High Tide Aquatics

Kessil lights, MH equivalent

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sfsuphysics

Supporting Member
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Ok those who own Kessils, either the 150s or the 350s, what sort of MH equivalent (assume bluer bulbs and not those "PAR buster" 6500-10000K spectrum bulbs) are they? 150w? 250w? My 250w MHs are probably on their way out, and I'm looking to replace them with LEDs and I'm torn between Kessils and a DIY fixture (depends how much effort I really want to put into it). Currently I have a couple T5 bulbs (blue) and 2 -250w MH bulbs over my 4' x 3' tank, at $400 a pop per Kessil 350 it could get awfully expensive to replace them.
 
I have a kessil 350 and quite honestly for me I went back to my halides for my sps. I moved my kessil over my lps and zoa tank and am very happy with it that way. I just didnt like the way my sps tank was looking with the kessil's. Just my own preference.
 
LOVE, LOVE, LOVE my A350's!!! Going to get 3 more when I can afford them. Not really sure how to compare them to MH? I have only used 150w MH in the past and these are easily as good as 150's. I am guessing they compare well to 250w as the LED's are INTENSE. I have had them on 100% power though for over a month now and everything is loving them. How deep is your tank? If it is 20" or less I would think you could use the A350 wide and get away with only two or three of them. They cover a lot of space. However they are not nearly as intense as the normal A350. I get a good 2' spread on the narrow A350 and closer to 3' on the wide. Also depends on how high you place them.

You are certainly welcome to come check them out in person sometime if you want. They have a bunch on display at Neptune, Diablo and a few at All about fish. No heat, quiet and bright. Only wish would be for more controllability for ramping up and down. I had one of the lights start to flicker a little and contacted Kessil. They explained how to clean the fan and were ready to replace the unit right away. I opted to try the cleaning and haven't had it flicker since. Nice to know they were ready to give me a new one though.

Good luck on the decision, but I don't think you will regret it.
 
I'm still not sold on the Kessil's as the amount of coverage per dollar is still greater with a LED kit. I like the idea of getting better value for my money. However, I can't disagree with the presentation/packaging/housing of the A350's.
 
tankguy said:
I have a kessil 350 and quite honestly for me I went back to my halides for my sps. I moved my kessil over my lps and zoa tank and am very happy with it that way. I just didnt like the way my sps tank was looking with the kessil's. Just my own preference.
Click to expand...

Oh, please tell me more. I've been thinking about pushing to get a few of these for a work tank.

If you want to do it via email, that's fine with me :)
 
Kmooresf said:
You are certainly welcome to come check them out in person sometime if you want. They have a bunch on display at Neptune, Diablo and a few at All about fish. No heat, quiet and bright. Only wish would be for more controllability for ramping up and down.
Click to expand...
Well I've seen them before, Jess had a couple over a frag tank at one of the meetings, although lighting corals with them for what is usually a short term really doesn't sell me vs. a long term over your tank type of thing. I was just wondering if anyone simply replaced a MH of x-watts and kept it at that. The controllability is something that does bug me too, either off or on isn't the most ideal of thing, I mean granted my MH bulbs are off or on, but I still have T5s, the idea would be to have "blue" and white channels that change over time even if it's as simple as only blue on, then both, then only blue again. Also looking at the Razor unit from Maxspect

denzil said:
I'm still not sold on the Kessil's as the amount of coverage per dollar is still greater with a LED kit. I like the idea of getting better value for my money. However, I can't disagree with the presentation/packaging/housing of the A350's.
Click to expand...
True, I'm usually the king of cheapska... er value oriented shopping ;) Hell I built a Lumenarc reflector from scratch just to save $50-60 or so. Although at 90 watts, you're looking at 24 LEDs, at about $4.50 each, that's $108, then a couple of drivers for each one, that's another $100, a heat sink probably $25-50 range, you're over halfway to the cost. But we'll see.
 
BAYMAC said:
tankguy said:
I have a kessil 350 and quite honestly for me I went back to my halides for my sps. I moved my kessil over my lps and zoa tank and am very happy with it that way. I just didnt like the way my sps tank was looking with the kessil's. Just my own preference.
Click to expand...

Oh, please tell me more. I've been thinking about pushing to get a few of these for a work tank.

If you want to do it via email, that's fine with me :)
Click to expand...
Not sure what else there is to say , i just didnt care for the kessil over my sps. Others have liked it , I just didnt
 
No experience with the Kessil 350 but the 150 seems about the equivalent of a 150w MH.. At least the 'Sky Blue 10k'(actually 12-14k IMO) model does. The 'Ocean Blue 15k'(actually 20-22k++) model seems significantly less powerful than an 150w 20k Ushio/Radium MH bulb.

For small tanks, the A150 is great. For anything over 15-20 gallons, I'd go with AI Sols any day. My corals and fish aren't really into the full blown disco scene... Would be interested to see the 350 vs. an AI Sol. Anyone have hands on experience with both? Not interested in numbers or anything like that.

^ Just observations...Nothing systematic or scientific ;)
 
tankguy said:
BAYMAC said:
tankguy said:
I have a kessil 350 and quite honestly for me I went back to my halides for my sps. I moved my kessil over my lps and zoa tank and am very happy with it that way. I just didnt like the way my sps tank was looking with the kessil's. Just my own preference.
Click to expand...

Oh, please tell me more. I've been thinking about pushing to get a few of these for a work tank.

If you want to do it via email, that's fine with me :)
Click to expand...
Not sure what else there is to say , i just didnt care for the kessil over my sps. Others have liked it , I just didnt
Click to expand...

I guess I was looking for the why behind the what. You didn't care for the color rendition? Dion't care for the disco effect? Didn't like the flicker? etc no worries, sounds like you don't want to get that deep. You're the first to that I have seen to say this so I am very curious. I value your input :D
 
I have been 100% kessil over all of my tanks now for maybe 2 months maybe longer.... My sps has a tendency to morph a tad but not any more than any other led light on the market so far that Ive seen. I wont say Kessil is the best or worse light but from all the testing we did with AI, reef brite and with kessil I decided to do the whole store in kesssil.


As for SPS i was skeptic at first because up until kessil released the A350 i hadnt been 100% impressed with sps under leds(besides reefbrite but its too much $$ to light up a frag system with strips) We had a few tanks (customers) running AI sols and we were supplementing the tanks with T5s to get proper color out of the corals from the switch. I have noticed the LEDs also tend to morph lps (acans especially) reds/ornages tend to go back and forth . If this gets to bouncy of a read just give me a call i talk way better than i right.

I have all of our sps under LEDS and i can tell you if you seen some of the browned out sps pieces and wild caught pieces thatw e get and how quick i can get them to initially start to color up you would be impressed. I am sometimes still,lol...


I think LEDS have some more room to expand but i think for what kessil brings to the table @400 a light they are still probally best bang for buck( lightitself, customer service,a nd warranty) plus theyu are local for us!!
 
BAYMAC said:
tankguy said:
BAYMAC said:
tankguy said:
I have a kessil 350 and quite honestly for me I went back to my halides for my sps. I moved my kessil over my lps and zoa tank and am very happy with it that way. I just didnt like the way my sps tank was looking with the kessil's. Just my own preference.
Click to expand...

Oh, please tell me more. I've been thinking about pushing to get a few of these for a work tank.

If you want to do it via email, that's fine with me :)
Click to expand...
Not sure what else there is to say , i just didnt care for the kessil over my sps. Others have liked it , I just didnt
Click to expand...

I guess I was looking for the why behind the what. You didn't care for the color rendition? Dion't care for the disco effect? Didn't like the flicker? etc no worries, sounds like you don't want to get that deep. You're the first to that I have seen to say this so I am very curious. I value your input :D
Click to expand...
I gotcha now , sorry. I didnt like the way my sps colored under the kessil. As jess stated all his are and he likes it. Im sure others do too. For me , I think my sps looks more colorful under the 250W halides that im using. Im just not completely sold on LED's for sps. Having said that i also feel that lps tanks will be awesome under kessils. I have a 20L and with the kessil 350 my zoa's and lower light chalices are doing killer.
 
sfsuphysics said:
True, I'm usually the king of cheapska... er value oriented shopping ;) Hell I built a Lumenarc reflector from scratch just to save $50-60 or so. Although at 90 watts, you're looking at 24 LEDs, at about $4.50 each, that's $108, then a couple of drivers for each one, that's another $100, a heat sink probably $25-50 range, you're over halfway to the cost. But we'll see.
Click to expand...

Haha, I was actually looking at the AquaStyle kit which should put me out $170 + 52 shipping (shipping seems a little higher than I expected). I guess it's just hard for me to justify spending that much on a single LED. LED's, by design, are very much directional so I'm not entirely convinced that the spread from an A350 is really "efficient." My thinking is having more LED's over the same area makes more sense (for me).
 
I started out with two A150s (the 10k version) and right off the bat supplemented that with a ReefBrite 50/50 to get rid of the spotlight and shadows. This is over a 36x18x24 tank. I liked the color of the light but it didn't do much for SPS in my opinion. My LPS did great and I got good growth but SPS never really colored up that much and growth was slow to nonexistent. I replaced the A150s with A350s (narrow) over the last 3 months and the SPS has started coloring up and I'm seeing new growth on the SPS. I still have the ReefBrite in there and I'll probably add a DIY LED blue strip down the road but as it sits right now I'm very happy with the A350s. They don't hit PG&E/Solar as hard and I have little problems with heat in the tank.

I'd say the bump in light definitely helped the color but I'm only speculating on the growth. I've been dinking around with my CA and ALK for a while and changed several things in the tank over the last 6 months that all could have played a part in the growth.

~Charlie
 
Piper said:
I started out with two A150s (the 10k version) and right off the bat supplemented that with a ReefBrite 50/50 to get rid of the spotlight and shadows. This is over a 36x18x24 tank. I liked the color of the light but it didn't do much for SPS in my opinion. My LPS did great and I got good growth but SPS never really colored up that much and growth was slow to nonexistent. I replaced the A150s with A350s (narrow) over the last 3 months and the SPS has started coloring up and I'm seeing new growth on the SPS. I still have the ReefBrite in there and I'll probably add a DIY LED blue strip down the road but as it sits right now I'm very happy with the A350s. They don't hit PG&E/Solar as hard and I have little problems with heat in the tank.

I'd say the bump in light definitely helped the color but I'm only speculating on the growth. I've been dinking around with my CA and ALK for a while and changed several things in the tank over the last 6 months that all could have played a part in the growth.

~Charlie
Click to expand...
Thanks for the info, it seems the A150s are great for display, but not for exactly the best for intensity, where as the 350s do crank that up significantly. I do have LEDs over my anemone/frag/random junk tank, and the softies definitely grow (some are under nothing but royal blue) and the anemones seem to be flourishing under whites and blues... I do have a couple pieces of digitata and poccilipora that looks fine, not sure it's growing terribly well though, but these are basically some home made Cree jobbers, the "enough to keep it alive" level.

The tank now is 24" deep, although the next tank will be a little bit shallower, but it will have significantly more surface area. And while I can do MHs, I'd rather not have THAT many over it. Plus not knowing the configuration of the system I might be able to get away with less light just over the areas where corals will be. But I do need to change out my bulbs or come up with a new lighting solution now though.
 
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