Smatfarm led color spectrum

[ikaros70]

Picked up a smatfarm led fixture off amazon, mostly due to the reviews I have seen on them and wanted to give one a try.
I have spent several days and countless hours playing with the channel settings and IMO just can’t get it to a color spectrum that looks good.
Current channel settings are set to what telegraham suggested. 20% 14k, 100% both blue channels, 100% purple, 20% 3k, 60% green. In the attached pic, the ends of tank have mars aqua led fixtures, very similar to Viparspectra. The middle fixture is the smatfarm. IMO, the smatfarm white channels are very yellow and overpowering all the other channels. Anyone else running the smatfarm reef lights and what are your experience with them. The color spectrum of the mars aqua fixtures and IMO worlds better then smatfarm.
Color spectrum of the mars aqua pops much better than the smatfarm.
I’m about to chuck the smatfarm in fire. Lol!
Spent a lot of time playing with the channels and just not happy with it.
The mars aqua only has 2 channels but color spectrum IMO is much better.

 

[ikaros70]

Also, smatfarm very much has disco ball affect, Mars aqua fixture no disco ball going, lol

 

[ikaros70]

I just contacted Amazon and they are sending me out a replacement.
Hopefully, I have better luck with the replacement.

 

[piranhaman00]

No disco ball from mine, I run all my channels at 35% and it’s perfect visually

 

[ikaros70]

Unfortunately, I didn’t have much luck with the led fixtures.
Amazon sent me replacements but just had the same issues.

 

[LeftyReefer]

Also, smatfarm very much has disco ball affect, Mars aqua fixture no disco ball going, lol

I think you are confusing SHIMMER with disco ball effect.

I find it hard to believe that a Smat Farm light which is known for having great spread, which has a puck style array with a dimpled fresnel lens would create more pronounced disco ball effect than a mars aqua black box, full of individual colored emitters, each with it's own individual 90 degree lens...... Not only is it hard to believe, it's just flat out wrong from my experience. I've never owned mars aqua lights, but I've had viparspectra, which is the same style light. Those need to be hung up high in order to not get disco ballling. No issue with the Smat Farm light.

The smat farm light has great spread, no disco ball that I have seen and great shimmer.

I think you have disco ball and shimmer confused.

 

[Pale Morning1]

I have been very happy with mine. I run the lights at 30,88,88,50,20,50.
still dialing them in but I do like the look.

 

[ikaros70]

I think you are confusing SHIMMER with disco ball effect.

I find it hard to believe that a Smat Farm light which is known for having great spread, which has a puck style array with a dimpled fresnel lens would create more pronounced disco ball effect than a mars aqua black box, full of individual colored emitters, each with it's own individual 90 degree lens...... Not only is it hard to believe, it's just flat out wrong from my experience. I've never owned mars aqua lights, but I've had viparspectra, which is the same style light. Those need to be hung up high in order to not get disco ballling. No issue with the Smat Farm light.

The smat farm light has great spread, no disco ball that I have seen and great shimmer.

I think you have disco ball and shimmer confused.

Not confused, I know what shimmer is.
I have been running MH since the mid-late 90’s. The led fixtures I have now shimmer, I would not consider them having a disco ball effect.
I grew up in the 80’s, I know what a disco ball looks like, lol! No old man jokes! ,

 

[codenfx]

No problems with mine, the colors look good to me but I have nothing to compare it to. I posted my setting with par meter on another thread which was 1/75/75/60/1/0. I have since tweaked it a bit to 3/77/77/60/3/0 and happy with it.

 

[minus9]

I like to run mine a little on the white side, so it’s set 55/100/100/100/20/20 no disco ball here either. And I’m currently running halides on my other tank.

 

[Steve Jewell]

I wanted to ramp up my lights and ramp them down. I had sunrise set for 2 hours and sunset set for 2 hours. Lights shut off at beginning of the sunset. I'm still trying to figure these things out!

 

[Who me?]

Not confused, I know what shimmer is.
I have been running MH since the mid-late 90’s. The led fixtures I have now shimmer, I would not consider them having a disco ball effect.
I grew up in the 80’s, I know what a disco ball looks like, lol! No old man jokes! ,

Try it with channel e, the 3K white channel, at zero. In my opinion, the 3K white creates both a disco ball effect and yellows the coloring. Even with that channel at 1%, it still is overwhelmingly yellow. Keeping the 3K off completely yields a really nice color spectrum.

 

[Dedicated Reefer]

Picked up a smatfarm led fixture off amazon, mostly due to the reviews I have seen on them and wanted to give one a try.
I have spent several days and countless hours playing with the channel settings and IMO just can’t get it to a color spectrum that looks good.
Current channel settings are set to what telegraham suggested. 20% 14k, 100% both blue channels, 100% purple, 20% 3k, 60% green. In the attached pic, the ends of tank have mars aqua led fixtures, very similar to Viparspectra. The middle fixture is the smatfarm. IMO, the smatfarm white channels are very yellow and overpowering all the other channels. Anyone else running the smatfarm reef lights and what are your experience with them. The color spectrum of the mars aqua fixtures and IMO worlds better then smatfarm.
Color spectrum of the mars aqua pops much better than the smatfarm.
I’m about to chuck the smatfarm in fire. Lol!
Spent a lot of time playing with the channels and just not happy with it.
The mars aqua only has 2 channels but color spectrum IMO is much better.

I have them too. Try to lower the purple to 50 and raise the whites a little

 

[Dedicated Reefer]

Picked up a smatfarm led fixture off amazon, mostly due to the reviews I have seen on them and wanted to give one a try.
I have spent several days and countless hours playing with the channel settings and IMO just can’t get it to a color spectrum that looks good.
Current channel settings are set to what telegraham suggested. 20% 14k, 100% both blue channels, 100% purple, 20% 3k, 60% green. In the attached pic, the ends of tank have mars aqua led fixtures, very similar to Viparspectra. The middle fixture is the smatfarm. IMO, the smatfarm white channels are very yellow and overpowering all the other channels. Anyone else running the smatfarm reef lights and what are your experience with them. The color spectrum of the mars aqua fixtures and IMO worlds better then smatfarm.
Color spectrum of the mars aqua pops much better than the smatfarm.
I’m about to chuck the smatfarm in fire. Lol!
Spent a lot of time playing with the channels and just not happy with it.
The mars aqua only has 2 channels but color spectrum IMO is much better.

My settings are 10/80/60/80/10/20

 

[Dedicated Reefer]

My settings are 10/80/60/80/10/20

Btw is your tank filled with sps or lps

 

[moz71]

I have my Smatfarms for about 8 months now and never seen any disco ball affects at all! I do see some disco ball affects on my vipraspectra on my other tank though. Couldn’t be happier with them

 

[Dedicated Reefer]

That’s strange. I bought mine two weeks ago and have it on half of my frag tank. And it matches the kessil shimmer on the other half of the tank

 

[ikaros70]

I returned both the smatfarm fixtures and went with Viparspectra.
The Viparspectra just gave me more of the color spectrum I was looking for, I like more of a 20k look. The smatfarm was just too yellow for my liking. I did upgrade the lenses on Viparspectra to 120*, that helped with the spread. I don’t have any disco ball effects on the Viparspectra.
A lot of this is personal preference and I just like more of a 20k look.

 

[ASWoodsy]

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[vasilli2416]

Does anyone have the 60 watt one? Trying to figure out what a good setting for A,B,C. under the settings i would be under the mixed category for different kinds of montipora, Zoa's.