OMG MORE PICS!! This looks so much cleaner than the ghetto DIY wall hangers I used.

It's adjustable too.

I don't have that pink hue at all that some people have been talking about though?

Legs and splash guard seem easy enough... But how hard would it be to make it two cords instead of one? (I have zero experience with that sort of thing)

my friends 4 bulb 48" unit jus came in today. sweet packaging and lights are nice n bright. ill ask him to take pics n ill try to post them hopefully tomorrow. think im gonna order one for myself.

I would get some washers between the top of the brackets and the bolts, it looks like the head is too small for the hole.

Now they got the new nova extreme with individual reflectors 48" 4 bulb with moonlights and fan and timers for $286 at pet mountain shipped. I wonder i this was a better deal? Why do I keep breaking my head? you will always find a better deal later on anyways! at least i will get ati bulbs with the one from hellolights.

So I wanted to share what I came up with in terms of legs for my 20H aquarium. Also, I used the idea of magnets from runyonh to create a splash guard. Here are some pictures

1. I went to Home Depot and bought 12 3" t-plates. I also bought some #8 x 1/2 metal screws. (You can buy larger plates depending on how high you want the light to sit.)




2. I decided that I wanted a total of four legs, so I stacked 3 plates per leg (the number of plates will depend on how much space you need to cover.


3. The next step is to completely disassemble the light. Make sure to remove the parts that hold the lights on the side before you start drilling holes.


4. Drill holes to your liking.


5 Here is a picture of what the legs look like.


6. After I fitted the legs, I removed them and spray painted them black.

7. While the legs dried, I went to Ace Hardware and had a piece of acrylic cut with dimensions 22 1/2" x 8 1/8". I added the magnets and everything fit perfectly. (Note that I originally bought my glass to be 22 3/4" long. However, the plexi glass will expand with the heat and cause the plastic to bow. I had to go back to the store and get a smaller cut to leave room for the glass to expand.)


8. After the legs dried (wait at least 24 hours), I reattached them to the light. Here are some pics:







I hope this helps anyone who cannot afford the TEK legs. Enjoy.

i would be worried that would slip into the tank.

Wow, thats really nice but really close to the edge...Aren't you afraid the light could slip and go in the water?

it's not going anywhere guys, go grab three of those plates, stack them on top of each other, and try to bend them.....add to the fact he's got them so they fit the inside of the rim perfectly so theres no room for it to slide either way (except front to back), which is the only thing that would worry me, i would put a spot of hot glue just in front of and just behind the legs so that could not happen easily just to be safe i think, but other than that i like it, the flower pot universal bracket shown above looks a little nicer to me though if only because it is adjustable, but this is a nice DIY mod!!

planning on using the magnet and acrylic shield idea myself

acrylic is easy to cut guys, get a sheet big enough and buy a $7 cutter and cut and snap it yourself....i have even done it by scoring it well with a straight razor blade, but i suppose this seems like a daunting task to some so if they cut it for you ok.....it's just a pride thing to me, having done it all myself...you know...LOL

The 3 plates make a supper tight fit. That light is not going anywhere. Also, you can add black electrical tape or some type of protective rubbber to make the fit even tighter and avoid any slippage.

I might suggest that anyone else looking to do the magnets for the spash guard use nickle plated magnets. The unplated ones will rust. Here is a good, cheap place for nickle plated rare earth magnets.

http://www.rare-earth-magnets.com/

actually, i would be worried about the part of the frame that those plates are attached too. it won't take much to cause that to flex, which in turn could cause the angle of one of those legs to shift...and then slip. it looks a bit sketchy, IMO. but hey, if it works for you then more power to ya!

My GF got me this light for christmas and was wondering if it will support SPS and clams in a 30gal cube. 20"x18"x18" or so.

which bulb configuration?

Where could I buy a plain piece of acrylic from?

Me too.

I don't think it would be too difficult to add some metal - maybe epoxy two more pieces of steel at 90 degrees to form a bracket that goes over the lip of the lid.

The magnet plexi glass cover looks great though.




Is the nickel plating rust proof? If not - I wonder if you could use some epoxy to cover the entire magnet as a protective coating to shield the metal from saltwater.

home depot or lowes to name major places and they cut to your desired size as well, any well stocked hardware store i imagine should have it

I wouldn't have recommended it if it was going to rust now would I

Well you ARE evil.

It's true, it's true

I'm looking at adding moonlights to the 24" light that I just received. It's going to be hanging over my BC29. Would the 2 wide 4-LED Bars from MeasureExplorer be too much light? http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...em=310111657844

Or, would something like this be better? http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...em=170289217372

I'm leaning towards the MeasureExplorer due to the packaging of the lights. But, I don't want to have too much light.

i think it might make it a little bright..I just like a little bit of light in the tank just to give it a little bit of blue glow...I think 4 bulbs 2 on each side would be enough

i would also recommend a 4 led kit for a smaller shorter tank like your's

my 75 hex, 30" tall, with the measure explorer 8led kit





i got the one that has one led at the end of each lead so i could place them how i wanted, keep in mind even though they say water proof, after about 6 months three of my led's managed to get saltwater in them and fried them, i simply ordered some 5mm led's and resoldered and shrinktubed them, so what you see is 5 wide angle leds that came with it and 3 standard narrow beam blue leds

if you like to DIY and have a soldering gun and shrink tubing and multimeter i would recommend getting some stuff from here

http://www.oznium.com/led

and making your own, they also sell pre-made strip lighting, thats where i got the replacement leds

Thanks for the feedback. I went ahead and ordered the loose 4 wide LED set from MeasureExplorer.

Now I just need to hang my new light.

Well I cancelled my order since they took so long to process it. I also didn't like the idea of paying the same amount of money that others paid for the 8bulb fixture, when i was getting the 4 bulb fixture.

It still would have been a good deal even for the 4 bulb combo.

???? $186 is still a great deal i would say

yeah but you can buy the nova extreme with contoured reflectors, timers, moonlights, splash shield mouting legsand warranty. By the time you buy moonlights, splash shield, legs and all the rest for this fixture you will only save about $50 or less? what do you guys think?

splash shield can be made for 10bucks..i made my hanging kit for 6bucks..Moonlights dont really do anything..I mean how often do we look in the tank with them..maybe a little at first then it dies off. Can get moonlights on ebay for 10bucks..so still close to $200 saving

Well I have my sunpod 2x150w(48 inch) over my 75g tank right now, so all I really need is bulbs right now, wich would be about $100. Do you guys think my sunpod is a stronger light than the one from hellos 4X54w t5? i'm only keeping lps and softies anyways.

i think MH is a bit of an overkill for LPS and softies..you could probably be just fine with 260w PC lights

So whenever you shop - you never buy an item that was on sale in the last year???

Why not evaluate the deal on it's merit alone. If it's a good deal - hop on it - if not - pass it up. I purchased the 2x24" model and was a bit hesitant after the purchase - but the fixture is real nice and lights up the 29 gallon tank I want it to light at some point in the future.

Do I wish I got the light fixture for 100 bucks. You betcha. But I got mine for 125.00. Falls in the category of you snooze you lose. I took a little longer before I decided to jump in - and it cost me. Still a nice light for the money though. Missing out on that 8 bulb light is a stinker though. At that price - it was a SMOKIN HOT DEAL!!!!

The 8 bulb started out at $150.00 and I got mine when they marked the price up to $175.00. After that they marked it up again to $200.00. All those prices are still a good deal for a 8 bulb T5...I ended up saving close to $200.00 compared to the Tek light I was planning on buying...

Plexiglass and acrylic are basically the same when it comes to how much light will be allowed to pass through them correct (before I go and purchase either or I wanna make sure I'm buying the right thing for a splash shield)?

Hung the light last night. Turned out to be a fairly easy job.

I am wanting to get this for my new 30g long (30" long). i really dont want to hang the fixture. any way to do this?

You can drill it so that tek mounting legs fit perfectly. Its relatively easy to do

I just got this light delivered to me and WOW it is soo nice. i'm planning on using it on a mixed sps/lps/softies 10g frag tank...will the sps survive under these babies? anyways THIS IS A FREAKIN AWESOME LIGHT!!!

yes

Here's how I hung mine.




before



after

thats a pretty nice idea..gives you some shelf space to put your stuff on as well

nice and clean privateer, but wheres the splash guard? yur gonna wish you had one

I gotta tell you ....the shelf was the wifes idea. The splash guard is comin'.

i really like the suspended light look personally, this tank is my first canopy enclosed setup, i actually wanted to find a way to use something clear yet tough enough to trust to suspend my lights, so they would appear at first glance to be "hanging" in mid air, had one hung with several strands of fishing line, looked good, but the eyelets on the top of the fixture got so hot i would not trust it, figured the line would stretch and melt and break and thats no good

Just got my new upgraded bulbs in this fixture today.
Unfortunately one of the bulbs they sent me was wrong, so I currently have 2 ATI Blue+ and 2 KZ Fiji Purple.
Oddly enough, it looks pretty nice, the colors REALLY pop and there's just enough blue with it being TOO blue.
I actually think the corals look nicer under it than they did under my MH fixture with Phoenix 14k bulb.

i know mine look better, the only ones that dont look quite as nice is some bright green star ployps...not GSP......i dont know what they are, they look like this but the center and main stems of the arms are bright green, only the feather looking edges are white.....anyways.....they are not as vibrant green under this setup as they were under the 14k Phoenix 250....

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cor...n_Sipadan_4.jpg

my bulbs from back to front are, TRU 10k, TRU Actinic, UVL Aquasun 10k, UVL Super Actinic R

Time to Rant on myself here

I put an order in to an online retailer Jan 4th to get in on a free shipping deal for the new year. After I put the order in - I realized the retailer carried the rare earth magnets I needed for splash guard for dirt cheap. I tried to alter my order - but it was too late - and now the shipping cost is higher than the magnets so I'm stuck with no magnets again.

Can anybody recommend a place to get these Magnets on the cheap ( shipping included of course ) . I screwed up by not picking up the magnets for a handful of pennies when I had the chance.

http://www.rare-earth-magnets.com/

http://www.rare-earth-magnets.com/detail-ID-115.html