Well after a long wait my AI modules have finally arrived, thanks Ray. Picked them up on friday, the controller is due in this week so for now I can only run everything at 100%. I decided not to go with the AI mounting brackets due to the fact I needed the lights a little higher then what the standard brackets give you and I wanted a more custom look to work with my canopy. Built the covers out of plexi and bought some stainless rod, threaded it and bent them to as close to 90 as I could get by eye lol. The brackets will allow me to adjust the light from 5'' off the water surface up to 8'' off the water surface, with the 70 degree optics which as supposed to arrive this week I whould be able to get the spread I am looking for, even with the 40's I am very pleased. Gave the plexi a quick coat in Krylon fusion, not the greatest match for the wood the canopy is made of but it will have to do. Once I get the controller I will set it up for good and take some better pics, but for now these will have to do.
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nice hood :D just wait till you fill that tank with stuff :D
It is hard to tell with a picture, so what kind of output are you getting at %100. It looks bright, and a nice colour blend. What size tank and how bright compared to other options, if you can compare roughly?
looking nice so far!!
when are you coming to visit? hehe
Come on Jet jumper you don;t think that tester frogspawn frag is enough hahaha
Well to compare it with T5 (I have never had MH myself so I will not compare it to that) it is a lot brighter than the T5 setup I had to get it going. From what I have read all over I will not be able to run them anywhere close to 100% even when I switch them to 70 degree optics. They are on a 90 gallon tank and I am very happy so far, with the controller I am gonna turn down everything of course but the white a bit more than the blue. I took the pics and I am horrible with a camera so once I get it setup for good I will get my gf who's camera it is to take some pics.
Oh and the shimmer you get from the is crazy
Wow 2 on a 90 and you still have to dial them back. I am surprised that with the two different blues and only one white you still need to turn the white down more than the blues. I guess I am definitely getting the blue rather than the white Sol then. So on a 29 Gallon one white fixture will probably be running at 50% or so. I thought there was someone on OVAS a while back that ran 2 Sol fixtures on a 29 gallon before. That is insane!
Check out RC for some good info on AI, there is days and days of reading, one thread has like 2000 post lol
Well the mail man came and brought me a gift, my 70 degree optics :) Now just to install them suckers. Gonna get at it after dinner and volley, will post some pics later this evening.
SOOO the pictures took me a little while with exams and all but here they are. The lenses were very easy to instal, kinda makes me happier with my decision on these lights, since they are modular down the rod if there are upgrades it seems they will be pretty easy to instal if they were anything like these lenses. Over the tank the lenses make a moderate difference, will not really be able to tell until I get the controller and am able to dim them a bit.
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Oh yeah forgot to mention that I got a darn bill from UPS this weekend for a $40 brokerage fee for the lenses. They were shipped USPS priority so I thought I was gonna be safe, I guess not.
QuoteOh yeah forgot to mention that I got a darn bill from UPS this weekend for a $40 brokerage fee for the lenses. They were shipped USPS priority so I thought I was gonna be safe, I guess not.
WHAT!!!! USPS shipped it but UPS billed you? I hate duty. How much do the lenses cost? I would fight that one. Always go USPS Air. I have never seen customs from that. I would also complain to AI that UPS charged you that.
Yep I was planning on giving them a call tomorrow (just got the bill friday when I got back to Ottawa). The package says USPS First-Class International, and UPS sent me a nice bill for 39.77. The lenses were 50 plus 10 for shipping, so now instead of 60 bucks they cost me 100 grrrrrr my hatred for UPS and Fedex has just grown stronger.
yo something doesn't sound right with that equation if you got them usps then ups had nothing to do with it...\
have you got anything else from ups lately??
Quote from: Malyon18 on May 01, 2011, 06:26:41 PM
Yep I was planning on giving them a call tomorrow (just got the bill friday when I got back to Ottawa). The package says USPS First-Class International, and UPS sent me a nice bill for 39.77. The lenses were 50 plus 10 for shipping, so now instead of 60 bucks they cost me 100 grrrrrr my hatred for UPS and Fedex has just grown stronger.
Ya I know I thought the same thing. I got caught once on ebay back in the day having something shipped UPS and swore I would never let it happen again, therefore I ask any seller from the states who they use for shipping before purchasing. The weird thing is the package from USPS on the declaration form has a value marked as $1 where on the UPS bill the value is marked at $49 (the lenses cost me 50) the bill also has C2 developments address on it. Anyways I have still not contacted them, plan on doing it soon :) a little busy lately.
Hey man. did you have an updated picture with the 70 degree's on there. I am curious to see what it looks like instead.
I have taken some but they are on my g/f DSLR, I will finally have them setup with the controller on the weekend so I will take plenty and post them I PROMISE ;D
Do you think 2 are going to be enough for the foot print of tank? Just wondering how the 70's look.
Oh yeah I think it will be plenty, I am not a big SPS fan so it will mostly be softies and LPS with a few SPS, but with both units hung 7'' above the water gives plenty of coverage, but I will only know for sure once I get some corals in my bare tank lol. I will have pics this weekend for sure. Are you interested in taking the plunge, if you are once I get the controller you could swing by and check them out.
I am weighing options right now. Working on merging a lot of things to a 120g tank and currently I have tried reefbrites, Maxspect, hopeing to get more local input on the AI's.. Thinking MH and thinking T5 as well.. haha.. I am all over the board right now.
The 120g currently has my maxspect running over half of it to light up the side with the corals.. haha. But there is GSP on the other side that get enough light spilling over to make them want to come out of their purple shell.
I await your pictures. :)
I just set up the AI on my 29 gallon. I am using one only. Coverage is good not great. It is hard to get the high stuff near the back lit well without overcompensating. I could move the optics around to suit my tank better I suppose. The colours are amazing. Robin using it at %100 doesn't do it justice. You will be so happy when you get the controller. The brightness is about what I expected. Very bright and strong penetration with the 40 degree but the 70 degree is average brightness. That is to be expected of course. It would have been nice to set up the tank with the light already in place. That way the corals would get the proper light levels. Just going to have to make some adjustments. My recommendation is that these are the way to go for so many reasons. I would take the plunge Jet! Controller is kind of crap, but it has plenty of settings to make all the adjustments you could ever want. It is just a bit finicky and glitchy.
Alright Jet here are some pictures as promised, I took them so they might not be the best, gf was busy when I asked her to take them, pictures do not do these lights justice, well the ones I took anyways.
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With the controller these lights are great. The pictures were taken when the light was at it's peak (White 25 Blue 32 Royal Blue 32). I love being able to have the lights ramp up and down during the day, a lot easier to have the dusk to dawn effect. I will also be increasing the intensity as the weeks go on and I may add a bit more white. Overall I am very pleased with my purchase. Now time to start moving some of my corals into it, other than my lonely little frogspawn tester. Picked up a mini carpet from Ray today so we will see how that looks under the lights.
Oooh Mini carpets looks awesome under the LEDs!