Tunze 8850 LED question...

[Maximus]

Hi Roger, I had no idea Tunze made a water proof led light until today. Can you completely submerge this light for extended periods of time? I was thinking about using this as a refugium light. Can you control the lights at all without a controller? Any chance this is Apex compatible? Thanks.

 

[rvitko]

Hi, for a basic refugium light you could use the 8821, which is a more basic 6500K 8W light. It is not controllable. The 8850 is much brighter, both are completely waterproof and the 8850 must be submerged for cooling if it is to run at full power, it dims to 14W when run emersed. The 8850 can be adjusted by swiping the magnet holder over a sensor on one end. To my knowledge it is not compatible with Apex, my understanding is the signal is not a basic 0-10V but is a script for the 3 colors of LED and the intensity of each channel.

 

[Maximus]

Is the wattage automatically switched when submersed or not under water? What if the water was dripping on the unit, and not totally submerged in water? Thanks.

 

[rvitko]

The dimming is based on the temperature of the light, if it is even half submersed it will work at full intensity. I would imagine a sufficient flow over it would do the same.

 

[Maximus]

Ahh, gotcha. Thanks again!