Kessil A160 Tuna Blue on Freshwater?

[Itchy Trigger]

I recently set up a 75g freshwater tank with SA cichlids and large tetras (my wheelhouse back in the day). I wanted LEDs on this tank and picked up two of the Kessil A160 Tuna Sun lamps, thinking they'd be better for freshwater, but good god are they YELLOW. The fish don't show good color at all and I'm disappointed. I hate to just have to replace these but has anyone tried Tuna Blue on freshwater? Not trying to grow plants or anything, this would just be for esthetics.

My first thought was to supplement the Kessils by putting a couple of small blue LED strip lights behind each one. But maybe better to just suck it up and buy two Tuna Blues and try to sell the others...

Any advice or suggestions?

 

[oreo57]

I recently set up a 75g freshwater tank with SA cichlids and large tetras (my wheelhouse back in the day). I wanted LEDs on this tank and picked up two of the Kessil A160 Tuna Sun lamps, thinking they'd be better for freshwater, but good god are they YELLOW. The fish don't show good color at all and I'm disappointed. I hate to just have to replace these but has anyone tried Tuna Blue on freshwater? Not trying to grow plants or anything, this would just be for esthetics.

My first thought was to supplement the Kessils by putting a couple of small blue LED strip lights behind each one. But maybe better to just suck it up and buy two Tuna Blues and try to sell the others...

Any advice or suggestions?

OK hear is the deal.. those kessils can be changed from a range of 6000-9000K or close.

Technically they shouldn't be very "yellow" though color perception is an individual thing.

You could just have some tannins in the water if set at 9000k you think things are still too yellow.

Now as to color, that is another story.
These are very short in red spectrum and most blue heavy lights wash out colors..

Tuna blues aren't going to improve your fish colors.

One word of warning is newer Kessils for fw seemed to have addressed this problem and maybe even in stealth updates to later iteration of older models.
Unfortunately Kessil is VERY tight lipped on what they use diode wise.VERY annoying to me personally.

If you want to stick with a type AI Prime freshwaters are way more errr "advanced" than Kessils old school ones.

sort of proof that Kessil did undocumented mods

https://www.kessil.com/aquarium/freshwater_A160.php

https://www.modernaquarium.com/kessil-a160we-tuna-sun-led-light/
Kessil A160WE Tuna Sun Freshwater LED Light

diode composition is completely different..

 

[Itchy Trigger]

Thanks, oreo. You're definitely right about color perception being pretty subjective. I've adjusted the Tuna Sun over its entire range and the whole thing looks yellowish white to whitish green to my eyes. I don't think it's a tannin/algae issue.

From those wavelength graphs, it looks like maybe the Tuna Flora might be better for bringing out color? Those graphs have always confused me though, so perhaps I'm wrong about that. I had thought the Tuna Flora was just a very pink/purple light for growing stuff in a refugium.

I used to have AI lights on all my tanks and loved them. It seems like they had a much wider range of colors to adjust and the controller was much nicer than the Kessil one, which is pretty lousy in my opinion.

 

[oreo57]

Thanks, oreo. You're definitely right about color perception being pretty subjective. I've adjusted the Tuna Sun over its entire range and the whole thing looks yellowish white to whitish green to my eyes. I don't think it's a tannin/algae issue.

From those wavelength graphs, it looks like maybe the Tuna Flora might be better for bringing out color? Those graphs have always confused me though, so perhaps I'm wrong about that. I had thought the Tuna Flora was just a very pink/purple light for growing stuff in a refugium.

I used to have AI lights on all my tanks and loved them. It seems like they had a much wider range of colors to adjust and the controller was much nicer than the Kessil one, which is pretty lousy in my opinion.

none of them will meet your criteria really.. the green-yellow thing just tells me cheap 6000k-ish (and up) diodes w/ poor CRI

Th tuna flora won't be yellow or green but more like intense magenta to purple.

almost perfect high CRI, high K (>5000) led

https://www.eenewseurope.com/news/entire-light-spectrum-sun-one-led/page/0/4

 

[Itchy Trigger]

Yeah, intense magenta isn't really what I'm going for either! Haha. I guess maybe I'll take a look at the AI Prime Freshwater, which has a graph that looks like this:

 

[oreo57]

Yeah, intense magenta isn't really what I'm going for either! Haha. I guess maybe I'll take a look at the AI Prime Freshwater,

bit of a warning .. out of the box it "may" seem yellowish to you. Your fish will look much better.
Color is adjustable though.
adjustments may be counter intuitive but not that hump in yellow/green range is from the whites.

Normally one would think of dimming the warm whites since they are, by themselves, yellow..but theoretically dropping the cool whites should work better.
Warm whites are rich in yellow and red. Cool whites mostly yellow (as you have seen).
Dropping the cool whites cuts more yellow/green while dropping the warm whites cuts err orange (red and yellow).

for fun.. reef version w/ all diodes 100%. Old version AI-Prime

 

[Itchy Trigger]

That tank looks nice! So the pic is AI Prime Reef (older version). You'd suggest the Freshwater version for my tank though, right? And that's interesting about the cool whites vs warm whites - I'll make a note of that for sure. Thanks for your help!

Edit - just checked - the Freshwater is the one with the warm whites so that should be the one.

 

[Imaexpat2]

With the Kessil's...the Tuna Blue will give you great 10K to 20K (Crisp White to Deep Blue actiniC 03 look). The Tuna Sun will give you a 6-9K look which is a warm white. The Tuna Flora will be Magenta in color and is great for growing macro algae and plants but kinda hard on the eyes and typically only used in sumps.

I have and personally use the Tuna Blues and have a Tuna Flora over a sump. I havent used the Tuna Sun but I have seen a couple in use. In fact I am running 3 A80 Tuna Blues over a 40 gallon SPS Dominant tank and average between 250-325 PAR over just about the whole tank, at the moment and have another A80 Tuna Blue over my QT tank since I often QT corals. What I like about the Kessils is the idiot proof simplicity, the A80's dont have a fan and run silently, and the price tag of 130.00 per a A80 make them a awesome deal. I run 3 over the 40 gallon breeder due to the fact I have light demanding SPS corals and try to shoot for 250-350 PAR over as much of the tank as possible for optimal coral growth. You could probably get away with 2 for cichlids. The AI Primes would be great (2) as well if you like playing with the slider bar and making adjustments and programing lights. At about 210 each this makes them pretty freaking awesome bang for the buck wattage wise.

 

[Itchy Trigger]

Thanks - yeah the A80s are going to be high on my list if I set up a small to medium sized reef in the future. I think I'm going to go with the AI Prime x2 for this tank. :thumbsup:

 

[oreo57]

Thanks - yeah the A80s are going to be high on my list if I set up a small to medium sized reef in the future. I think I'm going to go with the AI Prime x2 for this tank. :thumbsup:

New, to me, led..
https://www.amazon.com/Electronics-...&qid=1609941877&sprefix=hm+el,pets,167&sr=8-1

Contains he "missing" cyan (long story).

 

[Itchy Trigger]

Just to follow up... Got a pair of AI Prime Freshwater fixtures and they are fantastic. I've only just set them up, but I already like them way more than the Kessils. Thanks for the nudge in the right direction!

 

[oreo57]

Just to follow up... Got a pair of AI Prime Freshwater fixtures and they are fantastic. I've only just set them up, but I already like them way more than the Kessils. Thanks for the nudge in the right direction!

Yes, few complaints about them in FW world.