chinese led lights

[radbluesfan]

Originally Posted by jg210302

I am looking into buying at least two also, maybe we could go in on a qty. buy for the lower price?

Probably won't hear back on their discounted price verification til after bedtime tonight. It really sounded too good to be true. Splitting an order with a forum member might be an option if they lived near me. I do not want to be re-shipping these lights again------- and the other buyer's warranty issues, if there were any, would be something I would rather not have to take care of unless they were local. I am near St. louis MO.

[ReefBeforeGirls]

pulled the trigger on the Epistars JRP linked, will post pictures when up and running!

Excited

[TropTrea]

Originally Posted by radbluesfan

I don't know about these personally but I have been looking at them too, but the 48X3 version. I have been emailing them and doing some research. The 48X3 Crees were $395 and Bridgelux $295 with solar controllers--knock about $100- $125 without controllers. With Bridgelux you can ask them to put some red or UV or whatever mixed in---not sure about the Cree. I've been mostly looking at the Bridgelux because of budget. I have read the fans are quieter than the other black boxes. Shipping is really high --- $72 for one, $122.60 for 2, and $128 for three units (48X3s, 60X3 are probably more). Strange thing is this morning's daily email reply stated that if I bought 4 of the lights the price was much, much less. So much that I had to email her back to ask if it was a typo or mistake---no reply yet. Still not sure what I will get. Luckily I have a lot of time to think about it. If you want to discuss anything further or see my email chain with them, PM me.

Cree does offer Red LED's. However there UV LED's 380 to 405 nm are only listed for medical usage. I had tried some Philips, near UV LED's 410 to 420 nm, 2 in an array of 24 and everyone asked me way was my tank to pink. I pulled them and replaced them with nuetral whites and the tank looks much better.

The Bridglux LED's however are rated at a max of 700ma compared to the Cree's. at 1,000ma plus. At 700ma and 3.7 volts (2.6 watts) the bridglux is slightly dimmer than Cree XP-G at 700 ma and 3.05 Volts (2.1 Watts) these LED's are now rated to run up to 1,500ma @ 3.25 Volts which is actualy 4.8 Watts.

While I know you custom configuer there drivers for these orders the Crees would still be the better deal for total light output. To mee the 100$ difference is well worth it to get the Crees. On a DIY build with 48 LED's the price difference between the Bridgelux and Crees is about $130.00. Actualy a DIY build with the Cree LED's would be in the $350.00 range, dependent on the drivers and heat sinks one used.

The big thing is to make sure they running the LED's at 2.5 Watts each or more. If they are this is great deal.

[danmartis]

so which one is better the aquariumleds 120 Watt Aquarium LED 14K 3 Watt LEDs or the one on ebay http://www.ebay.com/itm/150726029374...#ht_5696wt_984
looking to pull the trigger one one of these for my 24x24x20 high.
and how is the noise level on each of these ones?
thank you

[jeffesaurusrex]

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Aqua-Pro-150...ht_3395wt_1037

I haven't seen those yet, they use crees and are even linkable for only 30-40$ more per light. Any objections to these?

[BigCountry74]

Originally Posted by danmartis

so which one is better the aquariumleds 120 Watt Aquarium LED 14K 3 Watt LEDs or the one on ebay http://www.ebay.com/itm/150726029374...#ht_5696wt_984
looking to pull the trigger one one of these for my 24x24x20 high.
and how is the noise level on each of these ones?
thank you

aquariumleds

[TropTrea]

Originally Posted by danmartis

so which one is better the aquariumleds 120 Watt Aquarium LED 14K 3 Watt LEDs or the one on ebay http://www.ebay.com/itm/150726029374...#ht_5696wt_984
looking to pull the trigger one one of these for my 24x24x20 high.
and how is the noise level on each of these ones?
thank you

Looking at the ebay modle

Vender claims 30 Blue LED's for 63 Watts
this means each LED is running at 2.1 Watts each not 3 Watts.

Vender claims 25 Waites are running at 66 Watts
this means the whites are running at 2.64 each not 3 Watts.

There is no indication on what type of LED's they are other than them being 12K or 14K. That means your whiutes a very heavy in the blues and lacklng in the reds. Also the higher the K rating of whites the less total lumens you get per LED.

I would stay clear of that fixture even though the price seems sweet for that many LED's. Well below retail price on the parts to do a quality DIY fixture.

The AquariumLED 120 sounds like a much better deal with the bridglux LED's running a full 3 Watts each. However I personaly do not like the color mix and would prefer CREE LED's because of there higher effeciency.

Dennis

[danmartis]

Originally Posted by jeffesaurusrex

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Aqua-Pro-150...ht_3395wt_1037

I haven't seen those yet, they use crees and are even linkable for only 30-40$ more per light. Any objections to these?

these look good just because of the cree leds.
anybody used this one?

[SimonSKL]

Originally Posted by TropTrea

Cree does offer Red LED's. However there UV LED's 380 to 405 nm are only listed for medical usage. I had tried some Philips, near UV LED's 410 to 420 nm, 2 in an array of 24 and everyone asked me way was my tank to pink. I pulled them and replaced them with nuetral whites and the tank looks much better.

The Bridglux LED's however are rated at a max of 700ma compared to the Cree's. at 1,000ma plus. At 700ma and 3.7 volts (2.6 watts) the bridglux is slightly dimmer than Cree XP-G at 700 ma and 3.05 Volts (2.1 Watts) these LED's are now rated to run up to 1,500ma @ 3.25 Volts which is actualy 4.8 Watts.

While I know you custom configuer there drivers for these orders the Crees would still be the better deal for total light output. To mee the 100$ difference is well worth it to get the Crees. On a DIY build with 48 LED's the price difference between the Bridgelux and Crees is about $130.00. Actualy a DIY build with the Cree LED's would be in the $350.00 range, dependent on the drivers and heat sinks one used.

The big thing is to make sure they running the LED's at 2.5 Watts each or more. If they are this is great deal.

I just received two units of Eshine 48x3W CREE w controllers and have been running them since 3/27/12. I replaced four of the CREE blue with red. CREE does come in red.

Today I put a Kil-a-watt meter to one of the lights and at 100% on for both white and blue, the meter registered 94 watts. So it is running at about 65% of stated max wattage or 1.95 watt per LED! Does it sound right?

Here are a couple links to my build thread where I commented about the lights.


http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/sh...&postcount=105

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/sh...&postcount=107

[danmartis]

Originally Posted by jeffesaurusrex

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Aqua-Pro-150...ht_3395wt_1037

I haven't seen those yet, they use crees and are even linkable for only 30-40$ more per light. Any objections to these?

this ones look like the one eshine sells http://www.eshinesystems.com/aqua/3g...ium-light.html
same specs dimmensions and everything.
but on eshine it does not say they use cree leds.

[SimonSKL]

Re my earlier post on wattage used by the Eshine light: The Kill-A-Watt also registered 1.21 amps and 120 volts. If watt=volt x amp, then 1.21x120 = 145 watts. Now how come the meter display 94 watts?

[TropTrea]

Originally Posted by danmartis

this ones look like the one eshine sells http://www.eshinesystems.com/aqua/3g...ium-light.html
same specs dimmensions and everything.
but on eshine it does not say they use cree leds.

Eshine does offer a CREE set up.
http://www.eshinesystems.com/aqua/cr...ium-light.html
The advertising though is a little questinable as they claim they are using
XP-G R-5 White LED's at 8,300K to 10,000K while Cree rates the R-5's at 5,000 to 8,300K.

This is probably one of the better fixtures out there if they are driving the LED's at 3 watts. However my personal preference would be for less White LED's using the XP-G R-2 or R-3 to better bring out the reflective reds in the tank. As well as spliting the Blue spectrum between Royal Blues and True Blues.

However on a comercial fixtures they are intrested in the broad spectrum of individuals that might be buyng there fixture. Some would probably want a whiter fixture others a bluer fixture and this is probably a good compromise.

[TropTrea]

Originally Posted by SimonSKL

Re my earlier post on wattage used by the Eshine light: The Kill-A-Watt also registered 1.21 amps and 120 volts. If watt=volt x amp, then 1.21x120 = 145 watts. Now how come the meter display 94 watts?

Now meter accuracy actualy is not great even at 10%. The 10% accuracy is at full scale. So if you have a meter that is set to read three digits to a max of 999 watts then the only gurantss on even a 5% accurate meter is that it it is within 49 watts of the true value. This is why many meters have scales lke 200 max where the accuracy then on the 200 scale is 10 at 5% or 20 at 10%.

Depenent upon which scales on the meter you were using and what the accuracy is guranteed at this could easily be your issue here. That is why I generaly cringe at meter reading that were taken with $20.00 meters.

I had been called in for TS calls because someone got a reading off 92 volts when they thought they should have had 117 volts only to find they were checking it on a 1,000 volt scale where the 25 volts they were off was actualy within 2.5% accuracy of the meter. Using a 200 volt scale on my meter I got a reading of 119 volts.

[jeffesaurusrex]

Originally Posted by danmartis

this ones look like the one eshine sells http://www.eshinesystems.com/aqua/3g...ium-light.html
same specs dimmensions and everything.
but on eshine it does not say they use cree leds.

Yep, looks like it's just a rebranded version of the eshine. I'll probably get this - for about $50 more apiece than the aquariumleds.com lights, you get lenses, cree leds, 30 more watts of power, and the ability to link the fixtures so there is only one power cable. Coincidentally the last part is also a con, because ideally there would be only two cords - one for actinic on both fixtures and one for whites, that way you can have an automatic dusk/dawn with timers.

[danmartis]

Originally Posted by jeffesaurusrex

Yep, looks like it's just a rebranded version of the eshine. I'll probably get this - for about $50 more apiece than the aquariumleds.com lights, you get lenses, cree leds, 30 more watts of power, and the ability to link the fixtures so there is only one power cable. Coincidentally the last part is also a con, because ideally there would be only two cords - one for actinic on both fixtures and one for whites, that way you can have an automatic dusk/dawn with timers.

Yea the one cord really sucks.

[TropTrea]

Originally Posted by jeffesaurusrex

Yep, looks like it's just a rebranded version of the eshine. I'll probably get this - for about $50 more apiece than the aquariumleds.com lights, you get lenses, cree leds, 30 more watts of power, and the ability to link the fixtures so there is only one power cable. Coincidentally the last part is also a con, because ideally there would be only two cords - one for actinic on both fixtures and one for whites, that way you can have an automatic dusk/dawn with timers.

With the single cord I would have to make sure I had a controler that worked the lighting set. If not your realy adding in the eventual cost of the controler. For some that might be an issue as with large systems that are automated it is simply adding the lights to the controler. But different controlers work with different types of outputs and even with a controler you may be adding an output module for those lights upping there price.

Keep in mind that Exhine is bringing out there Cree Pro which is a 120 Watt lighting system. Which might be worth the wait. The system you looking aty might be a prototype of it before they worked the bugs out of it and want to put there brand name label of approval on.

[SimonSKL]

Originally Posted by TropTrea

Now meter accuracy actualy is not great even at 10%. The 10% accuracy is at full scale. So if you have a meter that is set to read three digits to a max of 999 watts then the only gurantss on even a 5% accurate meter is that it it is within 49 watts of the true value. This is why many meters have scales lke 200 max where the accuracy then on the 200 scale is 10 at 5% or 20 at 10%.

Depenent upon which scales on the meter you were using and what the accuracy is guranteed at this could easily be your issue here. That is why I generaly cringe at meter reading that were taken with $20.00 meters.

I had been called in for TS calls because someone got a reading off 92 volts when they thought they should have had 117 volts only to find they were checking it on a 1,000 volt scale where the 25 volts they were off was actualy within 2.5% accuracy of the meter. Using a 200 volt scale on my meter I got a reading of 119 volts.

Not sure if you saw my post referencing to a Kill-A-Watt meter which does not allow a user to select scale. According to the specification this particular model has an accuracy rating of +/- 0.2%.

http://www.amazon.com/P3-Internation.../dp/B00009MDBU

[TropTrea]

Originally Posted by SimonSKL

Not sure if you saw my post referencing to a Kill-A-Watt meter which does not allow a user to select scale. According to the specification this particular model has an accuracy rating of +/- 0.2%.

http://www.amazon.com/P3-Internation.../dp/B00009MDBU

Looking at that 0.2% accuracy at 1875 VA is 3.75 VA or Watt accuracy. If it read 94 Watts you should have between 90.25 and 97.75 actual wattage used.

If voltage max is 125 at 0.2% accuracy and a reading of 120 you have between 119.5 and 120.5 Volts.

Simularly for current you read 1.21 Amps with a scale max of 15 Amps so the .0.2% accuracy means between 1.18 and 1.24 Amps.

If we put the Amps and volts at there minimum 119.5 X 1.18 = 141 Watts yet. My strong suspicion is that one of the scales if not more than one way out of calibration.

[danmartis]

Originally Posted by TropTrea

With the single cord I would have to make sure I had a controler that worked the lighting set. If not your realy adding in the eventual cost of the controler. For some that might be an issue as with large systems that are automated it is simply adding the lights to the controler. But different controlers work with different types of outputs and even with a controler you may be adding an output module for those lights upping there price.

Keep in mind that Exhine is bringing out there Cree Pro which is a 120 Watt lighting system. Which might be worth the wait. The system you looking aty might be a prototype of it before they worked the bugs out of it and want to put there brand name label of approval on.

do you know the cree pro is coming out?

[TropTrea]

Originally Posted by danmartis

do you know the cree pro is coming out?

The Eshine website claims it is coming soon.

There is a good possibility that some of the limited no name fixtures that look similar to the standard Eshine are pre production runs that they are probably gathering data on to see how the customers react to it. This is very common in pre production. After they get input they make minor changes in a system and sometimes do a second preproduction run or go right to production. Most companies do not do there production runs until they are sure that customers will be happy with there device. Sometimes ideas are even killed completely in this phase.

An example is the last product I worked on. It was scheduled to have one pre production run on the basic model, then the basic model would be released to production the two upgraded models would go to pre production at the same time. After the pre production run it was decided to make about a half dozen changes and another preproduction run. This was followed by the third preproduction run in which the two upgrade models were also included. In all there were 4 preproduction runs on the basic model the 1st upgraded version was released 6 months later, and after two additional attempts the third upgraded model was scraped. The reason for scraping the third upgraded model was that production costs would cause the price to exceed what marketing estimated customers would be willing to pay for the extra bells and whistles.

I should also note that about the time we decided to do a second preproduction run just on the basic model a Chinese look alike hit the market. We tested the Chinese look alike and found it inferior in the two three area to even our first prototype build. Our lawyers were also looking into patent infringement issues with this Chinese product. However do its poor performance I do not believe they pushed the issue very far.

[Ianwraab]

Trop trea.... U just made this more difficult....now ima be looking for a needle in a haystack... Just when I start gathering the scratch to build my own you me
Ake it seem like hmmm...

Oh well
, thanks for the input though

[TropTrea]

double posted

[TropTrea]

Originally Posted by Ianwraab

Trop trea.... U just made this more difficult....now ima be looking for a needle in a haystack... Just when I start gathering the scratch to build my own you me
Ake it seem like hmmm...

Oh well
, thanks for the input though

Building your own is in my mind always the best option.
Financialy you can do a better fixture for less as long as buy quality LED's .
Adoptability wise it is better as you can always modify it to meet changing needs.
Quality wise you can aways stay ahead of the comercial fixtures as do not have to wait for them to market the newest inovations.

The biggest cons is the time it requires for DIY projects. Dependent on your skills and the size of the build a LED fixture will take 4 to 16 hours of your time.

[Ianwraab]

Ok. I've decided to do the DIY to make sure I don't get screwed... Gonna be able to stay in budget... I hope...

I've got a degree in electronics so I'm looking forward to sitting down and getting to work...

I'm going to do a full build walk tru so stay tuned.

-R

[cdivine]

Originally Posted by jeffesaurusrex

Yep, looks like it's just a rebranded version of the eshine. I'll probably get this - for about $50 more apiece than the aquariumleds.com lights, you get lenses, cree leds, 30 more watts of power, and the ability to link the fixtures so there is only one power cable. Coincidentally the last part is also a con, because ideally there would be only two cords - one for actinic on both fixtures and one for whites, that way you can have an automatic dusk/dawn with timers.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Aqua-Pro-150...ht_3395wt_1163
Would this be equivalent to a 250 watt Halide? Do you guys think Three of the 3g units or the Ebay version using CREE would be enough over a 220 Gallon tank?

The single cord is a little bit annoying, but I like that you can link these together. I would probably supplement the dusk to dawn with led strips.