I have been in the bowfishing game now for a year and currently in the process of buying a new boat /mud motor and need advise. I am running 150w HPS lights and was curious is anyone having luck with the LED lights or any other light that will draw less current? Halogen is out of the question.

I run 29 27 watt LEDs on 12 volt power. I love them

I run 16 50w led seeliteleds on 120v. I use the true warm light which is 3000k your hps are around 2400-2800k depending on which ones you have. The K is the color so as you see the true warm are about the same as the hps. I use to run 8 150w hps with caps but did not like them on clear water( a little to yellow) so I added some 6500k leds to the mix. On my new boat I knew the 3000k lights ( not as yellow as the hps but still yellow tinted) would work well on clear and murky water.
Your amp draw on leds is alot less than hps you just take how many watts your light and divide it by what power source 12v 24v or 120v. As you know with hps you have a ballist which will require a higher amp draw to get the light up to operation. I have seen cheap 150w hps draw as much as 6amps on start up and balace out around 2amps.

I been running nothing but 300w Halo's and to me chit ya can't beat em for the price and if one breaks (which hardly ever happens) go to lowes and pick up a new one. But I ran across a deal on some 400W HPS and MH and we going to run them this yr.

I've been in em all and I've tried a couple of the 27w LEDs and didn't like them and its like deltduckbuster said about them they great lights but you got to have a bunch of them. Now I've fished over the same ones that missile has and those that he has is great!!!! But then you got to ask yourself do ya want to spend that kind of money. Yeah they look good and they maybe a touch better then the HALO's but man I can't bite that bullet. It's just not that serious for me.

IMO if you have a boat that you can haul the load and got the money to drop on 6 of the 250W or 400W HPS lights. Nothing out there beats em in stain water!!! If you shoot a bunch of clear water go MH.

Your going to need a lot of LED's to beat my 400 Watt HPS lights....my boat has the brightest lights that I have ever shot over. Judging from the pictures I would say that the LED lights are really nipping the heels of the HPS lights.

I haven't shot off a boat with them LED's yet so I'm not sold on them yet. And they are very expensive. I do like that they draw less amps off the generator but if you need twice as many to get the same amount of light then what is the point? Most people go to LED so they dont have to run a generator at all. I will say though that LED lights dont have the bulb burnout problem that the HPS has. I have to remove my bulbs when trailering or else they break the fixtures.

I think its the style of bulb I am using. Its not from them coming out of the sockets.

Show me one like ya talking about brother.

I don't think LED's can penetrate the water like HPS lights. At least not in my area.

My set up is for two honda 2000i generators. I also run two 55amp powermax convertors for the trolled. I split the load on the two generators and keep them on econo. You barely hear them running setting under the seat.
I have shot over 400 250 and 150hps also over metal halides. The seelite true warm are awesome on murky water I would rate them just under the 400hps. The leds don't wast a lot of light and are much easier on your eyes. I have tried other leds that sucked they were to white normally 5500-6500 k.
I choose not to go silent just for the fact I run convertors. I can fish all day and night with no worries of dead batteries.
On the fact that I run 16 lights well I overkilled big time I got 12 on the front and 4 on the rear. I have the rear removable for day time river fishing. I could of gotten by with four across the front and three down each side. The rear are just for shits and giggles and to help me see when I drive while others shoot.
I shoot some really muddy water in my local rivers.

missle, do you say that those seelites penetrate basically as good as a 250hps light?

Yea I'm starting over completely, and basically don't know which way to go

I did my remote ballast box myself but it is a bit of a pain. Needless to say it was a serious lesson in wiring...lol



My new boat will have 6 400 Watt HPS lights and a remote ballast box.

The trend to me seems to be that:
A. those that have SEELITES love em
B. those that haven't fished behind them don't have the right to comment
C. Those that want em and don't have em need to get a set ordered, you won't be diapointed.
I fished behind em all and I wouldn't have anything else, ran a guide service for 4 years and will be glad to switch from what I had to these.
Old lights were.
175 Econolight MH....



It's not slow....its big...and you just see it for a long time.

What are these seelites yall are talking about?

Personally I think you are going to cook your battery or put too much unnecessary strain on the generator. Run the lights 12V run the troller 12V run two generators one for troller and one for lights with IOTA-12-55 Volt Convertors off each of them to charge. That gives you the option of running for a couple hours without batteries and then turning on the generators and running for the rest of the night with them or until the batteries are topped off then running without them for a while.

Bottom line if you are asking for one generator to do too much work. 2000WATT Generators are not meant to charge trolling motor batteries and power lights. Unless you have two of them. You will fight the thing the entire time.

Hope that helps

Missle will have some other helpful advice I'm sure because he has been down that road.

Thanks, Missile, for all of your help on the light setup. Once I put together my system and try it out, I will post the results for the benefit of all.

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No problem if you got anymore questions give me a call.

This is an update. I have ten 500 Watt LED lights on a 110 volt system that pulls 5.2 amps total. My 2000 Watt inverter generator on economy runs it no problem. They are awesome.
Use a battery on the troller but when it is really shallow we take turns using the gator-tail to move the boat. Works like a charm.

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Dang! Yes. 50 Watt. Not 500.

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Update on lights I have been running 12 50 watt seelites now for nearly a year and love them I tried Custom fitz but after waiting a month and finally receiving the light I was pissed and had seelites in two days you can't beat the service and durability of the lights you truly get what you pay for.

Inverter Geny love the 50s and a buddy has the 100s they are even better very low profile


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