Why the Kessil H380 was my best purchase ever

[minus9]

The H380 is on/off, no intensity. There is a spectrum choice, grow & bloom. Like crabs, I've been drinking the Kessil Kool-aid for quite some time, so I'm familiar with how these lights work. My 22g had three 160's over it at the end (along with a 4 bulb ATI sunpower) and my current 90g shallow has two ap700's. I just mounted an a80 tuna sun over my 5g planted freshwater tank, so you could say I like these lights, a lot. ;Woot Cheers!

 

[lbacha]

The H380 is on/off, no intensity. There is a spectrum choice, grow & bloom. Like crabs, I've been drinking the Kessil Kool-aid for quite some time, so I'm familiar with how these lights work. My 22g had three 160's over it at the end (along with a 4 bulb ATI sunpower) and my current 90g shallow has two ap700's. I just mounted an a80 tuna sun over my 5g planted freshwater tank, so you could say I like these lights, a lot. ;Woot Cheers!

I wonder if the h series spectral controller allows you to adjust intensity. I have a a160we tuna sun with a spectral controller over my freshwater planted tank and I love it. I actually just bought a h80 with gooseneck used so we will see how that works over my 10g fuge.

I'm kinda a Kessil fan myself

 

[Whipples]

The H series does not have an intensity setting. The H380 has two settings, "grow" and "bloom" which offer two different spectrums but that is it.

 

[lbacha]

The H series does not have an intensity setting. The H380 has two settings, "grow" and "bloom" which offer two different spectrums but that is it.

So I just looked and the h150 and h80 both have intensity settings. It's the h380 that doesn't which is odd

Len

 

[Crabs McJones]

So I'm familiar with the tuna sun and tuna blue but not the H series. Are you not able to set the intensity lower? I would recommend starting at a low intensity for 12 hrs or 24 depending on how you run your then ramp it up over time till you get to the sweet spot.

Correct, there is no intensity knob on the H380. The only way to increase or decrease would be to adjust the distance between the fixture and the waters surface.

 

[Crabs McJones]

The H380 is on/off, no intensity. There is a spectrum choice, grow & bloom. Like crabs, I've been drinking the Kessil Kool-aid for quite some time, so I'm familiar with how these lights work. My 22g had three 160's over it at the end (along with a 4 bulb ATI sunpower) and my current 90g shallow has two ap700's. I just mounted an a80 tuna sun over my 5g planted freshwater tank, so you could say I like these lights, a lot. ;Woot Cheers!

It's delicious isn't it!!

 

[Kyl]

So I just looked and the h150 and h80 both have intensity settings. It's the h380 that doesn't which is odd

Len

H150's have no adjustment knobs at all, they are spectrum and intensity locked.

 

[lbacha]

H150's have no adjustment knobs at all, they are spectrum and intensity locked.

My bad it is just the h80 that has controls for intensity

 

[Kyl]

Yep. I bet they're going to bring out another middle-sized one, ala the 160's, but time will tell. No doubt BRS moving so many of the H380's has made them take a bit of a notice.

 

[lbacha]

I think a 160 sized unit would be good for mid sized tanks. My total water volume is only 13g on my system so I think the h80 will do good without stripping too many nutrients from the tabk

 

[Crabs McJones]

@Ryanbrs when you guys did your testing, you mentioned that you had hair algae growing in the tank, did you notice any kind of brown algae growing on the chaeto itself and if so did you do anything to clean it? I took my big ball out today and freshwater dipped it and shook it around a little bit to get the algae off the chaeto as I believe it was choking it out.

 

[Crabs McJones]

@Ryanbrs when you guys did your testing, you mentioned that you had hair algae growing in the tank, did you notice any kind of brown algae growing on the chaeto itself and if so did you do anything to clean it? I took my big ball out today and freshwater dipped it and shook it around a little bit to get the algae off the chaeto as I believe it was choking it out.

Or has anyone else experienced this or have a good recommendation for cleaning chaeto?

 

[minus9]

When I did water changes I would rinse vigorously in the old water to loosen up the micro/unwanted algae. It helped, but as long as it didn't overtake the chaeto and stayed in the sump, I was fine with a little being there.

 

[Bronx19]

The idea is that macro you want out competes the macro you don't want. I would think if you were able to lower nutrients via water changes, with time the macro in greater volume will win.

 

[Crabs McJones]

Alright back from the store and I have my H380 hung over the fuge. Holy smokes is this thing bright. @saltyfilmfolks, see if you can make sense out of the Seneye stuff...

I had to mount it 6 1/2" over the water. Any higher and I get too much spillover into the filter sock and skimmer. The chaeto just sinks so it's a good distance away from the light.

Right at water surface.

At the chaeto at the bottom of the fuge.

Any updates on this? Wondering how your fuge is doing with the change over

 

[SashimiTurtle]

Any updates on this? Wondering how your fuge is doing with the change over

Chaeto melted. It just, disappeared until there were only a few loose strands. Chaeto is impossible to grow...

 

[wopadobop]

Try running it an hour on. Hour off hour on. There is a bit of heat build up at the surface with these lights as they are nuclear strong. As the Cheeto fills in you can start doing 2 on 2 off and so on. Find the sweet spot. These lights are 1600 our which is a crap load of light. They are meant to be run a full 2 feet over plant growth in air. The inverse square law of light and radiation states that if you take a light source and double the distance you receive 1/4 the intensity. So factor that down to about 12 inches over a fuge and your getting 4 times the amount needed. Mine grows everything from hair algae to sponge like snot balls (lol) Chaeto cant compete with the growth rate , but it can (and all. Macro vs micro can) out last micro algae’s. They have the ability to store energy better than micro algae’s do . Think the difference between a complex organism and a single called organism in a famine. The complex organism has more reserves . Thus the 1 hour on 1 hour off should work. It worked for me and i had the same issue. Chaeto just melted away to nothing.

Also, feed more. You will notice that @Ryanbrs tests 0P 0N on the brs160 but the fuge is growing. That’s because that fuge and amount of corals they keep are constantly cycling nutrients out. But its not an ulns system its a high nutrient system with amazing export. This wouldn’t possible without the fuge running at full steam.

 

[SashimiTurtle]

This is the par I got on mine 6" over the water... I don't have any more room that that. I'll see if I can set up an on and off schedule on my WiFi wall timer when my new batch of chaeto gets in this week. Ill maumybe start with 30 on and 30 off for a few hours at night until the chaeto adjusts. The H380 is a light cannon. USS Montana main turret gun worth of light. 2000 PAR of chaeto scorching light.

 

[Tobbe]

I had exactly the same problem with H80 the cheato disappear and then switched to 380 it kicked off great its not tumbling every now and then i flip it over
this is a month+ old photo its have improve a lout and very happy with the light and won't change it
the fuge is ca 170litres and return comes to it and a sicce pump to increase flow and also slip the reactor pump to put water back to it
haven't started dose iron so will follow this tread

 

[Crabs McJones]

I had exactly the same problem with H80 the cheato disappear and then switched to 380 it kicked off great its not tumbling every now and then i flip it over
this is a month+ old photo its have improve a lout and very happy with the light and won't change it
the fuge is ca 170litres and return comes to it and a sicce pump to increase flow and also slip the reactor pump to put water back to it
haven't started dose iron so will follow this tread

How far off the waters surfaace do you have yours mounted?