LED lighting

[Daschmidt]

so I am also an avid reef aquarium hobbyist and I noticed the other day that my LEDs light up my UVB testing cards. Specifically the ultraviolet purple LED bulbs the one that are around 420nanometer. Led technoligy is a newer technoligy in the reef trade and was wondering when it will come into play in the reptile trade. The lighting uses far less power and puts out less heat and doesn't have the par loss that UVB flourecent metal halide or pretty much any other light source. And like I said those little credit cards that test UVB power output glow darker than even my 60watt HO UVB bulb puts out brand new

 

[rambonerzilla]

Im.jusy gonna say hi and watch this thread. I almost bought led reef lighting to for like 75% off on letgo.... but I wasn't sure about the uvb and the seller wasn't either. I have test cards too and when I told Todd that from lightyourreptiles.com.... he ask how much I paid for them... I said 99 cents and he said ok well you didn't waste too much money. But I'm just gonna sit back and watch this bugger

 

[Daschmidt]

Thanks for the input Rambo yeah I'm hopeing someone will do a study one of these days let me know what your UVB card does when you get it fired up..

 

[pgr7]

The issue is that chams need a lower uv index that the reef leds don't provide yet I believe something along the lines of 290-315 nM.I've looked into this as well. It would be awesome.

 

[Carlton]

A good question for LYR...I think its come up before and the response was that the LED emits the wrong part of the UV spectrum.

 

[pgr7]

I think companies are looking into it though, as of now they are expensive and very large leds that can do it kinda, so it wouldn't be very effective as other leds are compared to bulbs.

 

[Daschmidt]

So I'm under the impression natural unfiltered sunlight is the best would anyone disagree this statement?? I'm sure there is always a few that might. sunlight at Earth's surface is around 52 to 55 percent infrared (above 700 nm), 42 to 43 percent visible (400 to 700 nm), and 3 to 5 percent ultraviolet (below 400 nm) so... I'm thinking it's just a matter of time supply and demand I think reef tanks are a bit more of a money maker in the industry over reptiles but we'll see I'm sure they'll be selling them left and right in a few years. Replacing bulbs every 6 months reminds me of what I used to do in the 90s in the reef trade