Nano in the works

[brandon4291]

hey, cmlp, nice mini leather coral! Your polyp thingy is the makings of a juvenile lettuce cup leather coral, I forget the genus/sp nomenclature.

They are fun to have in nanos, I have one in my RB that has been cut and removed twice from the LR and grown back slowly every time. They are nearly physically indestructable (although lousy water params can kill them) and will regrow from even the slightest cutting-so dont hesitate to frag when they are too big. Just cut them right off with a razor blade. Primarily photosynthetic as well, so no need for addt'l feedings.

Neat pic. B429.

 

[pulse13]

The 1000 hour life span is for the 5 watters only, the 1 watters are closer to 100,000 hours. I'm sure you could increase the lifetime of the 5w's by cooling them somehow or underdriving them, but I don't know how much. The other questionable thing is the stability of the phosphors used in the LEDs, I haven't seen any data on that, so I don't know if spectrum could change after so many hours. Another note, the life span is more like the half life, that is the time it takes till the output is 50%. LEDs don't burn out like light bulbs (unless defective), but instead their output gradually decreases.

So the 1 watters are practical for supplemental lighting (highlighting areas, etc.) and moonlights, but not the 5w's because of the life span. I've seen 1w's on ebay for as cheap as $6, so they are cheaper than using an array of 5mm LEDs. Its a good thing that despite their efficiency people are experimenting. Their efficiency is improving and they will get cheaper. Nichia is just now bringing a 2w LED to the market that will have the highest efficiency yet, 22 lumens per watt. Lumileds (maker of Luxeons) claims to have a LED with 50 l/w available within a few years. For comparison, PCs are > 60 l/w for white.

If you're interested in moonlights check out my post here:

http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/showthr ... adid=11367

 

[brandon4291]

Really pulse, it is nice to see such valuable work in LED array lighting presented in the NR Forum here at RDO. The multiple selections you have in colors is very impressive. Welcome to our site, and feel free to upload your pictures to enhance any post. I like nano-reef com, Chris M. runs an incredible site. He manages a massive web board pretty much on his own, and builds exceptional custom nanos as well.


You know, for a long time I thought those 5mm RSlack LEDs were top of the line, then I think reefrancher first turned me on to luxeons here. Actually saw some in person from a neat guy I met here in town, an engineer who is equally intrigued by LED lighting. The thing that shocked me most is when my other friend pulled out a lux meter, and held it under his vho actinic. 14Kelvin. Then he held it equidistant to the LED bulb(1wLuxeon), and it read 14Kelvin (~470 nM). finally he produced a kelvin rating sheet that showed the daylight luxeons being 5500K, well in the photosynthetic range and this dawned on me that palmtop canopies for little atto reefs can be quite intense, and I now firmly believe SPS can be grown in a circulated module the size of a shotglass. Havent been able to sleep since...

These last three threads about LED lighting are the absolute most cutting edge around, enjoyed reading them.

b429