# Red Plants and LED's



## jcgd (Feb 18, 2004)

I'm having the same issue as you. I was looking at the spectral graphs for the cw and nw and they are low in the green spectrum, which shouldn't matter much, and have very very little spike in the red spectrum. I think this may be one of the big issues and I'm going to explore it myself. I picked up some warm whites to swap in for some of my cool whites. The warm whites actually have more deep red than the t5s put out, a touch closer to the "ideal" spike for plants. 

Not sure if the spectrum is the issue, but I've only seen red in a few tanks with LEDs And they were using warm whites.


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## Hoppy (Dec 24, 2005)

You have to use a PAR meter if you want to know how much light you have. Equations or charts or calculators can't substitute for that. Those are only methods for getting in the right ballpark on PAR, not for determining PAR.

The only way I see to answer your question is to do comparative testing - identical tanks, same PAR, but one with LED light and one with T5HO light.


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## wastedtime (Oct 27, 2011)

jcgd said:


> I'm having the same issue as you. I was looking at the spectral graphs for the cw and nw and they are low in the green spectrum, which shouldn't matter much, and have very very little spike in the red spectrum. I think this may be one of the big issues and I'm going to explore it myself. I picked up some warm whites to swap in for some of my cool whites. The warm whites actually have more deep red than the t5s put out, a touch closer to the "ideal" spike for plants.
> 
> Not sure if the spectrum is the issue, but I've only seen red in a few tanks with LEDs And they were using warm whites.


Thanks, Please do let me know how it works for you. I am interested in seeing if changing the spectral output will bring out the red in plants.



Hoppy said:


> You have to use a PAR meter if you want to know how much light you have. Equations or charts or calculators can't substitute for that. Those are only methods for getting in the right ballpark on PAR, not for determining PAR.
> 
> The only way I see to answer your question is to do comparative testing - identical tanks, same PAR, but one with LED light and one with T5HO light.


Yes i understand that the formula for PAR is only an estimate. But shouldnt the fact that the plants are healthy and pearling indicate that light is sufficient, even the plants that are initially red grow just fine but just grow green. 

Comparative testing seems like the best thing to do, but I am limited in resources and I really like my LED's :smile:


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## wastedtime (Oct 27, 2011)

I also ordered some warm whites and some red cree's, the red cree's are more in line with the red wavelength put out by the giesemann bulbs. I will report back on how this turns out.


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## Milad LEDGroupBuy.com (Jan 29, 2011)

LEDs can bring out the red. Light is light, doesnt matter if its from T5s or MHs or LEDs.

If you want to get the Reds to come out in your tank, my guess would be that you want a couple of 120 degree versions of:

http://www.ledgroupbuy.com/ocean-coral-white/

This is my guess from all the work we have done on reefs. If someone has a tank with LEDs and would like to test this out over their tank, since we are a sponsor here im willing to shoot over a couple of the OCW so you can see what difference they make. 

Red LEDs or Warm Whites aren't going to be as effective as the OCW in my opinion.


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## jcgd (Feb 18, 2004)

Hmm. I was looking at the graphs for the geisseman bulbs and the warm whites as well as the reds. The warm whites had an average spike about 25nm higher than most fluorescent tubes. The reds were way up there, I am guessing they won't look very good. They migh be too red.


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## Gomer (Aug 14, 2003)

Two issues: Getting the red pigment (or suppressing others) and presenting the red.

LEDs will do fine at both, but they don't exaggerate the red like the classic GE 9325K bulbs and similar red bulbs

It's been a long while, but my experience is that to get more red pigment, you need at least "medium" light and a nutrient shift on uptake. I seem to recall that nitrate limiting actually did it with medium lighting where high lighting naturally nutrient limited photosynthesis. Again, it has been a while, so look into it a bit more


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## ThatGuyWithTheFish (Apr 29, 2012)

High nitrates tend to lead to less red in many red plants. Get your nitrates down to 10ppm and see if they redden up. My other theory is that the LEDs don't provide enough light that many red plants need. What sp?


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## Milad LEDGroupBuy.com (Jan 29, 2011)

ThatGuyWithTheFish said:


> My other theory is that the LEDs don't provide enough light that many red plants need. What sp?


LEDs can provide more light than any T5 tube you have seen so I would toss that theory. 


Again my suggestion, someone grab a OCW and put it over a planted tank that has just CW and report back with the findings.


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## wastedtime (Oct 27, 2011)

Gomer said:


> Two issues: Getting the red pigment (or suppressing others) and presenting the red.
> 
> LEDs will do fine at both, but they don't exaggerate the red like the classic GE 9325K bulbs and similar red bulbs
> 
> It's been a long while, but my experience is that to get more red pigment, you need at least "medium" light and a nutrient shift on uptake. I seem to recall that nitrate limiting actually did it with medium lighting where high lighting naturally nutrient limited photosynthesis. Again, it has been a while, so look into it a bit more


Yes you are right, Nitrate limiting works, but that means threading a fine line to keep the plants red. Tom Barr has always maintained that his tank has high nitrates, but he still manages to bring out the red in his plants. I saw a couple of posts by him that suggest that it has to do more with light than nitrates. 



jcgd said:


> Hmm. I was looking at the graphs for the geisseman bulbs and the warm whites as well as the reds. The warm whites had an average spike about 25nm higher than most fluorescent tubes. The reds were way up there, I am guessing they won't look very good. They migh be too red.


I am going to use the red led's with the moonlight driver and drive them at 350nm. i will pull them out if it starts to look wierd. For $8 it is worth a shot i guess. 



ThatGuyWithTheFish said:


> High nitrates tend to lead to less red in many red plants. Get your nitrates down to 10ppm and see if they redden up. My other theory is that the LEDs don't provide enough light that many red plants need. What sp?


LED's provide enough light for the plants in my tank. I've got some fairly difficult plants and they seem to be growing great with the lights I have. Except for the red color. 

Some of the red plants I have in my tank are : Limnophilia H. , Ludwiga Sp Red, Ludwiga Pilosa. I have some L. Grandulosa coming this week. 



Milad LEDGroupBuy.com said:


> LEDs can provide more light than any T5 tube you have seen so I would toss that theory.
> 
> 
> Again my suggestion, someone grab a OCW and put it over a planted tank that has just CW and report back with the findings.


Thanks for the suggestion, pm sent.


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## jcgd (Feb 18, 2004)

ThatGuyWithTheFish said:


> High nitrates tend to lead to less red in many red plants. Get your nitrates down to 10ppm and see if they redden up. My other theory is that the LEDs don't provide enough light that many red plants need. What sp?


What is your theory? What's do you think is missing?


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## Hoppy (Dec 24, 2005)

By far the best argument for using more light to get better reds is the commonly seen fact that plants that tend to be red, also tend to have the reddest leaves near the top of the tank, and often have only green leaves at the bottom. The light intensity up closer to the light, whether LED or T5, is always much higher than that near the substrate.

Using more light will almost certainly give you more reds and oranges in the plants that normally have those colors, but it comes at the price of also getting much more algae problems, much harder to avoid or fix, and a lot more tank maintenance that must be done very well.


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## Gomer (Aug 14, 2003)

You could also argue that the intense light results in "unbalanced" photosynthesis in the nutrient domain.


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## Milad LEDGroupBuy.com (Jan 29, 2011)

I'll be getting some OCW to a couple people in this thread so they can test the theory out. No more PMs!


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## Francis Xavier (Oct 8, 2008)

It has everything to do with color rendering of the lights, rather than PAR values or spectrum growing values.

T5HO's tend to be misleading since the pink bulbs reflect a lot of red, put the same plant under a different light source and you'll see the coloration change.

Take for example the reds in my rotala Colorata in my thread in the nano section - old school fluorescents bringing out intense reds - that's a soft white light.

Another example is color rendering under ADA metal halide - the standard NA bulb brings out reds and is more of a very slightly bluish light. 

However the NAG bulb (green) will make the reds almost completely disappear and emphasize greens and make them pop incredibly. There was one case of a user here who couldn't get Reds to pop at all in his rotala's, despite heavy iron dosing. After scratching my head for a second when he asked for help - I told him to check the bulb, sure enough it was the NAG bulb, the minute he made the bulb switch all the reds popped out.

The same can be seen in saltwater under actinic lights - coral under normal or white lights are quite dull and the blue actinic brings out the neon colors.

So in this case, it's not that the LED isn't growing the plants at all - its just that probably the mix of colors needs to be adjusted - the closer you can get to 6500K and 7000k bulbs the more reds and yellows will pop. The closer to 10000k the more greens come out. This is why the AQUASKY LED has a 50/50 mix of 7000K and 8000K bulbs.


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## Gomer (Aug 14, 2003)

Frank, cant bring out the red pop if you can't get the pigments there in the first place :-D This thread really has 2 themes going on and I think everyone will agree with you on certain lights make certain pigments (carotenoids etc) pop more than others. I think what many struggle with, is to increase the pigment concentration. This even occurs in reefing.


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## jcgd (Feb 18, 2004)

I have plenty of light. I've tested with a Quantam meter, and the Good Enough Par meter and I have very high light. In the range from 50-100 par at the substrate up to 350 par at the surface. This is with my fixture 20" off the surface!

I have a crap ton of bio mass and I got my tank stabilized with the light dropped down a bit (around 60-70 umol at the substrate). Things were just getting growing well, yet still only green, and I started to increase the light levels. I did two light increases. After the first, the colour started to get a tab bit better. I think I was seeing a bit of light stress, but my macrandra was looking really good. I did another bump to the intensity, and also added fleet enema to my NPK mix to increase the phosphates. After about two days my Ammania, Rotalas and Ludwigia inclinata stunted. New growth is small and twisted, not looking good at all. I believe I reached a point in light where the co2 is now limited again, but I simply can't add much more. I'm bothering my fish as it is. I did up it a touch though, and decreased the light back to my previous level.

I am sure it is not light intensity related. This tank is by far the most well lit tank I've ever had.

The plant colours in my low tech tank with 2x T5HO coralife bulbs:









Now my 165 with the LEDs:

























In the last pic you can see the Ludwigia inclinata verticillata cuba and L. Glandulosa which are generally healthy, but completely green.

So I was getting good, fast healthy growth that was completely green. Upped the light and squeaked out a smidge of red, but it was only near the top of the tank, and was on a scale of 1-10, a 1 point increase in colouration.

After a brief period the plants stunted, due to what I believe to be a classic co2 issue. I will see if healthy growth returns now that I backed off the light a bit. Only a few species are stunted, mainly the Ammania gracillis and the Rotalas.

I'm dosing per EI, but have lately added more PO4. I suppose I could have been limited before and by adding more PO4 created a co2 shortage, but the EI should have had me covered previously.

I am led to believe this is purely spectrum related, and not intensity related.


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## shrimpNewbie (May 6, 2011)

I don't have photos of it but it's a local fish lover that happens to be a botanist. His tank has almost pure reds and some plants I expect to be green we're turning orange ish green, he has warm white only over his tank with the exception of two LEDs that come on I the middle of day which are 5600k roughly. Met him through a coworker  I would give warm white a try


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## shrimpNewbie (May 6, 2011)

Btw how did you build your fixture


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## pandacory (Apr 18, 2011)

Interesting discussion. Could uv be the answer? In hydroponics at least, I know a lot of the shortcomings of early led fixtures was overcome by including uv emmiters.

Never tried leds so don't know personally. Just food for thought that I've gained through other hobbies.


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## shrimpNewbie (May 6, 2011)

No it isn't uv that brings it out it's usually the red in the lighting. Just don't flours red that won't grow plants very well


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## tobystanton (Jun 27, 2012)

There is a simple answer to this question. The reason plants turn red is to protect themselves from heat. LED's do no produce nearly the intensity of heat that T5's do, therefore the plants have no need to produce a heat resistant pigment.


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## monkeyruler90 (Apr 13, 2008)

It wasn't until I switched to leds that my plants started turning red. I'll post some pictures when i get home


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## wastedtime (Oct 27, 2011)

Francis Xavier said:


> It has everything to do with color rendering of the lights, rather than PAR values or spectrum growing values.
> 
> T5HO's tend to be misleading since the pink bulbs reflect a lot of red, put the same plant under a different light source and you'll see the coloration change.
> 
> ...


+1 on this. Since my plants are all growing really well, It only leads me to believe that the spectrum is an issue. 



Gomer said:


> Frank, cant bring out the red pop if you can't get the pigments there in the first place :-D This thread really has 2 themes going on and I think everyone will agree with you on certain lights make certain pigments (carotenoids etc) pop more than others. I think what many struggle with, is to increase the pigment concentration. This even occurs in reefing.


I am trying to get the plants with red pigments to turn red. For example Ludwiga Sp Red, that was purchased from Tom Barr was a deep red/purple when I received it. But all new growth has turned green in my tank.



shrimpNewbie said:


> I don't have photos of it but it's a local fish lover that happens to be a botanist. His tank has almost pure reds and some plants I expect to be green we're turning orange ish green, he has warm white only over his tank with the exception of two LEDs that come on I the middle of day which are 5600k roughly. Met him through a coworker  I would give warm white a try


Sounds good, Can you get more information on what type of LED's he is running (CREE XM-L, XP-G etc) ? 



monkeyruler90 said:


> It wasn't until I switched to leds that my plants started turning red. I'll post some pictures when i get home


I am really interested in knowing the type of LED's you have used. The point of this thread is to gather people who have managed to successfully brought out the red coloration on plants with LED's. Some pointers to spectrum, peak wavelengths will definitely help.


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## wastedtime (Oct 27, 2011)

tobystanton said:


> There is a simple answer to this question. The reason plants turn red is to protect themselves from heat. LED's do no produce nearly the intensity of heat that T5's do, therefore the plants have no need to produce a heat resistant pigment.


I have to disagree with this. I havent seen any data that establishes this. This would mean that If I crank up the heat in the room that the tank is placed the plants should turn red. I would assume that that will simply cook the plants.


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## Gomer (Aug 14, 2003)

Some short readings, that when put together, paint an interesting picture 

http://chemistry.about.com/library/weekly/aa082602a.htm
http://www2.mcdaniel.edu/Biology/botf99/photo/p3igments.html
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18476875

and some heavy reading
http://lipidlibrary.aocs.org/plantbio/carotenoids/index.htm


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## tobystanton (Jun 27, 2012)

wastedtime said:


> I have to disagree with this. I havent seen any data that establishes this. This would mean that If I crank up the heat in the room that the tank is placed the plants should turn red. I would assume that that will simply cook the plants.


Well that was the answer I got from my father (who formerly taught botany at UH). It was a really long answer, but basically the light coming from the T5 is hotter.

He went on to say that most people belive cartenoid's are what cause's aquatic plants to turn red, but its actually anthocyanin's. 

If you look up anthocyanin's on wikipedia it says

"In photosynthetic tissues (such as leaves and sometimes stems), anthocyanins have been shown to act as a "sunscreen", protecting cells from high-light damage by absorbing blue-green and UV light, thereby protecting the tissues from photoinhibition, or high-light stress."


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## Gomer (Aug 14, 2003)

tobystanton said:


> "In photosynthetic tissues (such as leaves and sometimes stems), anthocyanins have been shown to act as a "sunscreen", protecting cells from high-light damage by absorbing blue-green and UV light, thereby protecting the tissues from photoinhibition, or high-light stress."


There are also a lot of peer reviewed (ie, not wikipedia) papers that indicate carotenoids block UV  Not saying anthocyanins don't play a role.


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## shrimpNewbie (May 6, 2011)

Where did you get that fixture btw? I'm looking for a case for my LEDs that looks nice


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## shrimpNewbie (May 6, 2011)

Pretty sure they're XML I'll be going over to his house in a couple weeks to swap for a mangrove if he's up for it. I'll ask him more about his lighting if I see him soon.


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## wastedtime (Oct 27, 2011)

shrimpNewbie said:


> Where did you get that fixture btw? I'm looking for a case for my LEDs that looks nice


I built the fixture myself. The case is acrylic painted white. 



shrimpNewbie said:


> Pretty sure they're XML I'll be going over to his house in a couple weeks to swap for a mangrove if he's up for it. I'll ask him more about his lighting if I see him soon.


Sure Thanks roud:


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## jcgd (Feb 18, 2004)

Can you snap some pics of the fixture, led layout, and the plants? Even phone pics will do. 

I've got some of the ocean coral white LEDs coming. I will do a side by side comparison with them and the warm whites on opposite ends of the tank. The only variable I can't control is the absolute par. If the meter weights different spectrums differently, all I can do is get it as close as I can. 

Before modding my current fixture I will make a seperate strip for testing purposes.


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## wastedtime (Oct 27, 2011)

Sure. I'll do them tonight. I've got some warm whites and red's coming this week. I am hoping to put them in this weekend.


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## shrimpNewbie (May 6, 2011)

Really thin acrylic? Is it holding up well? No wArping at all? I'll have to look into it for my fixture if its cheaper than sheet metal


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## wastedtime (Oct 27, 2011)

shrimpNewbie said:


> Really thin acrylic? Is it holding up well? No wArping at all? I'll have to look into it for my fixture if its cheaper than sheet metal


The acrylic is 3/16" inch thick. It seems to be holding up well. The fan on the top is a 120mm San Ace Fan pushing 40+ CFM, That keeps the heatsink nice and cool. I have the fan pulling air through the heatsink and exhausting from the top. Heat isnt an issue at all.

The hanging wire threads through holes in the heatsink itself so the acrylic isnt holding up the fixture, its more like the acrylic cover is sitting on the heatsink. I'll post up detailed pictures tonight. It'll give you a better idea of things.


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## shrimpNewbie (May 6, 2011)

Thanks cause I'm looking for a somewhat cheap but awesome looking way to house the LEDs.


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## Hoppy (Dec 24, 2005)

wastedtime said:


> The acrylic is 3/16" inch thick. It seems to be holding up well. The fan on the top is a 120mm San Ace Fan pushing 40+ CFM, That keeps the heatsink nice and cool. I have the fan pulling air through the heatsink and exhausting from the top. Heat isnt an issue at all.
> 
> The hanging wire threads through holes in the heatsink itself so the acrylic isnt holding up the fixture, its more like the acrylic cover is sitting on the heatsink. I'll post up detailed pictures tonight. It'll give you a better idea of things.


I hope you can do a DIY thread on this. I can't recall seeing one on light fixture housings made of acrylic.


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## wastedtime (Oct 27, 2011)

Hoppy said:


> I hope you can do a DIY thread on this. I can't recall seeing one on light fixture housings made of acrylic.


Sure, I'll post one up tonight.:thumbsup:


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## jcgd (Feb 18, 2004)

Add the how to to a good thread on DIY housings so we can add everything to a few master threads. I also have some pics for DIY housings.


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## DaveFason (Aug 15, 2011)

I've done a TON of testing. Try WW and deep red. Here is a short clip. This is with the ratio both maxed out. The first is the cooler colors and then warmer colors come on. You've never seen a planted tank look so good! 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/[email protected]/7645861504/

P.S - Sorry for the eh quality. It was done on my iPhone.


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## jcgd (Feb 18, 2004)

Do you happen to have a vid of the plant growth under those lights? The proof is in the plants.


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## DaveFason (Aug 15, 2011)

I'll have some photos shortly. I'll see if I can do a before and after. I've been dealing with LEDs for some time. If you can trust me, I'm not pulling your chain.  

-D


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## jcgd (Feb 18, 2004)

No, you are exactly the person I'm looking for. The only thing I do not have is nice reds. Plant growth look good and healthy. Just nearly completely green. Before and after shots would be great. 

What leds are you using currently, how many, optics and current? What were you using before? Why did you add the red LEDs, and what was the result? Have you measured your par levels? 

It's defiantly true that LEDs apper more dim than t5 lighting. The Cree cw and nw have very little green in their spectrum. Mostly blue. 

The warm white have much more red than the others. They have much less blue as well. The only thing is I don't want my tank to have that red plant grow bulb look. I'm hoping I can add enough blue that the tank has a 8000k look, but no have that blue drown out the positive effects of the warm white.


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## shrimpNewbie (May 6, 2011)

Mixing royal blue with warm white will give you a nice looking light but still give the benefits of the Red light, just use 75-80% warm white and add some blue to it I personally like warm white but also like 10,000k so I go either way. Gonna hit up the acrylic shop for some scrap


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## wastedtime (Oct 27, 2011)

Wow finally someone who already has this tested out. I would be interested in the details of the fixture. Ratio's of LED's, Optics and Current will be helpful.

Personally to me the red's in the video are just too red for me. I think reducing the red to about 60% of the intensity will be pleasant to the eyes (provided this does not negatively affect the red's in the plants)


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## wastedtime (Oct 27, 2011)

The How-To for the Housing is now up in the DIY section.

http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/showthread.php?t=184951


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## DaveFason (Aug 15, 2011)

I will be posting soon. I want to make sure to have the tank nice and clean  

The string in the video has, WW, Deep Red and NW.Both maxed at ~812mA. I really like having it around 100% with the cool string and 40% warm string. This creates what you normally see with T5 bulbs. To me it pops even more. Of course some people like the super warm stuff but that is not for me. 

I never use optics and really do not prefer them. With planning and proper execution there is no need. Now *SOME* deep tanks will need them but I really try to stay away from them. 

Here is the unit above I just finished for a friend. Housed 26 LEDs, dimming drivers, ect. 









Like I said, let me do a water change and I will post photos over the tank. The "test" tank! 

-Dave


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## wastedtime (Oct 27, 2011)

Thats a sleek looking fixture you have there. Mind sharing a DIY on how you went about constructing the housing ?


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## Jegli09 (Jul 25, 2012)

Yea I would be interested to know as well


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## jcgd (Feb 18, 2004)

Sweet. Sounds good. How many of each led do you have? Just so I know what 100:40 equates to. 

That fixture is sexy! Did you bend it up yourself? I'd really like to know how you made that. 

Also, I understand that optics aren't needed, but there is a major advantage when you use them and raise the light up nice and high. This way par levels from top to bottom can be something like 200-80 umol instead of 450-80 umol. Most people have 4-5 times more light at the surface than the soil. My fixture provides much more uniform light levels because the fixture is 40+" over the substrate rather than ~25". 

I could also plant a 36" deep tank and have 130+umol or par at the soil. You would need a lot of bare LEDs to pull that off.


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## DaveFason (Aug 15, 2011)

Thanks guys. I have been making fixtures for reef tanks ( Nano Box ) and I am just getting into planted tanks now. I have a planted nano as a test tank and the results are stellar. The unit is CNC, powdercoated/anodized and assembled by me. Hand made  I am looking into sponsoring this forum for FW/planted units. Stay tuned! 

As far as optics, if you have a tank deeper than 26" than yes I would say you would need them. The only thing is you dont see many tanks that deep now. Most are much more shallow. Hanging a unit without optics 6" creates no "hot spot" and has a good spread. With optics hot spots happen 10x more. People only hanging 12-18" with 60 degree optics and toasting things. Along with the color shadowing you create with optics. Each there own. 

Like I said I will clean this little guy up. I tried using plain red but the results did not turn out to great. Deep red and WW is the ticket. 

-Dave


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## shrimpNewbie (May 6, 2011)

That fixture is amazing... I wish I had the time to ask you to build one


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## wastedtime (Oct 27, 2011)

An update: I received my LED order yesterday and wired everything up. I'll keep an eye out for the red plants to see how they do.

The fixture has a combination of : 5 Neutral Whites / 3 Warm Whites / 2 Cool Whites / 2 Blue and 2 Philips Deep Red.

There isnt a noticeable change in how white or yellow the fixture is. It seems to be nearly the same.


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## hydrosparky (May 1, 2012)

Waiting to see the results on these. I'm planning to get some LEDs and some red/orange plants. How well do the purple plants do on the LEDs?


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## jcgd (Feb 18, 2004)

My purple looks nice, but on stuff like Alternanthera species. Something is missing in general though. Some colours pop, but there are a bunch missing as well.


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## jcgd (Feb 18, 2004)

Calling out _*DaveFason*_! You promised pics... that's a long water change.


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## DaveFason (Aug 15, 2011)

Sorry! I revamped the entire set up. I'll post a teaser shortly! 

I plan to buy a few plants and do a weekly update to show. This way people wont think I just put a few red plants in there! 

-Dave


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## jcgd (Feb 18, 2004)

Oh, sounds good. I've noticed plants still appear red when added to the tank, but all new growth is green.


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## hydrosparky (May 1, 2012)

I wonder if LEDs+Supplemental Daylight would bring out the red. I plan to move my aquarium where it gets more sunlight, but I'm still using LEDs, because the light is still good for medium light plants.


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## shrimpNewbie (May 6, 2011)

Warm and neutrals will bring out reds. A simple yet complicated reason but the best way to put it is: plants with red pigments use it to protect themselves from the red, using high intensity LEDs with a big spike in red will produce more reds. Therefore add more red light. This came from the botanist. I can't take pics apparently because of the plants around his tank... You could guess if you'd like but it doesn't matter. I'm bummed but I'll be going over to pick up some moss. Still working on a fixture idea. My heatsync isnt a flat fanned aluminum heatsync so it's a little harder for me to mount. Anyone have ideas? Need a pic? I want to use acrylic for the only reason being I can customize it. I'm thinking about making like a 10x10x4 inch fixture so I can add a few XMLs to the fixture down the road just not sure how to mount the current led to a skeleton instead of to the acrylic, too dangerous.


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## hydrosparky (May 1, 2012)

So, if I want to get 12 high power LEDs (Cree), how many reds, blues, and whites (cold, neutral, warm) should I get in order to bring out the red coloration?


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## shrimpNewbie (May 6, 2011)

I would go 8 warm white 2 cool white and two blue with no optics on the blue or cw


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## shrimpNewbie (May 6, 2011)

Or if you don't mind it looking too warm 8 ww and 4 cw


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## hydrosparky (May 1, 2012)

So no red LEDs. And what do you mean by no optics on the blues? I'm new to lighting.


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## wastedtime (Oct 27, 2011)

hydrosparky said:


> So no red LEDs. And what do you mean by no optics on the blues? I'm new to lighting.


Optics are lenses that restrict the light from the LED to a specific angle. Most LED's without lenses have a 120 degree angle.

With 60 and 80 degree lenses you restrict the light to a smaller footprint of the tank which increases intensity and reduces spillage of light. 
But improper use of these lenses will also give you a spotlight effect if the light beams from 2 adjacent LED's do not overlap sufficiently.

Use of Red LED's with Warm White is not necessary. If you are using warm whites and neutral whites you should be ok. The blues will complement the setup nicely.


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## hydrosparky (May 1, 2012)

Thanks for the answer! There were also purples and greens and royal blues and etc. I shouldn't get those, right?


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## wastedtime (Oct 27, 2011)

hydrosparky said:


> Thanks for the answer! There were also purples and greens and royal blues and etc. I shouldn't get those, right?


No. the only thing you will need is Warm Whites, Neutral Whites or Cool Whites based on your preference and Blues. Anything else is going to mess up the spectrum.


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## jcgd (Feb 18, 2004)

The whole point of this thread, that if the ratios aren't right the reds won't come out. I picked all cool white cause it looked good and I'm getting little red in my plants. So I don't think choosing your colours by what looks good is wise.


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## wastedtime (Oct 27, 2011)

Ok I've little bit of an update on the new color spectrum that I have been using. I initially said the there isnt a big difference in the white: I was wrong, when you compare them side by side there is definitely a difference in the white color temperature.

Before:










After: 










Now for the plants : I have some red coloration on new growth, plants that were totally green have started to come back.

Notice that the old growth was green, the new growth is significantly red.










Ludwiga Grandulosa. This is a new addition to the tank, the old growth has held its color. The new growth is slowly turning red. 











I am still not convinced that this is all that needs to be done to get the red in plants.. I am going to keep this going and make sure the plants keep their color in the long term.


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## shrimpNewbie (May 6, 2011)

Proper ferts and intense lighting with a large spike in red will do it. Big difference before and after  I have to figure out how to hold my heat sync up in the acrylic box


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## jcgd (Feb 18, 2004)

Swapped out 12 cool whites for 12 warm whites. Before and after, but with different cameras. Close enough to real life.

All cool white:









With 12 warm white:









Looks like some colours pop more right off the bat. I'll update after a few weeks of new growth.


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## hydrosparky (May 1, 2012)

Oooooo! Looks different and nice! Can't wait for the next update!


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## Chaoslord (Feb 12, 2011)

I've been using the marineland aquatic plant LEDs since June. 
All my reds have deepened to almost purple. My macrandra has multiple colors on all leaves. My Blynxa has turned from bright green to green with reddish yellow tint. 
The best part is my electric bill has dropped noticeably , and my tank tempature has dropped from an average 80-82 degrees to a steady 76 degrees.


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## hydrosparky (May 1, 2012)

Are the Marineland AQ Plant LEDs that good!?! O.O They're too expensive for me though. I'll go on making my own LED fixture.


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## Chaoslord (Feb 12, 2011)

hydrosparky said:


> Are the Marineland AQ Plant LEDs that good!?! O.O They're too expensive for me though. I'll go on making my own LED fixture.


Wasn't suggesting anyone to buy them. Was answer the title of thread. 
If the price shocked you here's another :eek5:I had to get two for proper spread. :eek5:
Good part was they honored a coupon I had. 
Good luck to you building your own.


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## whiptail (Jul 13, 2012)

I've enjoyed the thread, lots to learn here. Just to late for me.
I make the mistake of buying an AI Sol for my planted tank. Most of the plants are gradually dying. The red lotus or anything with red in it has turned a pale pink. The stems are turning clear at the bottom and withering away. I have tried turning the white and blue up then down, nothing seems to make a difference. I have no idea about the par, the stores around here don't have a meter, or so they tell me. Shoud have stayed with the florescent, at least the plants did well.


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## monkeyruler90 (Apr 13, 2008)

hey just to give an update, I got some red coloration on my plants with running all CW XML-U2s
I love the color right now but I might try and add a few red LEDs in the middle to make my Cardinals pop out.


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## wastedtime (Oct 27, 2011)

jcgd said:


> Swapped out 12 cool whites for 12 warm whites. Before and after, but with different cameras. Close enough to real life.
> 
> All cool white:
> 
> ...


This is looking good, I've shut down my tank, I moved and most plants were sitting in a bucket for way too long. I lost almost all of them. I've started up again. but no red plants right now. Hopefully someday I'll come back to starting a dutch style tank :icon_frow


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## fishykid1 (Apr 5, 2010)

tobystanton said:


> Well that was the answer I got from my father (who formerly taught botany at UH). It was a really long answer, but basically the light coming from the T5 is hotter.
> 
> He went on to say that most people belive cartenoid's are what cause's aquatic plants to turn red, but its actually anthocyanin's.
> 
> ...


There's a difference between submerged growth and terrestrial growth. Being that infrared rays are heat and water has such a high heat capacity that doesn't really have any effect on water especially considering most T5HO either have some cooling or are a few inches off water where the evaporation/heat transfer negate the 'greater heat" from t5. Another thought to add to that is when sunlight - you know the feeling - even if it's cool outside and the sun is out, you can feel it 'warm you'. That's infrared heat. I haven't had a T5HO yet that I could feel the heat more than 5-6" from even after running a few hours, even less with LED's. 


That wikipedia article doesn't follow the fact that Cree XPG, XTE and XML LED's cool white and neutral white are lacking in the UV spectrum. So I believe you are slightly mistaken with that hypothesis. However, it would be interesting for someone to add a couple UV and see if they get the same results. 


Not to the poster above but in general:

This really lies upon the fact that different plants utilize different wavelengths of light, differently. For plant A, you may use something in the range of 440-500nm more effectively than say plant B that needs that 410-420nm to bring reds. Try using a variety of plants under the same lighting conditions before making that assumption. 

I'd say we're behind on LED's just like we were from the beginning. Reefers have it right, you need some form of UV light... which is usually in the 300-400nm range. Hanging a black light a few inches off the surface of the water might be interesting to see if that has an effect on it. Most black lights are UVA spectrum between 300 and 400nm. Most of the UV sterilizers that we use use between 100-250nm which can harm living tissues, hence why they are used in sterilizers and bug catchers.


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## HypnoticAquatic (Feb 17, 2010)

shrimpNewbie said:


> Warm and neutrals will bring out reds. A simple yet complicated reason but the best way to put it is: plants with red pigments use it to protect themselves from the red, using high intensity LEDs with a big spike in red will produce more reds. Therefore add more red light. This came from the botanist. I can't take pics apparently because of the plants around his tank... You could guess if you'd like but it doesn't matter. I'm bummed but I'll be going over to pick up some moss. Still working on a fixture idea. My heatsync isnt a flat fanned aluminum heatsync so it's a little harder for me to mount. Anyone have ideas? Need a pic? I want to use acrylic for the only reason being I can customize it. I'm thinking about making like a 10x10x4 inch fixture so I can add a few XMLs to the fixture down the road just not sure how to mount the current led to a skeleton instead of to the acrylic, too dangerous.


its not really about the red light blue light can actually do this faster as blue can put out more energy, ive done all blue and half blue half white and have seen HUGE increase in red with just blue. remember that the color of light that we see is being reflected *not absorbed so blue should actually turn them more red but you will need a red type of light to be reflected back for our eyes to be able to see it.

ill see if i can add a pic from my phone of ludwigia brivepes, this was in my 40b with 2 t5ho and was only green. this was 5-6 days under my new led light. the ludwig repen was only 2-3 days in there an u could already see the changes those arent new leafs there just changing to red. 

so overall i stand by the fact its the ammount of light that its using. remember that white has alot reflect off so blues and reds are putting out more than whites ran at the same current/settings, this is the same reason that actinic lights can grow plants but poorly due to the ammount of useable light they put out. just wanted to throw my 2¢ in.


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## mcarroll (Apr 14, 2008)

fishykid1 said:


> I'd say we're behind on LED's just like we were from the beginning. Reefers have it right, you need some form of UV light...


I'm pretty sure we'll always be at least a step behind, but I think you're right that we're a little behind where we should be here.

While the UV theory is logical, it's far from proven in practice....even on the reef side very few people are running UV LED's in their LED rigs. Not nearly enough experiences to draw any kind of conclusion like "necessity" from it. Definitely needs more experimentation though for those willing - both on the reef and planted side!

The capacity of water to absorb IR (and other nearby red wavelengths) is definitely interesting too. Most (perhaps all?) of the plants we keep are surface plants which grow emersed or in very shallow water.

By contrast, our reef critters that care about light are almost universally from deeper water - as deep as 60 meters - especially these days.

As such, freshwater plants are going to have a much higher acclimation to using red light (such as making use of other non-red or near-red wavelengths) which are much more available in open air and shallow water.

By comparison, blue light (including UV) is sometimes all that is available to the deeper water critters, so it should be no surprise that over the course of time they have evolved some beautiful ways to "make due"...such as bending blue light into red or other colors! 

-Matt


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## jedimasterben (Aug 21, 2011)

mcarroll said:


> I'm pretty sure we'll always be at least a step behind, but I think you're right that we're a little behind where we should be here.
> 
> While the UV theory is logical, it's far from proven in practice....even on the reef side very few people are running UV LED's in their LED rigs. Not nearly enough experiences to draw any kind of conclusion like "necessity" from it. Definitely needs more experimentation though for those willing - both on the reef and planted side!
> 
> ...


UV light is not good over any tank, which is why aquatic life has evolved a clear coat that protects them from UV. What is beneficial is light in the 410-430nm range, which is a true violet. Hobbyists using true violet LEDs are experiencing increased coral growth just by adding a pretty sparse amount (as few as 2x per 24"x24" area). It can be very, very easily overdone though. Our eyes cannot see well in the 380-430nm range, if at all, so they appear very dim. They put out a high amount of light, despite their looks, and since they sit across several photosynthetic peaks, consequently have a high PAR and PUR output (though it is still next to impossible to measure).

Another interesting fact is that while deepwater corals have to make do with only light in the violet and blue range, as soon as they are brought into shallower water (such as in our tanks lit with white lights), they can immediately make use of the new wavelengths presented to them, mostly in the deep red range. Some deeper-water _favia spp._ (as far as favia goes, anyway, they are typically shallow water corals) can photosynthetically use light the entire visible light spectrum.









My reef is lit right now with a DIY LED setup, 12x 5000k white, 24x 440-445nm royal blue, 6x 660nm deep red, 6x 475nm cool blue, 6x 490-530nm cyan, and 9x 410-420nm violet. If I use just the NW and RB, corals not only look great but also are easy to acclimate. As soon as the violet string is turned on (even dimmed low), it becomes very difficult to acclimate corals into the higher parts of the tank (the tank is only 16" wide, with water line around 13.5"). The string of exotics throws another wrench into the equation, as corals adapt to new wavelengths slowly, too quickly blasting a coral with, say, too much red light is a quick way to kill it.


For my new planted tank (24"x11"x11" bowfront), I'm most likely going to be using the following:
6x 2700k warm white
5x 440-445nm royal blue
2x 475nm cool blue
2x 660-670nm deep red
2x 410-420nm violet

I'm hoping that I can keep a color temperature at 6000-8000k by using so many royal blues. A 1:2 ratio of neutral white to royal blue gets 14000k, 1:1 of NW to RB gets 10000k, so hopefully a 6:5 warm to royal will get 6000 at least.


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## psychomar (Sep 17, 2012)

Just tried to chip in, and realized I lost my password, so with new user name.

Check this journal, I suppose quite old, just when the LEDs entered the hobby.
note the red blyxa(suppose to look so in super high light).
Those look like a 10,000K(?)

http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/showthread.php?t=82276&page=4


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## frrok (May 22, 2011)

Just to chime in here...
Although I don't have DIY LED I just purchased a TMC Aquaray mini 400 LED. It uses four OSRAM OSLON SSL high power LEDs with a colour temperature of 6500K. At 12w. I am currently running it over a a mini -m @14 inches from the substrate. I should be at 55 PAR at the substrate with this configuration according to a thread on another forum where they tested the light with a par meter. Anyway, I am also noticing that my red plants new growth is not RED. I am EI dosing and running co2 around 2bps. Plants are pearling and grow rapidly. But definitely not red! I have the same species of Ludwigia as the OP. The leaves grow larger and fast but a dark green with a slight tinge of red at the edges. It's funny because prior to these lights I had a 13w power compact with no co2 and no ferts and this plant was red from tip through the stem. I tried emailing the company where I baught the lights. And they tried to say that I should add more iron!


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