LED Lights: The future's here!

[marsaiko]

48" 20" 20" inch

Only 100 Watt LED light will be enough to grow any type of plant. Normally LEDs output 153 lumen per watt.

I seriously doubt that parameter!!
what make are we talking about here?

[SCORPIO]

48" 20" 20" inch

Only 100 Watt LED light will be enough to grow any type of plant. Normally LEDs output 153 lumen per watt.

I seriously doubt that parameter!!
what make are we talking about here?

I am reading that some LEDs now days offering upto 231 lumen per watt. Chines made LEDs are also able to emit upto 153 lumen per watt.

[marsaiko]

can you please check 2 things for me
> Is it at full running power? i.e. moSt LEDs give 2X lumen/watt at 3W but at 6W it will be just X lumen/watt, and it keeps decreasing.

> Are these in our usable spectrum range?

[SCORPIO]

can you please check 2 things for me
> Is it at full running power? i.e. moSt LEDs give 2X lumen/watt at 3W but at 6W it will be just X lumen/watt, and it keeps decreasing.

> Are these in our usable spectrum range?

>>Your first questions is really very important. I think LEDs are using full running power because they are diodes and not consuming electricity anywhere else. On Monday I will talk to Physics person regarding this matter.

>>They are coming in a wide range of spectrum. Mostly are in 6500K so best for planted tanks.

Sai bhai, I am doing research on various lighting sources. Within a few days, we have a full article about the aquarium lighting with practical knowledge without much theory.

[marsaiko]

>>Your first questions is really very important. I think LEDs are using full running power because they are diodes and not consuming electricity anywhere else. On Monday I will talk to Physics person regarding this matter.

bhai, did you ask the person?
anyway if you give me what company its make is I can try and check if its indeed worth.

To give an example about one of best in market is the below CREE-XPG led.
at 1W its giving best of 139lm/w... now check what is case at 4.5W circled in yeLLow
http://www.cree.com/products/pdf/xlampxp-g.pdf

Thank you.

Cree_at_high.JPG

[Bando]

Rajiveji most chinese LED's will give no more than 85 Lm per watt.
Only Cree will give what Masaiko says.

[Romi]

how interesting!

rajiv, u must tell us what the 'physics person' said!

[fishy.man]

Hi,
I have gone through a lot of nonsense during my amateur stage. so as a result i can share the following today.

1.LUMEN- you will come across this word all the time when you talk about light..lumen is si for measuring light ie the visible light produced at source that is sensitive/visible to human eye but there is also radiant flux which is measure of total light produced which also has spectrum not visible to human eye. radiant flux is also known as power of light. now when we talk only about lumen that means we are talking about light thats visible and most sensitive to human retina.
A human eye can see light with spectrum starting from 370nm to 740 nm approximately and spectrum between 540 nm to 570 nm is most sensitive to human eye that colours are yellow and light green,orange and their mix..this is the reason we find these colours very bright. now on the basis of this you want to decide what light you want for your aquarium...this is injustice to plants.
Plants do not need green spectrum atall it will reflect all the green light becos the plant is green in colour and it reflects all green spectrum though it seems brightest to our retina.
plants need max spectrum in blue and red region.
one should look for more of blue and less of red in the spectral distribution of light..WHY?...the reason red has wave length so high frequency so can travel farther but blue lights long wave lengths so less frequency so cant penetrate water so we need high amount of blue light...the blue light scatters far more than red light therefore the skies are blue in colour.
now

2.Kelvin- when we talk about kelvin it means the colour temperature ...when a pure carbon is heated it glows with different colours at different temperature thats how every colour of light is now measure with kelvin temperature( we use kelvin because it was found that at -273 degree celcius all molecular activity comes to absolute stand still)

when you buy some light for your aquarium make sure the spectral distribution of the light is conducive for your plants, you may land up buying light that may be the best for your plants and your plants may thrive very well BUT the tank may not look beautiful to you because it may not have enough lumen to excite your eye retina,
so you have to buy a light with such a spectral distribution that has normal amount of red spectrum (680 nm to 750 nm) and then peaks up at 550 nm( for your retina ) and then peaks higher at the blue as we now know blue spectrum scatters the most so you need more blue light.
This kind of spectrum is almost impossible to find in nor commercial lights. check for growlux and agri lights.

now comes CRI- colour rendering index, when we buy any lighting instrument, it has numbers written on it like 865,942,965 and so on....the first numerical value is like in 965, 9 means 90 cri that means the light produced in this spectral range is 90% like natural light and 65 is 6500 kelvin temperature.

when you buy LED please rather than going for colours please go through spectral distribution

different plants need different kinds of spectral distribution...vallisneria prefer more of red spectrum and crypts prefer more of blue...

when you buy any luminaire also ask for spectral distribution chart,

I wish i could write more on this but i am tired of thinking and typing...will write more on this soon may be with stastical diag for better explaination.

regards
fishyman

[aamir]

Good info Sir thanks for sharing .

[maaz]

NIce info...thanks for sharing..