Over the past few decades I’ve see all kinds of lighting equipment, from the most simple to the most complicated in various commercial and industrial forms, including those utilized in the aquarium hobby. And in the past ten years, have seen companies working towards new forms of lamps designed to be amazingly efficient. And PFO is one of those companies! Not only do they have a wide selection of aquarium related metal halides and fluorescent lamps/fixtures, they are breaking ground with an amazing LED aquarium lighting hood that will revolutionize the industry.
Called the Solaris LED Hood, it will be available in lengths from 12 inches to 72 inches, and is only 8.5 inches wide with a height of only 3.75 inches. It will be capable of dialing in a color of light ranging from 6500K to 20,000K. And if that’s not good enough for you, there’s a built-in timer to control sunrise, sunset, daylight hours, cloud cover, and also its moon lights (450 nm), which can have a 28 day normal moon cycle if you wish! And since heat, such as what metal halides produce, is not the case with LED lamps, could very well be many aquariums equipped with the Solaris hood will not need a chiller! And considering its LED lamps are thought to have a 100,000 hour life and 70% Lumen Maintenance at 50,000 Hours, that equates to 6,250 days of use at 8 hours per day (about 17 years!) before a lamp replacement is needed! And from what I understand, lamps will only degrade slightly with age (30% degradation is not visible to the human eye) and simply burnout when their lifespan is reached! Furthermore, there will be two versions; one will have the intensity of 250 watt metal halides, and the second, 400 watt metal halides.
Its field test results are due in July/06 and will be posted on a website dedicated to this leading edge device www.solarisled.com.
Keep in mind they do not sell directly to hobbyists, so checkout your suppliers for PFO’s excellent products. And for further information and a look at the Solaris fixture, click on the forward pointing arrow below, then click on their website address to visit their site. You’ll be highly impressed!
Visit the PFO website at www.pfolighting.com for more information.
Bob Goemans