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Advice? Adding colors to LED lighting?

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Actuary, Apr 18, 2017.

  1. Actuary Well-Known ReefKeeper

    705
    Adel, IA
    Ratings:
    +145 / 1 / -0
    So I've deduced that what killed my Apex last Friday was a nearby lightning strike - home theater receiver, projector, and my primary PC were all impacted as well. Interestingly some of my LED chips from my DIY lighting panels also went out. I built my panels when DIY LEDs were all the rage back in 2011. They have been working well so I was just going to replace the 14 chips that went out (out of 108 total).

    Back when I originally built them people were only using whites and blues - varying degrees of blue vs royal blue and cool white vs neutral white, but people were not mixing in reds, greens, ultraviolets, etc. I was wondering if people thought there was much of a benefit from doing so and what kind of ratio seems appropriate?

    Thanks!
     
  2. jeffmr4 Well-Known ReefKeeper GIRS Member

    304
    Marion, IA
    Ratings:
    +56 / 0 / -0
    I don't have personal experience with it but I've read that corals use violet and ultraviolet for photosynthesis. Green is easy to see by the human eye so it enhances your view of it. And red, I'm not sure if necessary but too much promotes algae growth. They don't have uv in this one but you could look at a few by other companies and see what they do. They usually lay out all the leds they have on their lights.

    Photon 32-V2
     
  3. Kungpaoshizi Well-Known ReefKeeper

    561
    davenport
    Ratings:
    +39 / 1 / -0
    advanced aquarist has a few articles about it. Since we know blue and white can do it, I don't think other spectrums are completely necessary, but the color mixing is worth it Imo. (since white includes low levels of all) Uv I think is incredibly worth it. Green I cant recall reading much about. And red I know they identified as being a "gauge" corals can use to sense how deep they are and photosynthetic processes adjust from that. If ya think about the sprectral analysis comparison between metal halide and leds, it really comes down to the spectrum produced. Through all the debates I've seen when comparing mh, t5's and led, I can't get passed the fact that light is merely photonic engagement. There's nothing, that we know of, that sets these light sources, or colors, apart. I've had people say "you don't see yellow being sustained in a color under leds", yet my sunset mille is extraordinary. I've heard growth isn't as good, yet I've seen some corals grow faster in a few months under leds than they ever did under my mh's. I've seen colors aren't as brilliant under mh or led as compared to t5's, yet I'm continually shocked by the auras produced under my leds when in the blue spectrum compared to the actinic t5's... The debate goes on, meanwhile I'm just glad I have decent success and amazing corals to house and grow.
    Through it all I think we don't know as much as we think we know about lights, corals, or water chemistry.
    So as to if you should add non white/blue, I say yes, even if only for the ability to change your perception of the corals colors. Worth it.
     

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