Are Metal Halides Making a Comeback?

Battlecorals

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Adam the question is do you have any large colonies under leds?. Like I said the shadowing/self shading for me is the bad part, they are fine on my frag tanks but on my full colonies I need allot more Fixtures than recommended. Lps do frigged great under them.
I am supposed to be betta testing a new led fixture coming up on my frag tanks. It will be going up against t-5 and a halide fixture. I have not heard much so maybe it fell through.

I think with sps UV used to be a big issue but now allot of fixtures are getting around the 400 nm range and the Kessils are even lower so this is becoming less and less a problem.

Hey Dave!

Unfortunately I don't have any large sprawling colonies under LEDs but I've got stuff that's over 4 years old now, grown entirely with Led. My largest is a yellow tort about 5" and a shades of fall about that size as well. But they all get fragged a lot so its kind of different in that regard, compared to a colony left alone to grow. I mean they are moved around and handled and clipped pretty often. I'm running reef breeders fixtures and i think the board layout eases shading issues a bit more than "puck" type leds for sure. For what its worth.

A lot of people much smarter than me have said over years that the warm/neutral whites are the key. And from what I had experienced myself I can agree that I've have the best results running fixtures with neutrals over cools.
 

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Hey Dave!

Unfortunately I don't have any large sprawling colonies under LEDs but I've got stuff that's over 4 years old now, grown entirely with Led. My largest is a yellow tort about 5" and a shades of fall about that size as well. But they all get fragged a lot so its kind of different in that regard, compared to a colony left alone to grow. I mean they are moved around and handled and clipped pretty often. I'm running reef breeders fixtures and i think the board layout eases shading issues a bit more than "puck" type leds for sure. For what its worth.

A lot of people much smarter than me have said over years that the warm/neutral whites are the key. And from what I had experienced myself I can agree that I've have the best results running fixtures with neutrals over cools.
I think I've asked you all of this before.. How many LED fixtures are you running? How large of an area does a single light cover? How high off the water and about how deep are the coral.
I have considered an acro LED lit tank but lack the knowledge. I know me, if things started to look bad under them I would take them down, sell and shame LEDs for a life time..
 

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No secret that LEDs have shading issues (I think diodes coving the surface are the way to go with LED and not clusters), in the current era of aquacultured frags we don't see too many huge colonies these days, which in part seems to be because we can get nice cultured frags and not just colonies unlike the old days when WC colonies were all we had. But I think that it's easy to forget once SPS gets big enough even halides have shading issues I remember from back in the day. Not saying it is anything like LED shading, but eventually it happens.

It's amazing how personal some people take lighting in a hobby. I honestly don't care what lighting people use. If I see a tank I like, I will ask or look into what lighting they use.
 

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Let's solve the debate and make the ultimate poll...
Let's start listing poll option here and someone or myself can create the poll and thread.

Poll example -
-had LEDs and switched to metal halides
-Love my LEDs and will never change
-Stared with Halides and switched to LEDs never to look back.

And so on

I would be curious on t-5. I am most likely moving back to t-5 from led or supplementing them with t-5 for my main tank. . I also would like to know how many run pure led or supplement it. Seems to be allot of people start out led and end up adding t-5 to supplement it, this seems like it is a trend too..
 
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shred5

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Hey Dave!

Unfortunately I don't have any large sprawling colonies under LEDs but I've got stuff that's over 4 years old now, grown entirely with Led. My largest is a yellow tort about 5" and a shades of fall about that size as well. But they all get fragged a lot so its kind of different in that regard, compared to a colony left alone to grow. I mean they are moved around and handled and clipped pretty often. I'm running reef breeders fixtures and i think the board layout eases shading issues a bit more than "puck" type leds for sure. For what its worth.

A lot of people much smarter than me have said over years that the warm/neutral whites are the key. And from what I had experienced myself I can agree that I've have the best results running fixtures with neutrals over cools.

Sorry Adam missed your post.
Just curious.
What lighting is on your main tank?
What percentage of frag tanks is led, t5 and halide? It better than asking how many fixtures.
If you had to pick one lighting only what would it be?

I know Adam personally but I have not seen Adam new place since he moved so I do not know the answer to this.
 

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I would be curious on t-5. I am most likely moving back to t-5 from led or supplementing them with t-5 for my main tank. . I also would like to know how many run pure led or supplement it. Seems to be allot of people start out led and end up adding t-5 to supplement it, this seems like it is a trend too..
I agree. T5 needs to be an option as well. They are well proven.
 

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Not speaking for everyone, but I do notice a trend with Kessil's. Usually resulting in not being satisfied. Unless you bought 2 per 2ft tank which would equal $800+tax. Welcome to the world of crap name brands. I use my $130 LEDs on my 30 gallon without shame. If I want more shimmer, it wouldn't take but a .50 watt pendant to create the shimmer. Just use the flash on your cell phone to determine the amount of shimmer needed.
 

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image.jpeg

@SB Reef Lights
has been growing coral from me under his LEDs with great success.
I have one of his LEDs over an LPS tank and it's done great. It's 32 inches above the water and covers a 4'x4' tank of LPS
Maybe two of them over the same size tank and placed closer to the water surface would do well for SPS?
 
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reeferfoxx

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@SB Reef Lights has been growing coral from me under his LEDs with great success.
I have one of his LEDs over an LPS tank and it's done great. It's 32 inches above the water and covers a 4'x4' tank of LPS
Maybe two of them over the same size tank and placed closer to the water surface would do well for SPS?
What is great with those LEDs is you can replace the lenses to spread further. Lowering the light and increasing the intensity will grow SPS just fine, in my experience.
 

SB Reef Lights

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@SB Reef Lights
has been growing coral from me under his LEDs with great success.
I have one of his LEDs over an LPS tank and it's done great. It's 32 inches above the water and covers a 4'x4' tank of LPS
Maybe two of them over the same size tank and placed closer to the water surface would do well for SPS?
Thanks for the plug Gary! Yes your corals love my lights. :) They ask for them by name. You could say they crave them. lol
 

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Not speaking for everyone, but I do notice a trend with Kessil's. Usually resulting in not being satisfied. Unless you bought 2 per 2ft tank which would equal $800+tax. Welcome to the world of crap name brands. I use my $130 LEDs on my 30 gallon without shame. If I want more shimmer, it wouldn't take but a .50 watt pendant to create the shimmer. Just use the flash on your cell phone to determine the amount of shimmer needed.

I think with the kessils what you are seeing and I am comparing them to the other high end fixture like Radion or Giesmann Vervve not the Cheap Chinese fixtures is they only have one cluster vs most people who buy the Radion or Vervve by them with two pucks. This means the kessils has more shading unless you add a second fixture. Kessils are much cheaper but I agree you need more which makes them a little more expensive.. The ap700 fixes that issue but is a expensive fixture. That said the Kessil has the widest and best spectrum over any another led fixture I have seen, so for sps users the little more it cost over those fixture might be worth it. This is because they make their own leds they can do this. Sub 400 nm leds are very expensive and that is why you do not see them on other fixtures,. Now I am just talking sps users would even care about UV. So what happens is people buy Kessils over these other fixture because Kessils are cheaper and then dont have the coverage they need because they needed more.
 

reeferfoxx

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I think with the kessils what you are seeing and I am comparing them to the other high end fixture like Radion or Giesmann Vervve not the Cheap Chinese fixtures is they only have one cluster vs most people who buy the Radion or Vervve by them with two pucks. This means the kessils has more shading unless you add a second fixture. Kessils are much cheaper but I agree you need more which makes them a little more expensive.. The ap700 fixes that issue but is a expensive fixture. That said the Kessil has the widest and best spectrum over any another led fixture I have seen, so for sps users the little more it cost over those fixture might be worth it. This is because they make their own leds they can do this. Sub 400 nm leds are very expensive and that is why you do not see them on other fixtures,. Now I am just talking sps users would even care about UV. So what happens is people buy Kessils over these other fixture because Kessils are cheaper and then dont have the coverage they need because they needed more.
http://m.ebay.com/itm/252431447233?...70&_trksid=p2141725.c100338.m3726&_mwBanner=1

There is a 3w epistar UV diode for less than $2.
 
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What is your proof halides are not making somewhat comback?. Seems to be a lot more threads on it lately. I posted what I heard about a year and a half ago above and it was confirmed. I do not think halides are out selling leds either.

Tullio as a manufacturer what are you seeing with halide sales are they coming back?. maybe Someone from Marine depot can tell us what they are seeing now.
I just picked up another halide fixture but then again I just picked up some leds fixtures too.

I do not think leds are a decline but I think halide sales are picking back up.
I also think it depends on what you keep.. I think those with full blown sps aquariums are going back to halides and t-5.
Metal halide sales are definitely up on our end.
 

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Then others should start adding it then.. even still it is not that low but those are on par with the kessils.. Just wonder what the quality of those are.. We should see some lower eventually.
These have been out for awhile. US market isn't catering to the tech savvy, only those that want to set it and forget it. That is why those name brands are ridiculous, to me.
 

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What can they dim down too? 35%? How much spectral shift is there when they are dimmed down? I have known about these for a while but never looked into them.
Metal halide lamps can be dimmed to around 50% percent before the arc extinguishes and the lamp turns off.
 

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Sorry Adam missed your post.
Just curious.
What lighting is on your main tank?
What percentage of frag tanks is led, t5 and halide? It better than asking how many fixtures.
If you had to pick one lighting only what would it be?

I know Adam personally but I have not seen Adam new place since he moved so I do not know the answer to this.


My entire back up system has been lit with Led only for over three years now. Other parts of it longer. I have one 24x48x15 tank with two 48" fixtures over it and one 8' x 24" x 10" with a 48" and a 32" fixture primarily. There's one other satellite tank that 24x24 with a 24" fixture over it. I think with these lights its best to cover as much as you can as the spread is not so great.

In total I am running 9 led fixtures total 8 halides and 4, 60" 8 bulb T5 The only tank that I have a halide and leds over is a 48x48 shallow and my friend Therman who was out a few weeks ago can vouch that the led side looks better than the radium side. Not sure if its a fluke, but I will say a lot of my best looking frags come out of the back up system
 

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