Why the Kessil H380 was my best purchase ever

Berlibee · Dec 4, 2017

It's funny; I have a very different situation. I've got the Kessil H380 and was using it with chaeto over a 7.5 refugium. Chaeto was becoming white and dying, but only in the middle of chaeto like a hot spot. I've tried everything, changing position, higher .... or away from the refugium, etc. nothing was helping it was too strong, and I think was "burning it" it was not growing at all. A lot of nutrients in the water. So decided to give a try to a cheap light, this one - Amazon link. 25$ ... I run it for about 50 days now, absolutely no changes in pH comparing to Kessil, no more burning chaeto and Caulerpa growing like crazy. I run a Reefer 250 with ATI 4 bulbs + 6 arrays LED from NanoBox so it's a lot of light as well. All nutrients are under control, feeding heavy twice a day with 12 fishes in the main display.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Crabs McJones · Dec 4, 2017

Berlibee said:
It's funny; I have a very different situation. I've got the Kessil H380 and was using it with chaeto over a 7.5 refugium. Chaeto was becoming white and dying, but only in the middle of chaeto like a hot spot. I've tried everything, changing position, higher .... or away from the refugium, etc. nothing was helping it was too strong, and I think was "burning it" it was not growing at all. A lot of nutrients in the water. So decided to give a try to a cheap light, this one - Amazon link. 25$ ... I run it for about 50 days now, absolutely no changes in pH comparing to Kessil, no more burning chaeto and Caulerpa growing like crazy. I run a Reefer 250 with ATI 4 bulbs + 6 arrays LED from NanoBox so it's a lot of light as well. All nutrients are under control, feeding heavy twice a day with 12 fishes in the main display.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

How far away from the waters surface did you have the light? And how long of a photo period were you running?

Berlibee · Dec 4, 2017

9" from the water surface and 12" to the chaeto surface. 10 hours a day.

drtrash · Dec 4, 2017

I have been running the h80 for 2 months and works well for small fuge but upgrading to a larger system and wondering what the light spread is for the 380? Maybe time for upgrade. Let me know if anyone started with h380 and wants a h80

Reef of Fillory · Dec 4, 2017

I was running the H380 and had to keep switching back to my TaoTronics light. My chaeto exploded under the TaoTronics [36watt] and then died off under the H380. Fell apart/shrunk and didn't grow at all. I tried with the H380 for 12hrs/night and 6hrs./night and couldn't get chaeto to grow. As soon as I put the TaoTronics back on the chaeto exploded again.

I am dosing iron and manganese directly into the refugium but still couldn't get it to grow. Just sold/shipped my H380. I'm glad you guys are finding success with it, but my phosphates doubled when I put the H380 on and the chaeto shrunk.

Forsaken77 · Dec 5, 2017

crabs_mcjones said:
I've had my tank up and running now for almost 2 and a half years. About 6 months in I ditched the hang on back equipment and bought an Aqueon Proflex 1 sump. I immediately set it up to accommodate a refugium. I put sand, rock rubble, and filled it with water and ordered my algea. I started out with flat blade caulerpa and a cheap marineland led light. Kept it this way for the better half of a year, and the caulerpa took off. After a little incident, I ended up upgrading to the Proflex 2 sump. Bigger all around and had a larger refugium chamber and return chamber to house my new Reef Octopus skimmer. Kept the same light, and transferred the caulerpa over. Long story short, I ended up switching to chaeto. After reading about caulerpa possibly going asexual and nuking the tank, I switched. The light I had was not even close to strong enough as the chaeto kept turning white and disintegrating into nothing. So I purchased a Kessil H80 after hearing great reviews about it on forums and supplier websites. Ordered a new batch of chaeto and hoped for the best. Chaeto came in, and same thing, the chaeto would white out after 2 to 3 days and die off. I knew I had the nutrients because I had GHA all over my display tank, and I was intentionally feeding heavy to give the Chaeto a chance to outcompete the GHA for nutrients. I went through probably 4 or 5 balls of chaeto. I even started dosing iron by recommendation of other users with the same issue. Still nothing so I decided to throw in the towel. I sold the H80 and used that plus my christmas money from my parents and bought the Kessil H380. Bought another baseball size ball of chaeto, and hoped for the best. Boy what a pay off. My baseball size ball of chaeto (purchased november 27th) has now exploded into almost a basket ball size! This light has outperformed even my expectations. I believe ryan from bulk reef supply said it best that a 13 watt light (H80) can't compete with the 185 watt light (AP700) in the display tank for the nutrients. And I'm noticing my green hair algae problem and other algae problem in my display tank slowly dwindling down. I am extremely happy with this light, and anybody who asks what refugium light to use will always get the H380 as a recommendation from me. Unfortunately it is pretty pricey ($300) but it's well worth the investment. I apologize for the long run, but hope that you found this useful and enjoyed reading it.

Does it grow algae in the rest of the sump?

Crabs McJones · Dec 5, 2017

Forsaken77 said:
Does it grow algae in the rest of the sump?

Not really, i think because the chaeto is taking up so much other algae doesn't have a chance to establish itself

rcpalmer1 · Dec 5, 2017

I just mounted my h380 today. Tonight will be my first night. I hope I have the same results. I am only running one AP700 on my tank. I am still undecided if I am going to upgrade my DR lights.

Ares · Dec 5, 2017

I've been running my H380 for 6 weeks now. It took a couple weeks for the chaeto to take off and I experienced the white/burning that others have mentioned. I did hear about this from BRS that it could happen until the cheat acclimated. I was able to use another powerhead and keep the cheat ball tumbling which helps. I run it 16 hours a day. This is all part of running the Triton method on my system which has elements to help the chaeto grow.

So much better than the cheap lights. Nitrates are 0 (Salifert) and Phosphate is .024 (Hanna Phosphorous ULR converted).
Bubble algae in the display and hair algae in the display have died off.

Crabs... not to hijack your thread, PM me if you prefer, but I'm going to setup a new tank, 220 (6') or 265 (7') and can't decide if I should go with 2 or 3 AP700s with T5 supplement, or 6/7 of A360WE (1 per foot) with T5 supplement. Sounds like you're having a lot of success with the APs and the H380 in the fuge. I may go add a second H380 to my 60 gallon fuge on that setup...

Crabs McJones · Dec 5, 2017

Ares said:
I've been running my H380 for 6 weeks now. It took a couple weeks for the chaeto to take off and I experienced the white/burning that others have mentioned. I did hear about this from BRS that it could happen until the cheat acclimated. I was able to use another powerhead and keep the cheat ball tumbling which helps. I run it 16 hours a day. This is all part of running the Triton method on my system which has elements to help the chaeto grow.

So much better than the cheap lights. Nitrates are 0 (Salifert) and Phosphate is .024 (Hanna Phosphorous ULR converted).
Bubble algae in the display and hair algae in the display have died off.

Crabs... not to hijack your thread, PM me if you prefer, but I'm going to setup a new tank, 220 (6') or 265 (7') and can't decide if I should go with 2 or 3 AP700s with T5 supplement, or 6/7 of A360WE (1 per foot) with T5 supplement. Sounds like you're having a lot of success with the APs and the H380 in the fuge. I may go add a second H380 to my 60 gallon fuge on that setup...

That's a good question. There are pluses and minuses both ways. The nice thing about the A360s is that you can daisy chain them together and use the spectral controller or your apex, but you need more lights. the ap700 you don't need as many lights and they're more powerful than the a360 and cover better, however I've heard people mention that if the power goes out you can potentially loose the master slave relationship between the lights. And The WiFi app still needs some work that I and other users have emailed kessil about, just waiting to hear back. I hate to bother him but @Ryanbrs from BRS had the ap700s on the BRS160 but then switched to multiple A360's. Perhaps he could shed some kessil light on the subject

if it were me I would do the AP700's

Ryanbrs · Dec 5, 2017

The Kessil t5 combo is my current go-to light. It just looks and performs better than any other led option the team has used. There are lots of good led options but most either have disco or coverage issues that prevent me from personally using them on my own tanks. It’s just a preference thing, I also don’t care about sliders and phone apps. I just want it to grow corals and make the tank look as good as possible.

As to 700 or 360? The 700 is lower profile, looks nice, higher output and wider spectrum but the slave master relationship is not reliable enough for anyone who has to unplug them or looses power frequently.

Here at the shop with video we have constant needs to power the tank down and it just became such an annoyance that I had to go back to the 360s. After making the change I have to say I like the ability to space the 360s the way I want, I have them turned down to half power anyways and I prefer the manual controls over messing with WiFi and phone apps.

All that said if I didn’t have a hood I would stay with the 700s because they simply look so much better above the tank and there is less than 1/3 the cords. That kind of thing matters to me.

Crabs McJones · Dec 5, 2017

Ryanbrs said:
The Kessil t5 combo is my current go-to light. It just looks and performs better than any other led option the team has used. There are lots of good led options but most either have disco or coverage issues that prevent me from personally using them on my own tanks. It’s just a preference thing, I also don’t care about sliders and phone apps. I just want it to grow corals and make the tank look as good as possible.

As to 700 or 360? The 700 is lower profile, looks nice, higher output and wider spectrum but the slave master relationship is not reliable enough for anyone who has to unplug them or looses power frequently.

Here at the shop with video we have constant needs to power the tank down and it just became such an annoyance that I had to go back to the 360s. After making the change I have to say I like the ability to space the 360s the way I want, I have them turned down to half power anyways and I prefer the manual controls over messing with WiFi and phone apps.

All that said if I didn’t have a hood I would stay with the 700s because they simply look so much better above the tank and there is less than 1/3 the cords. That kind of thing matters to me.

Thank you Ryan

one thing I hope is that someone at kessil sees your video or reads the thread, and they make these changes that we want to the App. Any chance at getting a killer deal on the Aquatic Life hybrid fixture so I can try out this kessil t5 combo

lol

1stNoel · Dec 5, 2017

crabs_mcjones said:
Thank you Ryan one thing I hope is that someone at kessil sees your video or reads the thread, and they make these changes that we want to the App. Any chance at getting a killer deal on the Aquatic Life hybrid fixture so I can try out this kessil t5 combo lol

I have both types of Kessil lights and I haven't experienced that power issue (and I live in Florida where thunderstorms and hurricanes frequently cause power loss). The app issues many refer to were fixed over one year ago. Between the two lights, there is a definitive difference in coral color pop. For that alone, I prefer the AP700.

My only complaint with the light is that it's a powerful Death Star that will obliterate your corals like the planet Alderaan if you go too high too fast with the intensity.

Props to BRS and their videos. I wish I would've had that PAR setting data when I first bought the light.

Ares · Dec 5, 2017

Thanks for the perspective Ryan. I’ve watched the BRS videos and have been convinced to go Kessil and T5 combo. Sounds like 360 or 700 can’t go wrong with either. I need to find someone local with a 700 so I can mess with it and see it in person.

hart24601 · Dec 5, 2017

Ryanbrs said:
The Kessil t5 combo is my current go-to light. It just looks and performs better than any other led option the team has used. There are lots of good led options but most either have disco or coverage issues that prevent me from personally using them on my own tanks. It’s just a preference thing, I also don’t care about sliders and phone apps. I just want it to grow corals and make the tank look as good as possible.

As to 700 or 360? The 700 is lower profile, looks nice, higher output and wider spectrum but the slave master relationship is not reliable enough for anyone who has to unplug them or looses power frequently.

Here at the shop with video we have constant needs to power the tank down and it just became such an annoyance that I had to go back to the 360s. After making the change I have to say I like the ability to space the 360s the way I want, I have them turned down to half power anyways and I prefer the manual controls over messing with WiFi and phone apps.

All that said if I didn’t have a hood I would stay with the 700s because they simply look so much better above the tank and there is less than 1/3 the cords. That kind of thing matters to me.

The orpheks didn’t change your mind eh?

I don’t have a sump system anymore but use the 380 to grow nephentes pitcher plants in my external overflow (fw). It’s been working great as the hydroponic system is somewhat a new idea with pitcher plants.

10Seconds · Dec 5, 2017

Im using the TaoTronics 36w in my fuge on my 220 sps tank and have been pretty happy with it. Maybe I dont know what I am missing but thats a big price difference to check it out.

Ryanbrs · Dec 6, 2017

lol I’ve told them directly and applied as much pressure as I can.

Ares said:
Thanks for the perspective Ryan. I’ve watched the BRS videos and have been convinced to go Kessil and T5 combo. Sounds like 360 or 700 can’t go wrong with either. I need to find someone local with a 700 so I can mess with it and see it in person.

one important note is we have a very complex network here that goes way beyond a home environment and like 50+ WiFi devices running right next to it. This is a special case.

Ryanbrs · Dec 6, 2017

hart24601 said:
The orpheks didn’t change your mind eh?

I don’t have a sump system anymore but use the 380 to grow nephentes pitcher plants in my external overflow (fw). It’s been working great as the hydroponic system is somewhat a new idea with pitcher plants.

Orpheks changed my mind enough to try them. On paper they should be the solution to many issues, particularly distribution. Color is better for sure but shimmer is a step down from kessil t5 combo. Nature of being able to see them all in person is you get really picky

drtrash · Dec 6, 2017

Looking forward to a new h380 that has adj intensity. Common issue is burning chaeto, especially when growth is low. Could raise and lower butalot of work, bring out the knob. Triton method seems to be working like a over sized skimmer where it kicks in when doc is high and produces low skimmate when not. Chaeto growns when nutrients are up and burns, goes dormant or crashes when N&P are 0. Need to adj light for lower growth ( my opinion).