Cheaper lighting

[turtlewax2020]

Sorry I’m probably going to get tore apart for this but Does anyone have any input on these type of lights? Does anyone here use them on their reefs? I’m just curious because I cannot afford a 600$ each light right now and I’m just looking for a budget friendly option

sorry I’m new to the whole posting in a forum page so I’m not exactly sure what I am doing.

 

[MoshJosh]

I don't have personal experience, but some people report success with "Chinese black box lights" (think that's what people tend to call them). In my search for "cheap" reef lighting, I landed on T5's, went with an amazon T5 fixture and ATI bulbs. Look up "Tidal Gardens T5", they have a few good videos about their setup and T5 lighting in general.

 

[exnisstech]

Not those but I have run black boxes from Mars aqua and LPS did fine. Noop psyche lights look interesting and get some decent reviews tho I have a not used them

 

[turtlewax2020]

Not those but I have run black boxes from Mars aqua and LPS did fine. Noop psyche lights look interesting and get some decent reviews tho I have a not used them

All I am doing is a softy and lps with torches that about it really. No sps ever. Just not interested in them.

 

[turtlewax2020]

I don't have personal experience, but some people report success with "Chinese black box lights" (think that's what people tend to call them). In my search for "cheap" reef lighting, I landed on T5's, went with an amazon T5 fixture and ATI bulbs. Look up "Tidal Gardens T5", they have a few good videos about their setup and T5 lighting in general.

Yea I have a par meter available to me also that I am going to check it with. Tank is still cycling and almost done.

 

[Eagle_Steve]

There is thread dedicated to these lights. Lots of info and results for the lights.

Here is the link to it.

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/smat-farms-led-from-amazon.843957/page-16#post-10132805

 

[mdb_talon]

As @Eagle_Steve posted there is a huge thread with lots of info on them.

I use lots of cheap lights on my tanks and recently got a few of these. In many ways i like them a lot. The wifi master/slave functionality is great when using multiples and not often found on cheap lights. Definetely more than good enough to grow coral and get the colors you want.

The one thing i really dislike about them and why i likely wont buy more is the inability to have a program that turns off specific channels completely for portions of the day. I like to have the last couple hours of cycle only blue and uv lights. With these i can adjust each channel intensity to get the color mix i want, bit it uses the same color mix the entire day. I can use the sunrise/sunset modes to have intensity ramp up/down over whatever length of time i want, but not able to set it so that at 8pm all whites go off but blue stay on for example. That is what i have found qt least and if anyone can correct me i would be very grateful lol. If that is not a concern for you i would say these are some of the best lights for the $$$ you can buy.

 

[Eagle_Steve]

As @Eagle_Steve posted there is a huge thread with lots of info on them.

I use lots of cheap lights on my tanks and recently got a few of these. In many ways i like them a lot. The wifi master/slave functionality is great when using multiples and not often found on cheap lights. Definetely more than good enough to grow coral and get the colors you want.

The one thing i really dislike about them and why i likely wont buy more is the inability to have a program that turns off specific channels completely for portions of the day. I like to have the last couple hours of cycle only blue and uv lights. With these i can adjust each channel intensity to get the color mix i want, bit it uses the same color mix the entire day. I can use the sunrise/sunset modes to have intensity ramp up/down over whatever length of time i want, but not able to set it so that at 8pm all whites go off but blue stay on for example. That is what i have found qt least and if anyone can correct me i would be very grateful lol. If that is not a concern for you i would say these are some of the best lights for the $$$ you can buy.

I second the not changing the colors to off throughout the light cycle. If this can be done, please let us know lol. I use one for my coral QT and it would be nice to just have the blue, as @mdb_talon mentioned to see how some corals are looking under all blue lol.