ramsey

I saw a thread on RC about a week ago and someone had one of their tanks for about a year and a half and it sprung a huge leak. I'd be very careful because there was a lot of people chiming in about the quality you get. Here's the thread: http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2036731&highlight=glass+cages

I run it down my driveway and into the street. I would not put it in my lawn unless you want the gras to die. It may not kill it right away but I would think it would after a while.

If the light and/or MP10 fall through, I'll take it/them.

That's cool. I'll give them a call Tuesday. It's no big deal if I have to wait. I still have about 3/4 of a bucket of salt left which should last me a while. I just wanted to stock up while the gettin's good. Thanks for putting this together!

I wasn't able to go by there Friday but plan on going Monday. I'm not too late am I?

I'm down for two buckets of the pro. I just started working up the road from them so it'll work out nicely.

There's an ongoing thread on nano-reef.com talking about using hydrogen peroxide to kill it. http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=268706 http://reefbuilders.com/2010/03/29/uses-for-hydrogen-peroxide-in-the-aquarium-algae-removal/ I've not tried this and it still seems somewhat experimental but people have had success with it.

First, I'm not using the forums for those purposes. I feel like people should know. What if I said nothing and someone else on ARC got treated this way tomorrow? I'd feel a little guilty for not giving a warning. Posting negative feedback on their support on a LOCAL reef forum is hardly trying to ruin their business. I didn't blast it all over the internet. You may not have a problem getting bad service and keep your experience to yourself not warning others. This just not my style. I provide a high level of service to my customers and I like to get some respect when the tables turned. I spent $400 for a sump from them. Not responding to my emails for two weeks is just not right when I'm trying to get support on something I spent a great deal of money on. On a another note, I did speak with him via email further about the situation and though I'll still likely never buy from them, he did make a small effort to try and smooth things over. It wasn't much but it was something. Just wanted to throw that out there to be fair.

BIGBIRD, This is a pretty strong indication of their customer service. I feel like people that aren't on MAAST have the right to know what they may or may not receive if they need to contact them. You know, just bad customer service is one thing, but when the owner of a popular company responds to a complaint about their service by insulting their customer and acting like he wants to fight, people should know about that. I tried to handle it reasonably. I think my post was reasonable and it was on MAAST, not RC. I respect your opinion but in the case I feel that people should know how I was treated so they know what experience they may have from them. If you've had a good experience with them, I'm happy for you. For me, this has been BY FAR the worst service experience I've ever had.

If any of you are thinking about buying anything made by PM, please look carefully at this thread: http://www.maast.org/showthread.php?63291-Precision-Marine-support-FAIL&p=795086#post795086 I just want to make sure you all are aware of the support you might get from them if you have a problem. Please message me if you have any questions. Mods, if this is in the wrong area, please feel free to move it to the appropriate section.

If you change your mind on parting out, let me know. I'd be interested in a few things.

First, as I mentioned, I have four over my tank and the light spread is just fine. The specs you listed are for an older generation. They now recommend one every 30" or less. This is because they are using different lenses. "Recommended Tank Width: up to 30" with proper placement of corals. Recommended Tank Depth: up to 36" with proper placement of corals. Power Consumption: up to 75W per module." Of course they say "with proper placement of corals". You wouldn't want to put your lower light corals way up in the tank and SPS at the bottom. I have two clams at the bottom of my tank. They seem to be doing great so far. I'll keep you posted though. Also, $5 a month for bulb changes? What kind of bulbs are you using? You said 1200w so I assume you're using 3 X 400w lights. You may be able to change one bulb for $5 per month. That's if you're using low end bulbs and your not supplementing with VHO's or T5's. A chiller is a HUGE turn off for me. First, I have this ugly thing sitting next to my tank but the real reason is it's a piece of equipment that I MUST have. I could get by without a protein skimmer, an ATO, etc. I would not be able to get away with no chiller. I will give you one thing, for your tank, you may need 5 or 6. I get good coverage but I also have nothing about 4-5" on each side of the tank. With my overflows in each corner, I have very little room. However, the corners of the tank are till lit on the bottom, but there is a darn "triangle" that starts about 8" up and goes about 4-5" on each side (at the top). One more thing I'd like to mention. One of the current themes in this hobby seems to be over-lighting a tank. While I think intense lighting is important, I think it is possible to overdo it. Running 12 of these would be a waste IMO. There is a thread on MAAST that I've been commenting in and one guy is running 8 fixtures over his tank. I will keep updated on how things are doing. I bought an acro SPS a few days ago partly due to this thread. I'm more of a zoa/LPS guy but I want to see how it does under my lights. So far, everything seems to be responding great. The true test will be growth so time will tell.

I have four modules on a 6' long bowfront (two foot wide in the center). I have them hung over the tank about 4-5". The light coverage is great. I don't get any spot lighting or anything. I'm not sure why you'd think you would need 12. I wouldn't put 12 250w mh lamps over my tank. I had a 250w fixture over the tank before going to these. One seems every bit as bright as the 250w light, IMO much brighter. I'd like to get my hands on a PAR meter to test for myself. My point is, I can easily get away with four over my tank. Before I decided going with LEDs, I was gonna do a 400w MH and 2 - 250w MH's with at least two actinic T5s. I was also going to have to run a chiller. So in my case, I'm using far less wattage then I would be using if I had not gone with LEDs. Saying that there's no way of 3 of those fixtures will not outperform 2 250w MH is wrong. I think 3 would GREATLY outperform 2 250w MH's, pretty sure it would greatly outperform 3 - 250w MH's. Now if you wanted to argue if they'd outperform 3 400w MH, you may have a valid concern/argument.

That's not easy to answer. There are a lot of variables that go into that. First, from my research, it seems that quality optics are just as important as the LED's themselves. There are currently two methods, high intensity, high wattage LEDs -or- lower wattage LEDs and high quality lenses. From what I can see, the second approach seems to be the best. So the real question is, do you want to compare a high quality LED fixture VS a high quality MH lamp? If you try and compare a low quality LED, nothing will get proven IMO. Again, I'm no light expert, this is based off the brief research I did when I decided to go LED. LED VS MH was a huge concern for me so I wanted to know a little bit about what I was getting myself in to. If I could, I would love to see a comparison of an AI fixture over a 10g nano and 250w MH with a quality reflector over an exact 10g nano, both plumbed together with the exact water flow, temp, etc, etc. I think that would be a somewhat accurate comparison though I wouldn't submit it to a scientific journal. It be more of a fun pseudo experiment.

Are you using LEDs to grow corals in your tank? Any SPS? How much LED wattage do you have overall? Please post some pics! I just got and set up my LED system about a week ago. They are 90w ( I think) each and I have four modules total over a 175g (Aqua Illumination fixtures). I have one SPS (a monti). Everything seems to be responding VERY WELL to the new lights. There seem to be more polyps on the monit out and all my LPS seems to be opening up more and just looks "healthier". It's important to note that the light system I had before was very underpowered (1 250w MH and a 4' PC fixture), Time will tell. My point was, from what I've read, PAR is a more important measurement than lumens. Lumens simply refer to how bright our eyes perceive the light to be. I'm in no way, shape or form saying that PAR is the end all, be all. I'm saying it's a better measurement and that lumen is somewhat of a moot point. *If* this is true, I encourage you to look at the PAR data for the AI LED module in this link: http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2010/5/aafeature2 Make sure you look at the Aqua Illumination data and not the other cheesy LED fixtures. Then, compare it to the PAR data for some various MH lights in this link: http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2010/2/aafeature2 Again, this assumes that PAR data is a decent measurement when it comes to growing coral. There are other measurements that may or may not be better but PAR seems to be one of the first thing the experts look at.