After 4+ years of LED I'm going back to halide

cilyjr

Chris
I have 3 fixtures shipping monday. Lumatek adjustable ballasts with lumen max elite reflectors.

Bet you are gonna ask why? Well here goes (This is NOT an anti LED thread)

1. my lights are getting older and I'm going to need to replace them (or the led pucks at least) in the next 2 years. And I don't have 3 grand to buy the lights I would need. Yes I'd rather buy 3 new bulbs a year

2. I didn't save any money on electricity! I replaced my 3 halides(750w@7hrs) with 4 sol blues(120w@10hrs counting ramp times). But without the heat from the lights my heaters are now working 24 hours a day that's an extra 800 watts banging away.

3. I don't care about the heat they add. My tank is in a finished basement and I have central air. My house is never above 77. It only helps the heaters run less

4. My tank was always at its best when I ran MH so I'm going back.

I do get concerned that they will stop making the MH bulb I want (this happened with the Phoenix 14k se) but that's a bridge I can cross later.
 
I think thats a great move. I tried leds, lasted about 6 months lol. I now run, what i class as an ultimate reef light. 2 x 250 watt halides, 4 x ATI t5s and 3 450 nm led floodlights. Dont forget to post pics of the swap over.
I really believe that Halides, will be making a big return in the next 2 years.
 
And I'm just the opposite......Moved from MH to LED and growth exploded. No changes to husbandry.

Electricity savings, I agree......I see no difference, maybe dollars.
In the winter I run a wood stove so heaters where never an issue. Summer was nice not having my 10" fans kicking on over DT and Sump.

Not having the cost of 3-250w DE bulbs yearly is nice and after 10yrs it was time for 3 ballasts (reason #2 for switching). Also was facing the Phoenix dilemma.

Post pics, before and after!
 
And I'm just the opposite......Moved from MH to LED and growth exploded. No changes to husbandry.

Electricity savings, I agree......I see no difference, maybe dollars.
In the winter I run a wood stove so heaters where never an issue. Summer was nice not having my 10" fans kicking on over DT and Sump.

Not having the cost of 3-250w DE bulbs yearly is nice and after 10yrs it was time for 3 ballasts (reason #2 for switching). Also was facing the Phoenix dilemma.

Post pics, before and after!

Buying bulbs annually is the big downside. Yeah I'll do some before and after pictures I'm sure
 
I'm thinking of keeping to sol blues for moonlights and/or sunrise/sunset silliness. Thoughts?
 
Where did you find the pendants? I thought those were discontinued as well.

I'm close to making the switch as well. Got my eye on the Caymen Sun pendant.
 
I cannot decide between the radium 20k and the Hamilton 14k. Bulb. Suggestions?

The Hamilton is less blue and $15 bucks cheaper. The radium is loved by all but might be a bit too blue for me (see spike in 450nm).

Heres sanjay's comparison.

spect3.bmp
 
Personally I ran Hamilton 14ks (SE) for a while years ago and was never very impressed with them. Color was blue enough, but somehow bland and IIRC pretty weak in PAR.

20k radium on the other hand was always a favorite of mine.


Side note, has anyone come out with an electronic ballast that drives the radiums properly? (Last I read they only performed properly on a M80 magnetic ballast)
 
I'm using Radium with Coralvue Luxcore 400 selectable.
I run the bulbs at 300W which is design to run the Radiums. It's as close as you can get to an M80 with an electronic ballast.
http://www.coralvue.com/luxcore-400w-selectable-wattage-electronic-ballast
With the result I'm getting, I won't be running anything else.

Thanks Nick, good to hear there is a viable electronic alternative (I'm seriously considering going back to MH and running a radium). That said, since I posted here I did some googling and found this write up that seems to cover the options for running radiums (and is consistent with what you said). https://premiumaquatics.com/articles/radium
 
The radium bulb is made to run at 270 watts. So setting the ballasts to the hqi setting even though it is a mogul bulb is what is recommended
 
I'd be lying if I said I haven't considered MH myself. If they made a fixture with nice tank mounting legs in MH i'd probably already be there TBH.
I'm not anti-LED either, but I can say personally that I had way better success with T5 and even PC than I did with LED and with those old lights I was a newbie who knew nothing and my tanks STILL did better lol.
 
Yeah, not very much choice for MH light fixture. But fortunately, the few remaining MH/T5 fixtures, and ballasts, are the best ones(Geismann).
The thing about having a nice MH/T5 fixture is that you don't have to worry about upgrading. If you buy SE socket, you can can 250W or 400W. Or if you have a DE socket, you can run 150W or 250W bulbs without spending any more than the price of the bulbs. The few remaining ballasts are also the selectable wattage one.
For example, on my Geismann Spectra fixture, if for some reason I think 250W is not enough, I would just buy a 400W bulb. The ballast I got is selectable from 250W, 250HQI, 400W, and 400W HQI.
And if MH are truly obsolete and LED is the new king, I would gut all the MH components in the fixture and place an LED in there. I don't think you can do that with an LED fixture. :D
 
I can't decide which bulb and I NEED to buy today or tomorrow as ri is going to start charging sales tax on online purchases February 1st
 
Upcoming Events

April 21, 2024
Paul B
Club Meeting

Back
Top