LED Reef lighting - Suggestions
 

Hello all,

I have been trolling this site for quite some time now and finally decided to post as i need your help.

I have recently purchased a 72 Gallon Oceanic bowfront with canopy that my current MH fixture will not fit under (its currently f/s).

I am looking for a 48" LED fixture (for size / heat reasons) that would be able to grow some of the lower light SPS that wont break the bank. I have been looking on ebay / online and it has only made things more difficult.

If you can please provide me with names / links and where i can purchase them that would be great. Fixtures that come with legs would be even better.

Thank you for your time!

Reefbrite Leds are awsome and will grow sps. I think oceanic corals and maybe aqua valley sell them. Look on the vendoirs fourm under oceanic for prices.

www.eshinesystem.com $250 for the CREE 250 watt units. But you would need at least 2.

I have 2 of these over my 72g bow, I can take a few pics of them if you want when I get home. I think that they are great for the price and I had them running for about 2 months and everything in the tank was growing nicely. I have since added 2x 39w t5's (aquapink and actinic+) to add a bit of color to my reddish corals. There is almost no heat that comes from the led's and the fans turn on automatically if they start to get warm.

where are the prices on the website? do these leds get shipped from china? what about a warranty would you have to ship it back to china?

Total for 2 units shipped express to Vancouver was roughly $500 plus about $45 in brokerage/duty/taxes from dhl. Warranty would be directly from Eshine and my guess would be to have to ship it back to them there. There is a USA company (OC Reef) that rebrands these for almost $400usd each.

I believe they have released another unit that adds 2x t5 bulbs but I do not know the price or output par of those units. They may be using Bridgelux leds in place of Cree ones in that setup but you would have to contact them to be sure.

Can you upload some pictures? Sounds exactly like my setup. Can you keep SPS? I would like to have a full blown reef running..

I ordered 19 lights through a group order. They arrive tomorrow. I'll let you know how they turn out.

Upload some pictures!

I'll take before and after pics so you can compare MH lighting to the LED.

According to my power meter, my MH lights cost 21 cents per hour to run. I'll let you know what the LED lights use for power.

check this one out......

http://www.reeftechled.com/

I have researched a few and have decided on this one.....

For a cheaper entry level LED fixture I would say a maxspect G2. I have one and it's not bad! I plan to change it for a Radion soon.

If you have a bigger budget, the best fixtures available right now in my opinion seems to be the Ecotech Radion (you would need two) and the Vertex Illumina. I like clustered and optics less LEDs designs like those.

I think Kevin has one of these set up at Red Coral Calgary

Hitching up to read more!

I set up the SWC LEDs last night. They should be hung at least 12" from the top of the tank otherwise they spotlight only certain sections of the tank. Currently they are just sitting on the top of my tank on 2x4s. Going to hang them from the ceiling on the new tank.

My power meter saw a drop from 21 cents per hour to 8 cents per hour.

4 LEDs with 4 cooling fans (barely ever turn on) vs 2x 250 watt MH bulbs with 4 T5s and 3 cooling fans.

Can you take a picture? for me they will be sitting 7"" off the surface as that is the max height of my canopy.

7" would be fine. Mine are 3.5" off the tank and still spotlight a bit. They should be higher.

I'll take pics in a week or two when I turn the lights up to max. They are at 40% right now.

Did anyone look into the Blueline 120W LED systems? Seems like a pretty good deal.

Just for information. SWC is a Winnipeg based company. I also run their Extreme LED lights

Sorry, was thinking about OC Reef...

Corrected the original post.