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Reef corner led's


BoringDave

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This makes me feel better. I made a impuls buy and was starting to have buyers remorse.

 

I was on here looking at the three sponsor adds and the CR180d jumped out to me. I liked it most because it was basically designed for a 36" tank. So I drove over to upscale's and checked them out. They did have one of the smaller lights on a tank. The sales guy "Tom I think" recommend one of the smaller lights for what I plan to do fowlr. But I decied I better go whole hog if I'm doing this and had him order me the CR180p. Not only did he order it the owner of Reef corner drove over and delivered it to me on a Sunday.

 

Great service from both parties!

 

I am now fabricating a mount that will attach to the back of the aquarium stand.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Well, since I am still waiting on my tank and stand. I started building my light fixture to hold my Reefcorner CR180.

 

This is how it turned out so far. It is drilled in a few places so the cord will run inside the tube. This tube will be mounted inside another and drilled every inch for adjusting up and down.

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Whenever I get my tank I plan on a build thread so stay tuned.

 

Dave

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  • 5 weeks later...

Update, I have been using this light over a rubber maid tote for about a week. I got a great deal from Noobtosalt on about 80lbs of live rock some sand and a few soft corals stuck to them. I fugued I better give them some light while I wait on my tank to arrive. And boy does it light! My last tank back in the day had a single XM 250w 20k and this led has all the power and maybe more. I have it mounted about 3' above the tote and everything seams to like the light. Within just a few hours of placing them and firing up the light they were already puffed up and looking great.

 

Although to me it is a bit tricky to program. So for now I just set the correct time and set it on automatic mode. I like the way it seamlessly ramps up and down on its own and I don't have to tinker with plug in timers. the color from above looking down is great looks close to my old MH from what I remeber.

 

At some point I'm going to have to figure out how to program it. The middle of the factory setting it ramps all white and blue to 100% for a few hours. Which right now isn't much of a problem mounted 3' above the tub. But when it's mounted over the aquarium that I'm getting it will only be 9 to 11" I figure to keep the light soak of the walls.

 

Imo it's a great light so far.

 

Some things that I would like to see for improvements.

1. A bit easier to program.

2. the display back light would turn off after a few minutes of not being touched.

3. The eyelets for hanging the light would be optional. (I had to remove them and crimp nut certs in there place) so I had a place to mount my custom frame work. If there were nut certs from the factory then screw in eyelets would be great. I hope this doesn't void my warranty? But this had to be done. I can't stand pendent lights hanging then a randome power cord just going wherever.

 

Dave

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  • 3 weeks later...

Hi Dave,

 

Looks like your project is coming along nicely. 

 

1.  Programming ease:  Agreed, but not too bad once you play with it a bit.  Let me know if you need any help.  There is an Excel spreadsheet on the website that can be helpful in visualizing the program as well.

 

2.  LCD Backlight:  The latest version of the CR180P now has the feature to automatically turn off the LCD backlight after a short period of inactivity.  It might be possible to upgrade your unit with some parts that I have inbound.  I will have to check on that.

 

3.  Eyelets:  Your application is a bit of a special case, but I like your idea of possibly using nutserts as it would give more options for hard mounting the light.  Perhaps design and offer some simple rails for mounting the light into canopies which comes up on occasion.  No worry's about voiding your warranty.  I generally draw the line at dropping the light into the tank.

 

When you get it fired up over the tank I'll be interested to hear what you think about it.

 

If anyone has any general product questions, feel free to ask away in the ReefCorner forum.

 

--- Ken

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  • 4 weeks later...

Well, I've had this running over my tank for a few weeks now and couldn't be happier.

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I have it mounted 9" above the water and have the blues set to 60% max and whites to 40%. I did figure out how to program it after all. It's not that hard once I could wrap my head around it works off a 24hr clock.(I have never had to before) I've reset it several times now and didn't even need to look at the instructions after the second time.

I like the way I'm able to mix the blue and white to virtually any spectrum I want at any time I want. No need for extra cords, timers or supplemental lights that I have had to do in the past.

 

My mounting system didn't quite work out so well, But maybe for the better. I had to cut out the funky hinge point and replace it with a temporary repair.

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I have actually come to like my temporarily repair better then the hinge idea. Now if I need to move the light to work in the tank. I just unplug the light loosen the top thumb screw and remove the whole light. I may just replace the thumb screws with some black knobs like on the sides of a shop light and keep it the way it is. Right now I have the power cord cable tired to the left side of the bar so it's absolutely unseen from where I view the tank.

 

I highly recommend this light to anyone that's interested in one.

 

Dave

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Yes , the tank is starting to come together and it is looking mighty fine. Thanks so much for the review as well, this is one LED unit I have not gotten my hands on yet but was curious about some of its details in real time use. I look forward to an udate when you start getting some livestock in. You say it will be a FOWLER but it would be a shame to not add any corals to a tank with a good light over it.

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It's not going to stay fowler that's why I bought the light. It's been quite a few years since I was in the hobby so I'm taking it slow. I'm trying to buy the best I can afford so in the future I don't have to re-buy to convert over to reef. I do have a few soft corals that came on the rock that are doing great.

 

The last time I was in the hobby I had a Red Sea Berlin skimmer if that tells you anything.

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