Today on BRStv we have episode nineteen of the Neptune Apex series with ramp profiles
and Kessil lighting.
Hi I am Ryan host of BRStv where each week we cover a new topic related to reefing.
This week we are going to show you how to use the ramp option within profiles section
of the Apex Fusion interface.
This is most commonly used to control LED lighting which has a variable volt output
which lets you dim or shift color of your LED's.
Since I have some Kessil LED's on my personal office tank we are going to use these to show
you how to use variable voltage and user profiles to control them.
The Kessil's have two channels; one for light intensity and one for color.
This single cord can handle both channels signified by the v1/v2 on the variable voltage
port we are going plug the cord into.
The first step is to hit the profiles tab in Fusion, select an unused profile and change
the type to ramp since we are going to effectively ramp the lights up and down for dawn and dusk
effects.
We have to create two profiles for this I am going to name the first one "Kessil Dawn."
There are three fields we need to fill out.
It is pretty common to leave the start intensity at zero and end at 100 which means at the
start of the day the lights will start at 0% power and slowly ramp up to 100%.
The ramp time is just how long it will take to do this.
In this case I would like to do it over the course of two hours so I will enter 120 minutes
and send to Apex.
Next I need to create a profile for what I want the lights to do at dusk which is basically
the same thing in reverse.
Name it Kessil dusk, select ramp as the profile type.
In this case I want to ramp down for dusk so I will start with 100 percent and end with
zero percent intensity.
I want to have the same ramp time so I will enter one hundred and twenty minutes again
and send to Apex.
Ok so that was all about the power or intensity of the lighting.
Since we have a second channel we are also going to change the color at dusk and dawn
as well.
Make another profile.
I am going to call this "KdawnColor" select ramp and the profile type again.
This time we are ramping the color.
If you turn the knob on top of the Kessil lighting you can see it slowly turns bluer
and bluer.
This is an effect we are going to ramp up for dawn and dusk.
Zero is as blue as the light gets.
In this case I am going to start there and my end intensity will be ninety percent which
is almost all the way white but not quite and the color I like for daylight.
In this case I am going to do a ramp time of 180 because I like to see the tank bluer
longer and I can compensate for the lack of intensity with a longer photoperiod.
By now you are probably catching on to this, we are going to create one last profile with
the name "KcolorDusk", profile type ramp, ramptime 180 , this time the color is in reverse
I want to start with ninety percent with the daylight spectrum and ram down to zero for
the end intensity.
Ok so we have our four profiles created we have a couple additional steps first we need
to tie our new profiles to the variable speed outlets.
If you inserted your cord into the v1/v2 outlet then locate the variable voltage outlet labeled
"varspd2" and click the settings gear next to it.
I am going to name this outlet Kessil power select advanced and type in the following
three lines of code Set OFF , I want the lights to turn on at 9 am so I will enter IF time
09:00 to 16:00 Then "KessilDawn" which is the name of our dawn light intensity profile.
Capitalization and spaces are important.
16:00 is when I want to start my dusk effect which is two hours long, so the next line
is "If Time 15:00 to 18:00 Then KessilDusk" which was the dusk profile.
So we are almost home, locate "varspd1", rename it "KessilColor", and hit advanced control
type.
Then enter "If time 09:00 to 15:00 Then KdawnColor" and since we have a three hour ramp on the
color this will start the profile one hour earlier than the intensity with "If time 15:00
to 18:00 Then KduskColor".
Set both to auto and you are done.
The Kessil's power can be plugged into the wall but if you would like additional controls
you can plug them into an outlet on the energy bar, in this case select the control type
light.
fall back off which will turn the lights off if the Apex base unit where to ever get disconnected
from the energy bar for some reason.
Enter on time of 9:00 and 18:00.
Shut down probe temp, the temp you at which you want the controller to turn off your lights
if it were overheating for some reason.
I would leave hysteresis at 30 minutes which means the lights will stay off for a full
thirty minutes before they turn back on.
On a final note, by the time you have seen this they may have already implemented a new
interface for the Kessil lights in Fusion which makes this process much easier, I know
it is in the works right now.
However what we did today can be used on any "ApexReady" light that uses a 12volt variable
voltage port to dim the lights.
If you have any questions about the Apex ramp profiles or any solid tips for your fellow
reefers checkout the comments area down below, if this is your first time with us hit that
subscribe button because we do this every week.
See ya next week with another episode of BRStv.