First impressions on Kessil Amazon Sun

[propsi]

I took the plunge. Ordered 2 Kessil A150 Amazon Suns. They came in today.

I'm not really into product porn but I thought I would share my first impressions and some photos nonetheless.

There's good and bad.

The good: very compact and seemingly powerful light. It's my impression__as of yet unverified__that 2 units will be able to light my 120p if hung within 24" of the substrate. My hope is that I will have anywhere between 30 and 80 par with the lamp at 20"-24" over the substrate. Pure conjecture on my part. Unfortunately I have no par meter yet, so no readings to give. The color is slightly blue-ish but does not seem to discolor plants in any unpleasant way . The lamp housing stays warm but never hot. Power consumption: 34watts per lamp. By all appearances this is the same base unit as the rest of the series. Reefers seem to be happy with the product.

The bad: and IMO Kessil drops the ball on this one. Hanging the lamp is something of an afterthought here. A collection of gold hooks, screws and brackets are included in the kit. The assumption here is that there is a canopy over the tank and if not, you're on your own. You can always hang the lamps from the ceiling with some kind wire arrangement, or even by it's electrical wire (no mention in the documentation if that's ok however). But the problem then becomes the length of electrical cord (6ft): way too short to run up to the ceiling and down a wall . Which means you're in DIY territory and possibly voiding the warranty depending on your solution. In my case, I'll buy an extension plugged in as an intermediary between the jacks and hang the unit from the ceiling.

You can always shell out extra bucks for their gooseneck if that arrangement suits your needs. In that case I just find it a pity that Kessil hasn't made any arrangements to hide their 1/4" cable.

The small cooling fan inside the lamp emits a steady whine that may disturb some. IMO Kessil could have spent more effort baffling the unit to limit the sound. Not quite a deal breaker but will take some getting used to.

Documentation is sparse to say the least. No PAR, no spectrography and precious little on how to hang the unit. It's as if Kessil won't stand behind their product and doesn't want to discuss consumers no 1 question: will the lamp do the job it's designed to and if so, to what extent (low, medium or high light ?). Is there a hot spot ? etc..
Too bad.

The final test will come when I put the light use. I'm still assembling my setup so no news for a bit.

[Daximus]

Looks like a neat product. Seems misleading to label A150w all over it...I suppose that's their model number, but it would seem to me they are trying to make it appear as a 150 watt item. Maybe I'm reading into it a bit too much, lol.

In your opinion, will the light spread out enough to properly cover the tank floor? At what height above the tank does this occur?

[propsi]

Originally Posted by Daximus

In your opinion, will the light spread out enough to properly cover the tank floor? At what height above the tank does this occur?

At 24" height light spread is 6'. It is a punctual light source however and light levels drop off considerably at the outer edges. That's the nature of the beast. I unfortunately do not have any light intensity readings to give. I'm just going on my visual impressions.

[Daximus]

Originally Posted by propsi

At 24" height light spread is 6'. It is a punctual light source however and light levels drop off considerably at the outer edges. That's the nature of the beast. I unfortunately do not have any light intensity readings to give. I'm just going on my visual impressions.

Cool, I'm just curious. Never seen anything like it. Is this like a complete florescent replacement or more of an accent light? I can see some really neat "sunlight" effects being possible. Pretty cool looking.

[propsi]

Originally Posted by Daximus

Cool, I'm just curious. Never seen anything like it. Is this like a complete florescent replacement or more of an accent light? I can see some really neat "sunlight" effects being possible. Pretty cool looking.

It is marketed as a "replacement" (your word). Reefers have been fooling around with it for a while and it is their general opinion that it does the job (for them...). They report lots of shimmer effects.

[Daximus]

Originally Posted by propsi

It is marketed as a "replacement" (your word). Reefers have been fooling around with it for a while and it is their general opinion that it does the job (for them...). They report lots of shimmer effects.

Sweet. Well if the reefers are happy with the light output then logically I'd have to guess it will work for us...perhaps even overkill.

I played around with some homemade spotlights...some really natural looking shimmer/sunlight effects can be achieved. I can't wait to see what you end up doing with them.

[propsi]

Originally Posted by Daximus

I played around with some homemade spotlights...some really natural looking shimmer/sunlight effects can be achieved. I can't wait to see what you end up doing with them.

I'm impatient to see the results also. That will take a while unfortunately. I'm still setting up my system and I have some contracts coming up and no spare time.

[IWANNAGOFAST]

We have these at my store, I can try to get par readings this weekend

[propsi]

Originally Posted by IWANNAGOFAST

We have these at my store, I can try to get par readings this weekend

That would be great! If you can, take some readings off center to see how much the light falls off. My initial impression is that light diminishes considerably 15" from the center line.

[samamorgan]

I haven't checked into the kessil fixture much, but i assume it uses some sort of reflector or lens. From what i have observed, most LED emmiters with no reflector drop off PAR values by about 50% in a pattern that looks like an equilateral triangle. So at 6" down from the light, 6" offset, PAR would be cut in half of what it is directly under at any given distance. Keep in mind this is just a pattern i have observed when looking at bunches of PAR readings on various fixtures, one of these days i'll get my own meter and to a bunch of experiments.

[propsi]

I've unearthed a long forgotten light meter and took light readings on both Kessils. Readings are in footcandles: best I can do at this point. Since I will be lighting a 120p, I suspended both lamps 16" apart and 24" high as a starting point. Interesting to see that the light readings were a bit higher in between both lamps than directly under. It suggests that I could separate the lamps to attain better distribution. Take note however that I "guestimate" error to be around 10%, if not more. Obviously a PAR meter will give the real story here, but the readings suggest nonetheless a significant drop off at the outer perimeter of the light field.

Originally Posted by samamorgan

I haven't checked into the kessil fixture much, but i assume it uses some sort of reflector or lens.

Yes there is a small lens.

[samamorgan]

Your mesaurements would suggest a 50% light cutoff at the 60 degree mark, mind doing the same measurements at 12 inches below the lights to confirm? Would give us a good idea of coverage pattern, even better once we get PAR results.

[MARIMOBALL]

Im interested in these lights. I have an ADA 120P with two 150 watt metal halides with 8000K bulbs and have never seen any LED come close to what these put out. I can borrow a par meter to check my setting.

[propsi]

Originally Posted by MARIMOBALL

Im interested in these lights. I have an ADA 120P with two 150 watt metal halides with 8000K bulbs and have never seen any LED come close to what these put out. I can borrow a par meter to check my setting.

It would be an interesting comparison.

[IWANNAGOFAST]

forgot to bring the par meter, but, here's a video I shot today while at the shop

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...&v=OakPhTON6PY