Following along. I want new lights and was wondering about black box. The big name brand lights are way out of my price range. Thank you.
The real Black Box light study
- Thread starter Manose
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I think i would like to see the following so people can get an idea of quality.
How much heatsink what type is it adequete
Passive or active cooling
type and mix of led
PAR readings you have covered.
Overall construction build quality
lens angle and realistic coverage.
Visual look I know this is subjective but is it full spectrum in some ways its easy to provide enough PAR for corals but does it look good to the user. Many budget units have a very grainy look as they miss parts of the spectrum or are low CRI.
Connectivity and does the app work or keep crashing
That should cover a lot of key areas
How much heatsink what type is it adequete
Passive or active cooling
type and mix of led
PAR readings you have covered.
Overall construction build quality
lens angle and realistic coverage.
Visual look I know this is subjective but is it full spectrum in some ways its easy to provide enough PAR for corals but does it look good to the user. Many budget units have a very grainy look as they miss parts of the spectrum or are low CRI.
Connectivity and does the app work or keep crashing
That should cover a lot of key areas
It’s a very interesting and complex idea. Will you match PAR on each coral? That is lower intensity of some fixtures or dim them so the PAR is the same as that could have more impact that the fixtures themselves and would only be related to the size and only show that more PAR is better for some corals. Then how about the PUR, will you look at that at all using a senseye perhaps?
Which leads into the next question of spectrum. Are you doing to run all channels equally? I fear this could become a “what spectrum grows coral best” over fixture review. Many of these run quite white, more than many people prefer, so how will you handle that? Attempt to match PAR and spectrum closely as possible on the coral? Fixture 1 might outperform fixture 2, but if #1 is really white it becomes a question of is that fixture better or was the more white light better and would fixture 2 have done as well if turned down the blues (or up the whites) and what does it matter since no one will run fixture 1 that white?
Just food for thought.
Which leads into the next question of spectrum. Are you doing to run all channels equally? I fear this could become a “what spectrum grows coral best” over fixture review. Many of these run quite white, more than many people prefer, so how will you handle that? Attempt to match PAR and spectrum closely as possible on the coral? Fixture 1 might outperform fixture 2, but if #1 is really white it becomes a question of is that fixture better or was the more white light better and would fixture 2 have done as well if turned down the blues (or up the whites) and what does it matter since no one will run fixture 1 that white?
Just food for thought.
OP
OP
Thank you so much @Fritzhamer .
A little update for all. Tomorrow I will be going down and picking up the par meter and a tank supplied by my friends at Sustainable Aquatics.
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OP
OP
All of these tests would have to be done in the basic review of the light. I feel things like heat sink would be be done by taking it apart and getting detailed pics of the guts so people with a better understanding of electrical components could make a visual documentation.
That is something we need to discuss when time comes ,as many of the cobb lights have a different way of spreading light than the standard Mars Aqua.
I think this is where a long term study of the lights under the same system with the same coral and monitor the coloration and growth then document what % of each spectrum was used.
Very good input and thank you @hart24601 !!!
Very interested in this.
I'm running the Reef Breeder's Photon V2 and consider it to be a very strong competitor to the AI Hydras as it uses nearly all the same exact LED's they use.
I'm running the Reef Breeder's Photon V2 and consider it to be a very strong competitor to the AI Hydras as it uses nearly all the same exact LED's they use.
OP
OP
Those are well known lights and have been regarded as some of the best to come from China. They are a bit pricey but the original Evergrow would nice to test https://www.alibaba.com/product-det...spm=a2700.details.maylikehoz.4.8c8f7edfpeWrQ4
Agreed on the cost. If they dropped the price by say 25%, they wouldn't be selling like crazy. But I bought mine second hand from a local hobbyist for like 375 who only had it for about 6 months.
My only complaint on them is the lack of setup information to dial in the right spectrum. You really are just kinda flying blind with this light. So I tried my best to mirror BRS's settings for the AI Hydra testing they did to match the Radeon Coral Lab configuration.
My only complaint on them is the lack of setup information to dial in the right spectrum. You really are just kinda flying blind with this light. So I tried my best to mirror BRS's settings for the AI Hydra testing they did to match the Radeon Coral Lab configuration.
OP
OP
***********************BIG NEWS*********************
Just got through talking with Matt from The Coral Reef and Sustainable Aquatics here in Tn., He has invited me down to his facility so we can use some of his already plumbed together systems, or make more for our study!!!
This is an awesome gesture that I can't refuse as it meets a lot of what we want to test about these lights.
I t seems my weekend will be spent away from home messing with some lights ;Drool
I will take lots of pics!!!;Snaphappy
Just got through talking with Matt from The Coral Reef and Sustainable Aquatics here in Tn., He has invited me down to his facility so we can use some of his already plumbed together systems, or make more for our study!!!
This is an awesome gesture that I can't refuse as it meets a lot of what we want to test about these lights.
I t seems my weekend will be spent away from home messing with some lights ;Drool
I will take lots of pics!!!;Snaphappy
NY_Caveman
likes words, fish and arbitrary statistics
Should be an interesting study. I have the SB Reef Lights 16” Extreme WiFi and I really like it. One nice thing about the black boxes as opposed to many of the higher end lights is you can take them apart pretty easily for customization and repair.
PranK
Active Member
This is a great study, thanks. All lights are marked up so much in Australia that the prices become very important to people like me who have other expenses.
I used to have a Mars Aqua with an SBReef retrofit until it fell into the tank. Was a great light until then!
I used to have a Mars Aqua with an SBReef retrofit until it fell into the tank. Was a great light until then!
Fritzhamer
Well-Known Member
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Wow! That’s awesome. Very exciting.
dantimdad
7500 Club Member
By this time tomorrow, I will have two different brands of these lights.
I will post my initial thoughts on these if you like.
One is a pre-black Friday special from amazon ($56 with shipping):
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07D47RLV5/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
and the other is white WattShine brand I got a good deal on a new open box one($56 the fan was messed up so I got a partial refund so it was even cheaper!)
https://www.amazon.com/Wattshine-Aq...pID=41DjUfNayRL&preST=_SY300_QL70_&dpSrc=srch
I will post my initial thoughts on these if you like.
One is a pre-black Friday special from amazon ($56 with shipping):
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07D47RLV5/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
and the other is white WattShine brand I got a good deal on a new open box one($56 the fan was messed up so I got a partial refund so it was even cheaper!)
https://www.amazon.com/Wattshine-Aq...pID=41DjUfNayRL&preST=_SY300_QL70_&dpSrc=srch
OP
OP
I just ordered these from China so I think that they will go on the new build to test
http://www.luminiaqua.com/file/38-pixie150.pdf
http://www.luminiaqua.com/file/38-pixie150.pdf
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