Reef Radiance 165p+

[REEF RADIANCE]

Ca and alk balance and stability will have a much stronger and more immediate impact on coral health than lighting. Read up on UV. you'll find very little science and a whole lot of conflicting opinions and anecdotes. One thing to remember. Look up led success stories. There are plenty. Only kessils contain UV light. The lions share of success stories are with radions and AI sols. No UV in either.

Lastly. Ignore manufacturer stats. Companies like reef breeders, reef radiance, ocean revive, ecotech radion, ai hydra 52, ghl, ect all claim to contain "x number of 420 nm UV's or x number of 400 nm UV's" in their lights. Those are all violet. Not UV. UV light is specifically that which falls BELOW 400 nm and is invisible to the human eye. That's just catchy marketing jargon on their part. Violet is more beneficial to photosynthesis than true UV is anyway. That's why if you look at a kessil multichip close up, a handful of black spots will appear amongst the array of colored diodes. Those black spots are actually 395 nm UV diodes. The eye cannot see it so they look like dead LEDs. They're not. Just FYI.

Hi Bpb,

Good point. However we don't advertise that we have UV on our lights because we don't. We advertise our lower NM actinics as Violet.

You can go to www.reefradiance.com and check every light on our site and you will not see any UV listed.

Rick

 

[REEF RADIANCE]

I loved my Reef Radiance for about 7 months. Good growth on all corals and made the tank looked great (full spectrum). The last month the blue channel on one light went out. Only had the white going. My corals on that side of the tank were not happy. I contacted Reef Radiance and was told that this is normal for their light but normally doesn't happen until one year or so. I couldn't believe what they told me. When I questioned further, they backed off a little on their statement but I have it in writing. Customer service took a few days each time to respond and said I would have to send the unit back (along with $59)and it would take a few weeks to repair. How am I going to be without half of my tank lighting for a couple of weeks. I asked them if I can buy a comparable light and they said that they are out of stock for a few weeks. I ended up buying I a different brand fixture and asked ReefRadiance who I send the light to (what address, what name etc) and have not heard back yet (over 2 weeks).
I get home today and the other Reef Radiance fixture malfunctioned again on the blue channel. So now I am down 2 Reef Radiance units and not getting any satisfaction from Reef Radiance. I did really like the lights when there're working.
Just wondering why both failed and they told me these had a history of failing after about a year. Who buys a $240+ fixture and only has it last for about a year. Disappointed!

Tanked - I responded to your other post on another forum - so the short version is - send me your name by PM or email or post it here - and I will look into this.

I cannot help you - or even respond - without a name.

And I will post my response here so the forum members can read our response.

Rick

 

[Wiz]

Nah. They're listed as royal blue on my 165p+. I would love to see a response to the blue channel being faulty because that would be very upsetting to my two new purchases. don't mean to offend but you could respond to that. so far you guys were right and I am very fond of my new LED's.

 

[REEF RADIANCE]

Nah. They're listed as royal blue on my 165p+. I would love to see a response to the blue channel being faulty because that would be very upsetting to my two new purchases. don't mean to offend but you could respond to that. so far you guys were right and I am very fond of my new LED's.

Hi Wiz,

I am not sure of any of the details on this guys post as it is 6pm and Charles is gone.

I have asked Charles to look into this and I will post tomorrow when I have the facts.

I don't know what lights he has but we have no issues with the DM-165p+ like this at all.

Like I said - I have asked Charles to give me a written response to this guys claims.

And I will post my response and that will be that.

Rick

 

[Wiz]

Good to hear thx rick

 

[REEF RADIANCE]

Good to hear thx rick

Like my mom used to say " the story is only complete when both sides have spoken " and I firmly believe this.

We care very much about our reputation and will always respond to posts like this.

And will this time.

Keep Reefing!

Rick

 

[Bpb]

Hi Bpb,

Good point. However we don't advertise that we have UV on our lights because we don't. We advertise our lower NM actinics as Violet.

You can go to www.reefradiance.com and check every light on our site and you will not see any UV listed.

Rick

I stand corrected. Maybe it's just nit picking on terminology, but I wish other companies would do the same and call violets "violets" lol.

 

[REEF RADIANCE]

I totally agree - this is the same type of hype that we see in many marketing campaigns from other light manufacturers as they run from buzzword to buzzword. It is very difficult to build and maintain an LED under 400 nm and if you create the wrong range of UV light - instead of helping your coral grow you can cause them to lose color and size and perhaps - if too much is used - to perish.

Here are the 3 types of Ultra Violet light that we and coral reefs are both exposed to - this varies of course on the location and time of year and time of day and weather and depth of water and other factors:

UVA: Wavelength: 315-399 nm. Not absorbed by the ozone layer.
UVB: Wavelength: 280-314 nm. Mostly absorbed by the ozone layer, but some does reach the Earth’s surface.
UVC: Wavelength: 100-279 nm. Completely absorbed by the ozone layer and atmosphere.



Very simply put UV rays can create both positive ( vitamin d production ) and negative ( sunburn ) on humans. Coral are also susceptible to UV and many times specific coral will create a mucus covering over their exterior to protect themselves from the harmful UV range.



I have been designing led lights for 6 years always with an eye to maximize coral growth and health and am not convinced the led UV technology exists that will guarantee no downside to the coral and at the same time will produce sufficient PAR to grow it. So I stick above 400 nm and our lights grow the heck out of coral.



Hope this helps.



Rick

 

[REEF RADIANCE]

I loved my Reef Radiance for about 7 months. Good growth on all corals and made the tank looked great (full spectrum). The last month the blue channel on one light went out. Only had the white going. My corals on that side of the tank were not happy. I contacted Reef Radiance and was told that this is normal for their light but normally doesn't happen until one year or so. I couldn't believe what they told me. When I questioned further, they backed off a little on their statement but I have it in writing. Customer service took a few days each time to respond and said I would have to send the unit back (along with $59)and it would take a few weeks to repair. How am I going to be without half of my tank lighting for a couple of weeks. I asked them if I can buy a comparable light and they said that they are out of stock for a few weeks. I ended up buying I a different brand fixture and asked ReefRadiance who I send the light to (what address, what name etc) and have not heard back yet (over 2 weeks).
I get home today and the other Reef Radiance fixture malfunctioned again on the blue channel. So now I am down 2 Reef Radiance units and not getting any satisfaction from Reef Radiance. I did really like the lights when there're working.
Just wondering why both failed and they told me these had a history of failing after about a year. Who buys a $240+ fixture and only has it last for about a year. Disappointed!

Dear Darrin,

I have received emails from customers in the past that did not accurately present the facts - but I will say that your posts here are about the most inaccurate and paint a picture that shows a very different set of circumstances from what really occurred.

What actually happened is that you got ( in one email you say traded and in another you say purchased for $229 and in another email to us you say you paid $240 ) two lights from a dealer in the fall of last year. You purchased or traded for a 2013 model that had been significantly upgraded - in 2014. So you would have a warranty that went until September of 2015.

You contacted us via the CONTACT US submittal form on our site instead of the service submittal form - so the very same day I emailed you this:

On Mar 6, 2015, at 5:29 PM, <[email protected]> <[email protected]> wrote:
Hi Darrin,

If you will take a second and fill out a Service Request Form on our site – this will get you in the system and we will have all the data in one spot.

Here is the link:

http://reefradiance.com/service-request-form.html

Since you bought it from a dealer we will need a copy of the invoice.

Thanks.

Rick

You then started to work with Charles - who emailed you within 24 hours of every single email. In addition Charles asked you - again - to provide an invoice as we cannot work on products unless we know that they are ours and have a proof of purchase. This is standard operating procedure for all companies and clearly posted on our website.

Charles did indeed say that we knew that - on a few of these older models - the blues could run into this issue. I have specifically directed the service department to be very transparent about any issues we know of with our products or any of the other manufacturers we sell. I really dislike when a customer service person automatically denies any issue with a product that you call them about.

His exact words were " it is a known issue in a small percentage of those lights that typically does not occur within the first year of use."

You had been asked twice at this point to send us an proof of purchase - once by me and once by Charles.

Since you had not provided it then ( and still have not ) and were demanding that the lights get fixed very quickly he offered you the option to get them fixed for a flat service rate of $59. This was only if they were our lights - so we still needed proof of purchase - which we asked you to provide on two occasions - but never received.

Remember - at this point we have no idea if these are our lights or not - and Charles was spending a lot of time trying to help you in any way he could.

But you would not - or could not provide proof or purchase so we were not able to do much.

On the 9th you asked if you could buy another light - Charles suggest the DM-132e which we had in stock.

On the 11th you said you wanted to wait to get the same brand light ( they were all the same brand - Reef Radiance ) and said you wanted to wait for our next shipment to come in.

On the 14th - you said you could not wait and bought something else. You said you wanted to ship the defective lights back.

We have asked for proof of purchase repeatedly and simply cannot help you without this - so there is really nothing more to say.

We have spent a lot of time working with you - to help you out - with no verification that you even have our product - and have responded within 24 hours of every email you sent us - with the exception of the last one as we cannot do anything without the appropriate paperwork and after asking for it twice - there was no reason to keep repeating ourselves.

Darrin,

What is sad to me is that you took a situation where a company jumped through hoops to help you - even though you may not have our lights at all and refused to cooperate by getting us a simple document to process a simple service claim. Then you posted a very inaccurate narrative that painted you as a victim of bad service and a company that sells bad products - nothing could be further from the truth.

And since our reputation matters to us very much - we are forced to respond and frankly could have spent the time doing productive things like designing new lights or perhaps working on someone's else's light that had taken the few moments necessary to process the necessary paperwork - just like everyone else does.

Rick