led lighting

[harleymike]

Getting my second tank going.
60 gallon. 48 x 16x 20
Looking at led lighting for this one. But i know nothing about led lighting.
What is the best place too get them, and best bang for the buck.

Mike

 

[copperkills]

Well lots of members have DIY kits but Im picking up my AI Vega from Bill TONiGhT and Im stoked!

 

[Seggsy]

I ordered a $150 job from China to play with on my frag tank and see how I like it - I customized to include some UV lights, and more royal blue than white.  I should have an opinion in a few months!

 

[msteane]

I just bought a kit from rapidLED.com.  They have solderless ones which are very easy to put together and you can choose whatever colour combinations you'd like for no extra charge.  I haven't put mine up on the tank yet since one of the driver's I got had a defect and I'm waiting for it's replacement to arrive in the mail.  However, the customer service is top notch and the prices are very reasonable.

 

[xxmurrxx]

best bang for buck i'd say a rapidLed kit.
If you have the extra money there are some nice fixtures out there radion, sol's, etc.

 

[Petercar (RIP Dec 2017)]

I dunno much about these.  But there is a froup buy for the 36 in controllabe for 400. In michigan reefers

 

[Petercar (RIP Dec 2017)]

Oops forgot to post the link....http://reefbreeders.com/controllable_led_fixtures.html

 

[TORX]

Rapidled all the way. Great service, great products, and great reviews. The solderless kits are worth the few extra Pennies.

If you have a lot of extra Pennies, then grab up a prefab unit, but can not really help you there. Never looked into it myself as the cost was out of my budget.

Sent from my SGH-T989D using Tapatalk 2

 

[Neopimp]

I went with buying my LEDs and everything from led group buy.  Heat sinks from heatsinkusa.  Check out my build thread.  It's gets a bit into theory and stuff but for a no thinking package and a little assembly rapid led fits the bill.

I am local so I can help if needed

 

[TORX]

Agreed Neopimp

Sent from my SGH-T989D using Tapatalk 2

 

[TORX]

My first LED build was from that group buy a well. Great deals through aquastyleonline. Also getting great growth and have personally had no issues. Actually still using that diy fixture over my frag tank

Sent from my SGH-T989D using Tapatalk 2

 

[Duke]

My first LED build was from that group buy a well. Great deals through aquastyleonline. Also getting great growth and have personally had no issues. Actually still using that diy fixture over my frag tank

Sent from my SGH-T989D using Tapatalk 2

I'm running bridgelux leds from there also, you've seen my tank, u can save some money that way

 

[harleymike]

duke your tank and neopimp\s look great.
I will look into it. ;D

 

[teebone110]

My first LED build was from that group buy a well. Great deals through aquastyleonline. Also getting great growth and have personally had no issues. Actually still using that diy fixture over my frag tank

Sent from my SGH-T989D using Tapatalk 2

I think Neo bought his LEDs from http://www.ledgroupbuy.com/  whereas some of us did a group buy through http://www.aquastyleonline.com/

I got in that aquastyle group buy too, my RB strips are still awesome one year later!

 

[Victoss]

I also did a DIY from Rapid LED but it always depends on if you feel up to a DIY, there are the pre-built fixtures you can buy and some will be a little more expensive but you are getting a quality built fixture from the brand name companys. Another option which looks really good is Rapid LED's new <a href="http://www.rapidled.com/onyx-by-rapid-led/">Onyx Fixture</a> which are on sale right now for $259 but you would have to wait till January for them to be released. Also their not dimmable which may be a deal breaker for some, but if the colour is right then maybe dimming is not needed (if you don't need sunrise/set).

 

[Neopimp]

Teebone nailed it . I spent more than three times the amount the aqua style guys did.  But my drivers also come from a company with a website.

 

[Salty Cracker]

I now know how to grow sps, and bleach sps with LED.    ;D


For me, I would never pay the crazy markup on the premade fixtures.  That said, I spent probably a year tweaking the setup I have, and even now can manage to bleach out an entire tank in one day. 

What would kill me would be to buy a premade fixture, plug it in, and find that a) it won't grow sps, b) looks like crap c) causes algae issues, etc and that I couldn't change it or tweak it.  To get a decent premade fixture, that would have everything (replaceable individual LEDs, dimmability of all the channels, CREE bulbs, etc etc that would do a 125 gal tank, I would expect to pay over $2000.  DIY it can be done for under $1000.  As one guy mentioned, they even have a solder free option now (which I would highly recommend). 

I'm a broken record here, and always risk pissing off the people that bought (X) fixture or the guys that are selling (X) fixtures.  So again, this is just my own opinion, and it's definitely not an option for everyone.  T5's work well and are hella easy to install, and don't cost as much to run as MH.  A good option for many.