t5 bulbs. How do I know that? I monitor the ph levels throughout the day and it kind of correlates with the photosynthesis levels in the tank. The photosynthesis levels jumps as soon as the T5's are on but stay pretty flat when only the LED's are on. Granted the LED pods are only 75w each and not all the diodes are firing at 100%.

My analysis is only applicable to SPS tanks. People have great success with LED only tanks but they are using one module every 12", not 24". For softies and LPS not much difference. You will actually get very good growth and flourescence form the Chinese black box LED's.

So if you're serious about lighting you can do a canopy with a pair of Chinese LED's and 4 T5 retrofit tubes. This configuration will run you about $600 for a 4' tank. Or get the 8 or 6 bulb T5 only ATI fixture for about the same price. There is a guy selling the ATI hybrid for $900 now on MR. It's a great deal.
 
JRWOHLER

JRWOHLER

I agree with you the ATI is sharp and arguably the best all around fixture out there. I guess I am lamenting the lack of choices, you would thing there would be more hybrids out there.
 
H

horseplay

NJRC Member
There is also aurora but it's more expensive. And another polish brand I forget. People spending a lot of money on 100% LED solution because of the perceived cost of replacing the bulbs. So not a big market for hybrids.
 
Empire

Empire

horseplay said:
Think about how much the AI's and Radions cost it's a bargain. I venture to say you would need at least 3 LED modules to cover a 4' tank and you will have wires all over the place.

My analysis is only applicable to SPS tanks. People have great success with LED only tanks but they are using one module every 12", not 24". For softies and LPS not much difference. You will actually get very good growth and flourescence form the Chinese black box LED's.

There is a guy selling the ATI hybrid for $900 now on MR. It's a great deal.
Click to expand...

I trimmed your posting to comment on what you mentioned. I agree with you 100%, the ATI hybrid is a BEAST of a light. However, the new radion gen 4's are quite amazing. Their hemispherical lens gives more light coverage than all other LED light fixtures. I've seen them in action - 3 on a 72" tank. I honestly think 2 g4's on a 48" tank will be fine. I'm sure I don't need to go into the costs of replacement bulbs and electricity between the two fixtures. I'll probably go with the G4 pro's once I get back into the hobby.
 
Empire

Empire

Jeremy Brito

Jeremy Brito

I was concidering building my own since the electrical wiring blue print is not a complex one at basic stand point but since radio shack isn't around any more buying the parts needed might be pricey ballasts and connections for the bulbs wires switch ect
 
Relic Turtle

Relic Turtle

What about iei could u possibly get some things from there and some from maybe Amazon? I would try those places lately I've been searching for a cheap par meeter and have just not had extra cash I've been wanting some electronic test meters for other things but they are expensive
 
JRWOHLER

JRWOHLER

Empire said:
Finally someone decided to do this but what's the plan with heat extraction?
Click to expand...
They are two pairs of T5 with the LED hung in the middle there is enough space that the fixture is not closed in and heat shouldn't be a problem the LEDs have fans even if the T5 don't. They are pretty open air with silicone endcaps. My original T5 didn't have fans with a similar design but 8 bulbs and never had a big problem.
 
Empire

Empire

JRWOHLER said:
They are two pairs of T5 with the LED hung in the middle there is enough space that the fixture is not closed in and heat shouldn't be a problem the LEDs have fans even if the T5 don't. They are pretty open air with silicone endcaps. My original T5 didn't have fans with a similar design but 8 bulbs and never had a big problem.
Click to expand...

So are you using these new hybrid mounts?
 
H

horseplay

NJRC Member
@299 for a 4' fixture this makes a lot of sense. Some of the mounting kits out there would cost half of that much already and don't looks as nice.
 
Jeremy Brito

Jeremy Brito

So finally I got around to what i really wanted this forum to be about.. the under standing of LIGHT and how it effects are tanks and coral and why it does what it does .

So to Begin why is lighting so important to our hobby?? Well to first lighting is how we visually enjoy the hobby! I know right nothing to scientific there.. sadly its true one of the first aspects of our light choice that we pick out but don't be discourage were not shallow in fact in apart the reason why we find things visually apealing is cause our human brains are trained to seek out and make us like things that benefit us in one way or another and although we are only conciously thinking out thats nice lighting what are brain is registering is the lights wave length being something it needs to help produce certain chemical is our body but enough on that and back to the Lighting.
Aside from wether or not we think the lights are pretty they serve some important roles in our tanks eco system first up would be providing our living tank inhabitants a sense of time. True fact all creature have a sort of internal clock and those clocks can be adjusted by out side influence in either a good or bad way but most internal clocks are tuned by light patterns so life with out light can lead to unhealthiness in our tanks. Second some of are tankmates depend on the light to produce energy/food from the microbial life forms to our large coral inverts light is a essential part of there life and with out it they do not survive long.
Since most of us here depend on our lights to keep our coral alive and growing this post will mainly talk about light and coral. So we should all know that most but not all coral depend on light to survive grow and stay healthy, the reason for this is a symbiotic relation ship our coral share with a type of algae called Zoozanthelly (probably botched that spelling), Zoozanthelly are similar to plant cells in that they produce chlorophyll which in turn uses light to produce energy in the forum of basic sugars and starchs which the coral then use to feed grow and live off. The most common type of Chlorophyll found in Zoozanthelly is Chlorophyll A, though there are also others as well but for this report we will just use Chlorophyll universally. Chlorophyll requires different wave lenghts of light to produce its energy TYPE A's requirements lay with in the 440 NM to 675 NM wave lengths though light wave lengths similar or close to that will also be beneficial just not as effective. So right about now some of you are probably scratching your heads going 440 NM 675 NM ??? what the heck is that and how do i measure light ?? well in to simplify it Wave Lenght in light is measured in color (simplified) for example 440 NM is in the violet color spectrum and 675 nm is in the red color spectrum but to add one more piece to the puzzle COLOR of light is measure ins Kelvin's which is a form of measurement regarding temperature, Confused yet?? Just know most of this isn't gonna effect how you buy lights for your tank and even though kelvin is a measurement of temperature is not about the actual hot or cold type of temperature .
SO Kelvin's? right Kelvin's regard temperature in forums of color it this sorta scale comes from how scientist measure the temperature of celestial bodies in our solar system Example 6,000 K is yellow in color (our sun) 8,000 to 10000 k is white in color and 15 to 25000 is blue in color... so yay now that your all going thanks for that confusion lets just say when you see a bulb labeled cool blue or warm blue this is what its talking about. Also higher kelvin bulbs are good for controlling algea cause they produce mostly blue light were most algea need red yellow and green. As far as coral go lower Kelvin tend to grow coral better because they are closer to natural sun light how ever with that said it should be known that corals can adapt to what ever types of light we throw at them but may change appearance along with the adaptation.

the next part of this will be the diffrence between types of light sources and followed up with how to make sure our light sources are up to PAR (no pun intended)
 
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