Sunlight Supply Tek vs, Nova Extreme Pro T5

One of 3Reef's sponsors is called Salty Critter. That's fairly close to Cleveland. You might want to check them out.

I've sold both fixtures. At first, I didn't want to sell the Nova's because 'back in the day', they had horrible customer service. Luckily, they have fixed this poor business practice. I've also used both of them in the QT Warehouse. When you were looking across the warehouse when the roof lights were out, you could easily see the difference in quantity of light between the fixtures.

 

If you can swing it get the Tek. You mentioned you are a DIY kind of person. I suggest getting a retrofit kit from Reefgeeks.com and installing it in your canopy to keep the clean lines you were mentioning.
I believe LET is the brand line and there might be one in the Sunlight line also.

I suggest getting 3 ATI Blue Plus, 2 ATI Aquablue Special and 1 ATI Purple Plus. All have actinic spectrum as part of their light. The ATI Aquablue Special is a white bulb and the Purple Plus is the Blue Plus with red spectrum added. The Purple Plus will make your reds, pinks and purples look much better.

 

Hands down, TEK. I Ordered a Nova extreme, and the balast blew out within 60 days...I returend it to Drs Foster and Smith and they nicely sent me another one....well...within 60 days...exact same problem....went for a third fixture....and exact same problem. So they refunded my $ and I bought a TEK fixture...that was well over a year ago. No issues, and my corals look great. Well worth the money.

 

The Tek should have approx 20% more output due to the superior reflector material, superior parobolic reflector design. This is also assuming that yoou will be using the superior ATI bulbs. however if the Current fixture is also running the ATI bulbs, they will probably only be a 5-10% gain from the Tek.

 

I actually was toying with the idea of retrofitting the canopy myself... I've done 2-3 canopys using the ole coralife 2 bulb electronic ballast and Icecap 660's (and also the smaller version whatever that was) ... stand offs, et et (BTW reflectors sucked back then)

...so yeah, I got Dremels, routers, wiring tools, blah blah and can make some pretty pro looking harnesses, et et... (if I say so meself's ha!)

Still, anymore I'm thinking I'd rather keep the "surfaces" under the hood simple to facilitate cleaning off salt...IMHO the more junk, the more complex it is to keep it clean...and just from your input I'm envisoning mounting an existing fixture just because the "geometry" of a TEK fixture under the hood is simpler to wipe down (repeating myself but its a hard concept to communicate)

...he he, I still think we should make a sorta "cyber Island of misfit aquarium junk" for the good of the hobby....Hey BTW has anyone tried that "ion exchange" deal that eliminates all filters & water changes <LOL>

 

Oh yeah, they will get my support & business...no doubt!!!...thats a clean well run place BTW...
but its not any LFS fault gas is $4/gal and I just can't justify the $30 in gas driving my pickup out there for a light fixture...:-[ (I'm gonna go mail order on this one I think) ....(problem is for a poor person spending $400, I gotta get the exact light I need and at the best value/quality for the money) :-/

Heck should'nt we all feel a lil guilty spending hours of these owners time talking to them and then buying equipment elsewhere...not getting on some soapbox, but I sincerely try to avoid that practice: I've seen people do exactly that and it irks me...

So as matter of fact, I've actually been trying to figure out how to "package" a few purchases to justify the trip .... I also plan on bringing 1-2 extra customers with me....

BTW; Kudos to you and anyone else steering business to a well run LFS ...8)

 

I would suggest the Tek fixture myself. I have had both, on separate tanks, and the Tek is by far superior. I have a Tek 6 bulb 3 footer on my 70 gallon and it is absolutely beautiful, i can grow any coral at any place in the tank. I also have a 4 foot 8 bulb on my 75 gallon. then theres my cube tank where i have a 4 bulb 24" nova extreme pro fixture, and after replacing all 4 bulbs (at about 20$ a bulb ~+80$ in price) i am wishing i just went with another tek fixture. The lack of penetration with the light is just killing me. I never had that issue with my TEK lit tanks, now i have to be wary of where i put what coral.

SO. Want to put any coral anywhere in your tank? Go Tek.
Want to replace all the bulbs right off the bat and probably a ballast or two in the first year? go Nova.

 

The replies are so appreciated...if my suspicions are correct then the TCO (total cost of ownership) for the TEK is lower....from what I'm gathering T5 bulbs need changing a lil less than T12/8's but never past 18mo's

thats $120 ever 16-18 mo's maintaining the tank ...cheaper than VHO or MH, more than the semi-unproven LED's ...the amount and scattered nature of researching a comprehensive LED build is daunting ...I'm wondering if I'd get on ya'll nerves doing that one

another question remaining then is cooling inside a enclosed canopy...I'm told the ends of the bulbs is the concern...

 

I have a 36" 6 bulb Tek... I can't find anything major to complain about, it's a great light. It comes with a small hanging kit for suspending the light inside of canopies too.

As for cooling, my light doesn't get very hot but I have it hanging above the tank without a canopy (I like to show it off... its a sleek looking fixture ). It heats my 50 gal tank up by 1-2 degree F during the 8 hours all 6 bulbs are on. The Tek light elite, which is a bit more money, includes a fan and apparently slightly better reflectors than the "stock" Tek light.

As mentioned by others in this thread, light output is fantastic.

Aquacave gives you a discount on bulbs if you buy the light fixture.

 

In my opinion if your going to be throwing it in a canopy just get a tek retro fit kit from reek geeks add some computer case fans on the inside of the canopy attach an acrylic shield so you can easily wipe off salt creep and call it a day