- Hey, it's Thomas here.
And today we're going to be taking a look at AquaticLife's,
brand new, all LED hybrid fixture.
The Coral Cover. It is app controlled.
It has presets for popular T5 bulb combinations,
so you don't have to think about spectrum too hard.
It has the ability to tilt at 15 degrees inwards,
to keep all those lovely photons inside the tank,
where they belong.
They also did a really good job of keeping the brackets,
and hardware from the previous generations of fixtures,
compatible with this new one.
So if you already have like a Kessil bracket,
or a bracket for your Radion,
they're going to fit just fine.
Plus I've got par charts at the end of the video for you.
So you can see exactly how this coral cover is going to
affect your primary LED light fixture to smooth out that
light field. So let's get into it.
Adding fill lighting, like T5 hybrid fixture,
has become super popular, and a lot more mainstream,
and AquaticLife has been the king of T5 hybrid lighting
for many years, with both their original T5 hybrid,
as well as their DX18 dimable model,
but not everybody wants to deal with bulb changes,
or responsible disposal of the materials inside of a T5
fluorescent tube,
which has led to more reefers supplementing their primary
LED fixtures with diffused LED hybrid lights.
The Coral Cover from AquaticLife
is their newest hybrid fixture, utilizing a mixture of LEDs,
spread out across two panels,
and with no lenses to focus the diodes,
it provides a wide blanket of light
that will help kill the shadows between
your prized coral colonies to make sure they get all the
photosynthetic energy that they need.
Each panel in the hybrid can be separately controlled
through the HM app.
So you can adjust the color, intensity,
and set up a lighting schedule.
It is also compatible with all of the exact same lighting
brackets as AquaticLife's previous T5 hybrid fixtures
to fit your favorite primary led lights
into the coral cover. But before we get into all of that,
let's get it out of the box.
In the box, you'll find the led panels,
the aluminum led rails,
the 18 inch side end plates,
the universal LED brackets with screws,
a screw packet to assemble the LED fixture,
the suspension cable set, as well as the power supplies,
power cables, and the instructions.
The coral cover is currently available in three sizes,
a 24 inch model, a 36 inch model, and a 48 inch model.
All which share the same 18 and a half inch width,
And one inch thickness.
The 24 inch draws 72 Watts from the wall.
The 36 draws 108 Watts,
and the 48 is drawing 156 Watts,
which should be plenty to get those diodes performing
similarly to the T5 bulbs they're designed to replace.
They each come with universal brackets,
that work with popular LED light fixtures with the 24 inch,
including a single pair of brackets,
the 36 inch coming with two pairs of brackets,
and the 48 inch coming with three pairs of brackets.
Also, can we take a moment to appreciate these simple,
but effective blocking cable connectors?
Thank you, AquaticLife. It is a small,
but very much appreciated detail.
When it comes to mounting options.
You've got a few to choose from.
The coral cover does come with that pair of suspension
cables for hanging the fixture from the ceiling,
or from wall-mounted brackets.
You could also pick up a pair of AquaticLife's adjustable
light hangers to attach to the back of your stand,
and suspend the fixture from them as well.
My personal favorite solution
is their floating suspension system.
It makes for a very clean look,
and you can easily lift your fixture up,
and out of the way whenever needed. Now,
if you're wondering what primary led fixtures are going to
pair nicely, or fit properly with the coral cover,
you've got plenty of options,
just about any led fixture out there that is up to
seven inches wide will fit between the two banks of LEDs
on the coral cover.
The universal brackets are easy to line up with a variety of
fixtures,
like the Radion Hydra Prime,
and Red Sea's Pendant style fixtures.
You can also pick up the optional brackets to perfectly fit
Kessil, A360 160 and 360X fixtures.
It is worth noting. If you are planning to use primes,
you'll want to make sure that you have the small bracket
from the AI Prime hanging kit.
So you can attach that bracket to the universal brackets
with the AquaticLife, using a pair of firm's zip ties,
or a nut and bolt combo from your local hardware store.
Looking at the 24 inch model that I've got here,
there are 144 diodes split into two separate panels.
So it's 72 diodes per panel.
Altogether, they provide a total of 56, 450 nanometer diodes
40, 472 nanometer diodes
32, 525 nanometer diodes
and 16, 620 nanometer diodes.
Like I mentioned earlier,
the Fisher will run these 144 diodes at a max power draw
of 72 Watts or 36 Watts per panel, on this 24 inch model.
What's interesting,
and actually quite smart is that regardless of what bulbs,
or spectrum you have the Coral Cover set to,
relative to the intensity,
the power draw of the fixture stays basically the same.
So in other words, whether you want it set to all,
so all of the diodes are evenly powered at that a 100%
intensity or blue, which removes all of the reds,
but still keeps it up at a 100% intensity,
each panel in the fixture is still running right around
that 36 watt mark.
I think the biggest reason aquatic life went this route
is unlike other LED fixtures,
where they give you the keys to the kingdom,
and you can play with all the different sliders,
and customize the spectrum however you want.
AquaticLife really wanted this Fisher to be simple,
and easy to use. As easy as say, a T5 fixture.
So instead of the guesswork with sliders,
you can just pick the T5 bulb profiles that you want your
coral cover to replicate,
and know that you've got a spectrum built for
growing healthy, colorful corals.
Now it isn't as specific as saying, I want ATI's blue plus,
and KZ's Figi purple,
but it is as easy as pie to understand
when you're looking at it.
And it's even easier to just preview when you have the
fixture over your tank.
So you can see which bulb combination
looks best to your eye.
You can choose from all,
which I presume mimics having one of each of the following
bulb profiles,
blue, coral, purple, and aqua blue.
Four bulbs might not seem like a huge selection
at first glance, but since it is a hybrid light,
most reefers are going to run some combination of a
blue bulb, but combined with a specialty bulb,
which is exactly what the selection provides you with.
On top of that,
since you can actually program the front panel completely
separately of the rear panel,
you can actually select two different combinations,
for example, blue plus aqua blue in the front,
and maybe blue plus purple on the back.
And for those who might not be familiar with the practice of
swapping out bulbs, until you find a selection,
or combination of bulbs in your T5 fixture,
that you really like.
The benefit of having it set up in an LED format like this,
is you can switch around all those bulbs
without physically having to do it,
or without wasting a bunch of money, swapping around bulbs,
buying new bulbs, trying to figure out what it is you like.
You can just preview it and change it whenever you want.
No bulbs, no more bulbs. The bulbs are gone.
When it comes to scheduling the app is simple enough to use
with an easy option that lays everything out for you
in a simple form, you choose the bulb,
you choose the on and off time, choose the ramp time,
the max intensity, and you're all done.
Rinse and repeat for the rear fixture,
and the light is ready to rock.
There's also an advanced mode,
if you prefer to map everything out manually,
or have the intensities changed throughout the day,
you can also preview your schedule, trigger lighting mode,
cloudy mode, or neon mode.
You can also get a readout of the light's
internal temperature and can toggle it between Celsius and
Fahrenheit.
Under settings, you can set the frequency of neon, cloud,
or lightning modes, or just leave them off,
and even trigger an acclimation mode,
which will be useful for those introducing this light to an
already established tank.
Okay, so now that we've covered all the bases,
like the layout of the LEDs, the spectral offering,
and the app, let's pair up this coral cover with a Kessil,
A360X Tuna Blue, and see how it performs.
looking at the A360X by itself
at its optimal mounting height of eight inches.
You can see that it falls short of those SPS numbers
of 200 to 350 par that we usually look for.
When paired with a Coral Cover, on the other hand,
at 100% using the blue plus setting,
we can see a significant bump in par that provides those SPS
dominated numbers in 89% of the tank, at the six inch depth
and a decrease in the drop-in par from the center to the
outer ring from 40% down to 30%,
while also providing lots of intersecting points of light
from the spread of individual LEDs,
without secondary optics inside of the coral cover,
which then translate to lots and lots of fill light
to get into all the nooks and crannies
of those branching coral colonies.
For those out there who are intending to use the Coral Cover
with the outer panels, tilted 15 degrees, as expected,
there are a couple of spots at the back of the tank where
the black background absorbs light.
Falling just barely short of our 200 par threshold
at the six inch depth.
At a 12 inch depth,
the tank is practically identical and at 18 inches,
there is a slight increase, bumping up a couple of spots
to within that 200 to 350 range for SPS.
Ultimately though, and actually unsurprisingly,
the percentage of points falling within the SPS dominated
range work out to be identical at 70%.
So for the average reefer,
unless your tank is more than 24 inches wide front to back,
the 15 degree tilt is going to be an excellent tool
to prevent some unwanted light spill.
So if your primary led just isn't getting enough photons
to the depths of your branching corals,
and the Coral Cover matches your reefing mantra,
you can pick one up for yourself by clicking right here,
(calm upbeat music)