Cree vs. Bridgelux led's

[C5flyboy]

I am doing some research into swapping over to Led lighting and was looking at some DIY kits and wanted some input on different bulbs. One kit i am looking at uses 3w bridgelux led's and the other uses cree 3w led's. I know there is a lot of love out there for the crees and was wondering if anyone had any experience or input on the bridgelux bulbs?

[NickC5FE]

Gee Lee-glad to see you dont trust me ;-) Just kidding. I am sure you will hear a lot back from this community

[C5flyboy]

I have all the trust in the world in you Nick! just wanted a broad overview of opinions and hopefully there will be some good conversation that someone else will learn something too!

[NickC5FE]

I was playing and i am tuned in because i may just go full-LED on mama's tank......we shall see

[yh1185]

without going into crazy detail:

price (cree >>> bridgelux)
penetration (cree >>> bridgelux)
color choice (bridgelux >>> cree)
getting to say you have top of the line crees (cree >>> bridgelux)

Reality: Depending on what kind of tank, how big your tank is, and the penetration needed, that should be what determines which LED's your going to buy. As a person who has a cree setup, i would suggest at least throwing in 1-2 LEDs that aren't white/blue. The reds on some of my acans are kind of fading, so i'm looking to buy a bridelux (or another brand) LED stunner strip of some sort. If your doing DIY, what i'd do is mix both bridgelux and cree. Have 1 driver with cree's for the penetration and such and have 1 driver for bridgelux for variety and save you on some cost. (of course if your getting a bigger setup you can adjust the ratio of bridgelux to cree, but i wouldn't put them on the same drivers) Good luck!

[C5flyboy]

Thanks for the input yh! I have a 54 corner tank that I want to change over to LED and want to be able to support an anemone, hopefully a Gigantea so want to make sure I have enough light to support whatever type I finally go with.

[SchnitzelReef]

Save yourself the money and go with bridgelux. I know people will tell you how Cree is the best led in the world, which may be partially true, but BL can't be beat for the price. The Cree LEDs are more efficient in that they produce more lumens per watt. However the BL are still way more efficient than T5s or MH. And of course there is no other lighting system that will give you color customization like LEDs. Also BL LEDs will penetrate just as much as a Cree. It really depends on what degree optics you are using.

Basically, if you want the best then go with Cree. If your on a budget, and you want to save some money, then go with the second best..Bridgelux.

Good luck

(ps- don't believe all the crap that you have to have double the amount of BL LEDs to match the Crees. That is 100% not true. As a matter of fact I have noticed that most people that run Crees have them dimmed to 60-70%....well crap they are probably as bright as my bridgelux at 100%)


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[ghellin]

I vote Cree since I am a Cree user myself. My tank is in my living room so silence is key, so running Cree LEDs at 70% generates little to no noticeable heat on my heatsinks so fans are not required. I also have the added comfort that I don't have to worry about fans going out and my LED fixture over heating and going out on me. As far as ratio for bridgelux LEDs I believe most will agree its closer to 3BL:2Cree.

[pwreef]

With the new XTE costing a little over $3 each I don't see how Bridgelux is really that attractive anymore. If you are thinking aqua style def stay away from 10K ones. Your tank will look sterile. Personally I am switching from those to Crees neutral/RB XTE.

[C5flyboy]

Do any of you that are currently running bridgelux or Cree led's have any pics you could post?

[viper12775]

i had cree fixtures a few years back and they were great untill i did a diy setup with bridgelux the color of the lux leds looked so much better imo i sold the crees and went all bridgelux

[NickC5FE]

Looking at the aquastyle.com diy kits. They seem too good to be true. And it will be for my wifes 20 gallon long so i think the 24 led kit should be fine.....?

[ghellin]

Tank pic with 26 XP-E RB and 14 XP-G CW/NW.

http://i737.photobucket.com/albums/xx12/ghellin/The%2058/NikonD3100056.jpg

[viper12775]

you cant go wrong with aquastyle led kits the only problem with them is the dimming pots are hit or miss but you can get them at radioshack for 5 bucks each and still be way under the price of any other kit and just as good

[C5flyboy]

Nice tank GHELLIN!! The RBTA really looks nice under those! One of the things I like most about the LED lighting is the way it makes the coraline algae really come out. I love that purple contrasting everything in the tank! I would be nice to see a Bridgelux setup to compare with for conversation sake. What do you think would be a good ratio of blue to white bulbs in a canopy and then any violets or cyan? Also would a mix of 10000K and 6500k and 4500K bulbs for a setup to sustain SPS and anemones?

[C5flyboy]

Viper are you referring to the LED driver for the aquastyle kits or the manual dimmer rheostats?

[pwreef]

Viper, would you care to elaborate on what Cree LEDs you had before and which Bridgelux do you find to be superior color?

[ghellin]

Thank c5flyboy!

2:1 RB to white. I also like doing 50:50 CW to NW this eliminates the need for red LEDs. I plan on ordering 8 violets and 5 blue next week to add to the fixture, this is just experimental but should yield good results.

[SchnitzelReef]

http://img.tapatalk.com/6c59c622-e9a0-1e80.jpg

I don't know where u can get Crees for $3/led. I paid like under a dollar for my bridgelux. Ray over at aquastyle hooked me up. I ran 90 LEDs over my mixed reef 180 gallon. I did 60 royal blue, 15-10000k white, 10-6500k white, and 5-4500 k white. I think I should have done more 6500k. The 6500k looks pure white, where the 10000k looks white with a slight blue tint. I think if you do all 10000k white ur tank will look almost purple. In person my tank looks a lot more natural colored, almost a Radium 20k color. I made my heat sink out of c channel and it doesn't get hot at all, even at 100%. I think people used to make a lot of false statements saying that you need 2 b-lux LEDs to 1 Cree. But now that a lot of people are using the b-lux, they are finding out first hand that those statements are not true. I am going to add 26 more LEDs to my fixture, but not because it's not bright enough, it's to attempt full spectrum. I'm gunna add 5-6500, 5-royal blue, 4- regular blue, 8-420nm actinic, and probably like 4- cyan or green. I prolly won't be running optics on any of those colored LEDs. I actually had to remove a lot of my optics because the LEDs were too powerful. Another thing is buying bridgelux you can afford to buy more LEDs and spread them even across your tank. I have zero shadows in my tank. I went from 3-250w MHs and 2-54w t5s and I honestly can't tell a diff. I have 2 clams, acros, bubble tip nems and do far they are all doing great.



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[ghellin]

Here XT-E for $3.40.
http://www.rapidled.com/cree-xt-e-royal-blue-3w-led/

For larger orders cutter gives nice price breaks that will get you at or below $3 per LED.

To compare the bridgelux and Cree as far as what equals what. Per the data sheet a bridgelux 6500k @700 mA will provide 180 lumens, a R5 Cree XP-G at the same 700mA is about 250 lumens. So no it does not take two bridgelux to equal one Cree but the 3 bridgelux to 2 Cree is a fair estimate. Now this is only while running the XP-G at 700mA, if you drive them to the full 1.5A you can get about 470 lumens where the bridgelux maxed out at the 180. So if this were the case 2 bridgelux would not even equal the output of one Cree XP-G. Main point here is how do you plan on running your setup, everyone has a different path of getting to the same end goal.

[wrx1908]

aquastyle was a good buy for me and ray is a good dude

[viper12775]

i mean the rheostat never had any problems with the drivers and the fixture i had used cree xpe 460nm and 10k i didnt care for the color of the crees the bridglux 460 and 10k look better to me the cree 10k got more yellow the brighter i made them the 460 was just blue. all bridgelux leds came from ray at aquastyle not sure of the model# of the bridgelux

[BigCountry74]

Bridglux.

Of course my buddy I grew up with runs his own commercial lighting company and he competes againts Cree....so he has brainwashed me...haha!
:D

[C5flyboy]

In the pics from Schnitzelreef and WRX1908 that the Aquastyle seems to have more of a blue color than the Cree setups. Grant it that could just be from the camera but since it was two different setups with the same overall hue it stands to reason it's not the camera. Could it possibly be from the number of 10000K bulbs used in the setups? Schnitzelreef had mentioned the the 10000K had more of a blue color and wished he had put more 6500K because they have more of an actual white color. Can anybody else attest to this? Oh and what degree lens is everybody using over their LEDs? I was thing of using 60 degree lenses. Think that is good or should it be a mix of different degree lenses?

I think thus far reading everyones inputs and seeing pics both brands are really good. Ghellin is right I think in saying we all just take different paths to get the same end result it's just how you decide you want to get there.

Oh and really nice tanks guys thanks for the pics! I'll put up a pic of my tank currently this afternoon. It doesn't have LEDs yet but since everyone is putting up their tanks for scrutiny I'll put mine up too;)

[SchnitzelReef]

Everyone always asks the optic question, and there is no exact answer! its not like if u run 50 leds then u run 60 degree optics. It really depends on how many leds your running, the height of your tank, and the height of ur fixture from ur water. EXAMPLE: my tank is 24" tall, im running 90 leds, and my fixture is close to 8" off of my water. So i am running 80degree optics. Personally the optics made my tank look ALOT brighter, however i noticed some of my corals started bleaching, so i took off alot of the optics. The optcis above the clams, sps, and Nems i left on and a few spread thru out the tank. Id say i prolly removed around half of the optics. hope this helps

also what ur saying about the bridgelux being blue is not true. doesnt matter what fish tank i take a pic of my Iphone makes it look SUPER blue...its just the cheap cameras. If i had taken a pic with a nice camera and edited it like most people do, you could see the real color of my tank. But trust me to 10000k is way too blue..go with an even mix of 6500 and 10000k. If u like 20k look better than add more 10000k. If u like the 14-16k look, then add more 6500k. Just make sure no matter what u do a 2:1-Blue:white

[C5flyboy]

Thanks SchintzelReef! I kind of figured it was the camera thing making the blue. I know unless I use my DSLR for pics of my tank they are really really blue. Even with the DSLR they have a blue tint to them but way less so.

I have a 54 corner tank and it's approx 18 to 20ish inches deep (I need to get an exact measurement). I'm thinking about getting the 48 LED DIY kit from Aquastyle for the change to LED lighting and putting the 60 degree optics on it. Does that sound like I'm looking at about the right amount of bulbs and optic angle?

[C5flyboy]

Here is a pic of my tank now. It will probably be two to three weeks before i'm able to get the LED's and put them together but I'll put some comparison photos up when I do.

[SchnitzelReef]

that is a good looking tank dude! i had a 55g corner tank awhile ago. I just got frustrated with it being so small, my new 180 fixed that lol. IMO i think 48 would be PLENTY. you will be able to get an even spread and you will probably end up dimming them down to 80%. which is good to help prolong the life. What kind of heatsink are u doing? if i were u, i would REALLY consider the c channel heatisnk. Its super easy to make and mine is working fantastic. The reason i say u should in particular is because of the awkward dimensions. U can cut the c channel to fit to the exact dims of the top of ur tank. I bought all my stuff from Home Depot. As far as optics goes, with that many LEDs on that small of a tank i would i go with 80. Unless of course u plan on hanging ur light really high. In my tank i have mainly LPS and softys, and the 80 degree optics were too much. Also on ur color choice if u go with Aquastyle i would recommend doing :

32-Royal Blue
8-6500k
5-10000k
3-4500k
(if u like the 20k look, then id consider maybe 7:6500, 7:10000k, and 2 4500k. Make sure if u use the 4500k, do not use the optic. It will look like a yellow spotlight. With out the optic though it looks sweet.)
I think that would be awesome. On my setup i havent been able to dimm my leds yet cuz im waiting on my apex to come in, and im REALLY surprised because my tank looks awesome with all LEDs @ 100%. Most people either do too much blue or too much white, and they will have to dimm one or the other to be able to get the color they like. I hit it right on the head with my color choice. That was my next question, do u have an apex? or any controller? or are u planning on getting one in the future?

[ghellin]

Yep it takes a great camera to get good pics, my wife actually complains saying my tank is too blue LOL.

Oh and it can be blue.
http://i737.photobucket.com/albums/xx12/ghellin/The%2058/NikonD3100170.jpg

[C5flyboy]

Thanks Schnitzelreef! I had a lot of help from a buddy of mine NickC5guy on the first page of this thread getting started.

I came up with almost identical numbers for the bulb ratio with a 48 bulb setup though I think i'm going to go with your numbers because I have no experience in the LED world yet. As far as the LED driver goes I was thinking of using Meanwell ELN-60-48P driver x 2 and a DDC-01 controller from Rapid LED. It looks to be a easy setup with the three built in auto sunrise to sunset programs in it. And I think i'll put 2 extra bulbs for moonlights with a seperate moonlight driver set to come on a little bit before the daytime controller kicks off for the night. Sound like i'm on the right track or should I be turning somewhere in there?

Ghellin that is wild dude! I took some pics of my tank today at lunch with my phone and my DSLR and my phone was dark and blue and the DSLR was really bright and blue but that's what Lightroom is for ;)

[ghellin]

Yep this is why dimmable is a must on LED builds you can dial in your perfect color!

[SchnitzelReef]

def go with dimmable. The ELN 60-48P driver will work with that controller, But if u ever want to get an Apex i would go with the ELN 60-48D driver. It works perfectly with the APEX... And No matter which color ratio u go with, remember u are trying to get it as close as possibe to what u think perfect will be. But since u have the dimmer, u can control the colors and tweak it to be exactly what u want. good luck

[C5flyboy]

What exactly is an Apex? I'm completely new to the led world. how is it different from the controller I mentioned earlier? Are they better and do they differ in operation?

[NickC5FE]

Lee, an APEX or RKL are digital aquarium controllers capable of running lights, feeders, pumps, heaters etc all in one simple digital controller. They are pretty badazz!

[ghellin]

I run an apex, I can control my entire tank from my phone. Plus it graphs all my parameters!

[SchnitzelReef]

an apex is a controller made by neptune, it will controll the ELN D ballasts. Thats the route i went

[joelespinoza]

Here is pics of my tank and details of my cree setup. Its fairly new so growth isnt there yet and the tank is foggy, but you can get a general idea: http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2160939