Anyone unhappy with kessils?
- Thread starter Fly5150
- Start date
It's interesting because I just set up a 24 gallon reef and I bought the Evergrow IT2040 LED's for lighting. I know they are the Chinese brand but they have 55 Cree 3 watt LED's. Full spectrum with the whites, UV's, Royal Blues, Blues, Greens, and Red. They also have full programmability. I liked the color(tried many different color combinations) but wasn't thrilled so I thought I would try the Kessil A350W. Really made a difference. The colors popped and you could see colors that the LED's didn't bring out. The shimmer is amazing. Also my corals opened up and responded better. The Kessil is set up mostly blue with a little white. I assume the Kessil is not as intense so corals will go slower but it sure looks nice. Also maybe since my tank is a little smaller the lower intensity won't matter as much.
I enjoy the shimmer and the Kessil 360we is plenty blue. I think they make LPS colors pop better than any other light I have tried. With that said I am T5 until I die and Led's are only suplemental for me. I do like the Reefbrite's as well, with their dimmer module you can go down to 0% for true dawn to dusk. My lights used to be on from 10 am to 10pm, now I start at 8 and go to 11pm. When the lights dim down at night the last hour the fish spawn like crazy and are very active. The Kessils add the shimmer I like when the T5 are off, but can only be dimmed down to 20% on Apex. I have never had a problem yet with the 360we and I have 7 of them, but when I did have problems with older version Kessil sent replacements without payment and return shipping for defective light. Their warranty and service is top notch! A very small percentage of led users have good results growing SPS under Led lights. Those that do have mad husbandry skills and can read the color and look of their corals and make adjustments to make Led lights work. I never had any results with led as I did with Halide or T5, but I tend to try too many things which is not so good on a tank.
I've had a 350we over my 2'x2' 12" deep frag tank. It's not great, I can either have washed out colors with the whites on or really low light with the whites turned way down, and somehow it still grows algae more than my corals. Going to go DIY again, aside from aesthetics I still haven't found a decent commercial LED fixture that rivals making your own.
