Jebao ML-60 for Fluval 13.5

[BurgerFish]

My tank looked great with the AquaKnight A029 light for 3.5 years, until it degraded and eventually failed. I replaced the A029—which, by the end, could only grow algae, dinos, and cyano—with the Kessil A80 Tuna Blue. That turned out to be a poor decision: the light was very weak, the colors were unimpressive, and the shimmer effect was distracting in such a small tank. The A80 could barely support even mushrooms.

So, I decided to replace the Kessil with the Jebao ML-60. For the same price, I got a much more powerful light—with better colors, better spread, and a Wi-Fi controller.

Of course, the color and contrast still don’t come close to my main tank with 8 T5 bulbs. Even a 60W LED can’t light a 13.5-gallon tank as well as 8 T5s light up a 90-gallon. But compared to the Kessil, the Jebao is far superior.

The fixture itself is silent, and the controller works in AP mode, but it doesn’t connect directly to my Wi-Fi (not even to 2.4GHz). However, both AP mode and Bluetooth work fine. It does have a distracting “disco ball” effect, but I fixed that by setting the red and green LEDs to 0.

The default color settings weren't good for my tank, and the fan runs even when the fixture is turned off.

I attached some pictures, but the light must be tunned for better colors. It wont be complicated.

 

[Rocks reef]

It is pretty hard to compare the spread and coverage of an 8 bulb T5 to a single point LED light source.

 

[Rocks reef]

They do make smaller T5 units that you could put over the Fluval

 

[BurgerFish]

It is pretty hard to compare the spread and coverage of an 8 bulb T5 to a single point LED light source.

The color and contrast of 8 bulb T5 is far superior. Kessil and Jebao leds are not even close.

They do make smaller T5 units that you could put over the Fluval

Smallest T5 bulb is 24 inch? Is way to big for 13.5g tank. It'll lit whole room.