LED Patents - Action Needed!

[lastlight]

Well regardless of how effective these are in practice I am very interested to see what you guys can do with them. I'm always one to go with what is tried, tested and true only because I can't afford to experiment. To be honest the LED craze doesn't really interest me all that much for my own tanks but that doesn't mean I won't be watching closely just in case.

[Ron99]

Good discussion even though it diverts a bit from the main topic. So let's keep discussing but also post any prior art you can find along the way

Originally Posted by sphelps

All talk my friend, I'd love to meet these people.

Has anyone tested these claims, I've read them but I don't buy it. All LED lamps used in residential applications are rated for around 10 years, so how can they last as long in aquarium applications. If they did wouldn't they last longer in other applications? Part of the reason our aquarium lamps don't last as long is due to the conditions they are used in, was this considered?

Yes, user evilc66 at nano-reef.com is a bit of an LED lighting guru and has built and tested countless systems including testing PAR. He is the one that found that the drop off in intensity was greater with MH than LED. I don't have the exact link at the moment but you can see a lot of LED info at nano-reef if you try.

As for whether they produce enough intensity or not, just look at the numbers. A really efficient MH can put out up to 115 lumens/watt. Good LEDs are now well over 130 lumens/watt and Cree just announced that their prototype emitters have hit 200 lumens/watt. So which one has more intensity? For longevity, LEDs are affected more by heat than anything else. Run them to warm and they will degrade faster. Cool them properly with a good heatsink and a couple of fans and they will last the rated time which is approximately 50,000 hours. We would have to see how the 10 year household rating is calculated. Also, most household LED replacement bulbs or fixtures that I have seen have minimal thermal management. So they probably run at higher temps and degrade faster.

Originally Posted by lastlight

I'm certainly one to read till my eyes are sore...but so much about LEDs seems to be specualtion as I see it. If these bulbs last forever like the claims why did the Solaris have them burning out on people etc?

Goes back to thermal management. The one Solaris unit I saw dismantled had only aluminum I beams for heatsinks and I don't remember them having good airflow over those. This was probably woefully inadequate and led to overheating of the emitters and burn outs. They also had problems with the power supplies they were using (modified PC power supplies) so I suspect a good portion of the problems were actually burned out power supplies rather thean burned out emitters.

[banditpowdercoat]

Ya, IIRC, PFO had more power supply issues then burnt out LEDS. But, these high power LEDS NEED cooling. Just cause they don;t heat your tank up, doesn't mean they don;t make alot of heat.

[StirCrazy]

Originally Posted by banditpowdercoat

Ya, IIRC, PFO had more power supply issues then burnt out LEDS. But, these high power LEDS NEED cooling. Just cause they don;t heat your tank up, doesn't mean they don;t make alot of heat.

they make a fraction of the heat a MH or T5 do because of the efficiency of the LED chip its self, so a very small amount of the power supplied is turned into heat. the cooling they need is for the actual die of the LED chip, if it gets to hot it decreases the life of the chip. if you keep it cool the chip is happy. so they are mounted to a heat sink, with a couple fans blowing air into the fins of the heatsink. so yes there is a small amount of heat produced, but it is put into the room the tank is in instead of the tank.

Steve

[banditpowdercoat]

Originally Posted by StirCrazy

they make a fraction of the heat a MH or T5 do because of the efficiency of the LED chip its self, so a very small amount of the power supplied is turned into heat. the cooling they need is for the actual die of the LED chip, if it gets to hot it decreases the life of the chip. if you keep it cool the chip is happy. so they are mounted to a heat sink, with a couple fans blowing air into the fins of the heatsink. so yes there is a small amount of heat produced, but it is put into the room the tank is in instead of the tank.

Steve

Guess I should have specified, Alot of heat for their size. yes, it's not as much as MH or T5, but heat still kills LED's