An Odyssea review

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eric b 125

Guest
i just got two 36" odyssea fixtures and figured i would do a product review on them. i'll preface this by stating: IVE HEARD! the reason i went with these lights is not because i dont have the $ for a more expensive fixture, it's because at this point i'm not willing to drop a ton of cheddar. i have other hobbies i enjoy that i'm more willing to throw money at. also, i'm using these lights as a stepping stone. if i want other lights i'll get them, if these work out fine then that's that. its a cheap fixture and i know that, if and when i'm willing to spend more money i'll spend it.
i've heard mixed reviews. the bad reputation they have, IMHO, is because of a bunch of hearsay, and they have changed a lot of things around in the past years. the good that i've heard is from reading other forums and a few friends of mine had good experience with them.
if they suck- i got what i paid for. if they do a decent job-i got what i hoped for. will post pics later tonight.
 
andezzzy

andezzzy

Member
Ive had the 48" (250w) Mh fixture with the 12 moon leds for about 6 months now. Ive never had a problem. The only thing i didn't like was the factory bulbs. I thought they were a little too yellow, so i ordered the pheonix 14000k bulbs for them. Im very happy with the product. People say you get what you pay for, i'm happy i saved hundreds of dollars and have a great reef growing.
 
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eric b 125

Guest
one of the boxes was damaged upon delivery. the one fixture took a slight hit. a screw came loose and although i knew how to fix it, i called the company to see if i should fix or return it. they said that if i felt that i could fix it they would send me a free MH bulb for the trouble, if not i could just return it for a replacement. with a few twists of a screwdriver the problem was fixed. the people on the other line were very friendly and helpful.
 
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eric b 125

Guest
andy: i'm glad to hear you are having a good experience. i plan on getting the phoenix bulbs as well, but the ones that came with the unit have good color to them so i may keep them. i was given 2 free ice-cap ballasts that are direct plug and play with the odyssea, but i want to see whats up with the stock ones, so i'm going to run them for a few weeks just to see whats up.
 
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eric b 125

Guest
i've had the fixtures for two days now, but i just started using them today (which is why i waited to start this thread). i left the actinics on while i was at work and when i got home at 3 i switched on the MH. i did this for several reasons. for one is that i want to make sure the fixture and ballasts stay reasonably cool during the MH period. although i dont take much stock into the bad rep, i'd rather play it safe as i would with this amount of electriciy of any name sitting over a box of water. another reason i chose to run the lights like this for the first few days is because i dont know how much temperature swing or evaporation i will have. i dont have any corals yet, so it doesnt much matter right now. on a side note, the only lights i had thus far were NO factory lighting that came with the tank (either the wifes chihuahua or rabbit pulled the stock lights into the tank by chewing on the cords behind the stand) and the fish were without lights for a few weeks. they are very happy to have some light and seem much more relaxed.
 
tru2037

tru2037

Member
i too went with oddesea - at first everything worked great but the ballasts died very soon but they can be swapped with the coralife ballasts. Also I agree they ship awful bulbs so if you swap those also you'll have a good setup. Watch out for heat! All my fans died quick(under 30 days 3 times),I finally upgraded to corallife when the lights started flickering in the whole house from the MH ballast.
Just noticed you also have the MH setup, the wiring was all loose inside the ballast housing and in the hood, I found the burnt wires when I opened her up to fix the fans. I also put rubber legs on the housing to quite down the noise. Also be careful of the rubber bands holding the pc's in they are very frail.
 
wifishman1

wifishman1

Member
ive had several odyssea fixtures with great results. the first was a power compact, 36wx2 it worked great had no problems. the second was the 2x250w/w pc's and leds had no problems with that for the first six months (sold the tank to a friend) he upgraded ballests to ice cap 660's and the bulbs to phoenix bulbs and the fixture is still running great. the last fixture is a 150w mh with 2 14w t5's now i just got the fixture but its day three and everything is going great. no problems and it was only $99 and free shipping. now keep in mind that there has been some things that they have changed since the (fire starter fixtures) now if you want to spend $800 on a fixture go ahead. but me i dont make all that much and am always looking for a deal.
 
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eric b 125

Guest
so far i'm very pleased with them. given, its only been a few days, but i only run the MH when i'm home and i monitor everything closely. the fixture is cool to the touch as are the ballasts. the fans run quiet, too.
i plan on getting some corals next week, probably some LPS, and then i'll plug the lights into timers but until then there's no need for the MH to be on for 8 full hours.
yesterday i did a 6 hour burn on them. about a half hour before i hit the hay i checked the temp of the tank and it was at 82 and the heater light was on. i turned the heater back a little, down to 79 did a short sunset and then moonlights for the night. when i woke up i checked the temp and still 82 so i'm guessing its the other heater. i was out all day so tonights burn will only be a few hours and i didnt check the temps before firing the MH. i'll worry about it tomorrow after work.
 
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eric b 125

Guest
oh, and as far as color is concerned:
i dont have much experience with lights, this is my first real fixture, but the color looks fine to me. we have a current fixture on one of our bow front reefs at work and the color is the same. its a blue-white that is even throughout the tank. i was worried about un-even lighting since i got two 36" fixtures with single halides in each but it turned out better than i hoped. my tank has a center brace which means no 3 bulb 72" fixtures and i dont feel the need to have two 250 watts on each side. however, i took a pic of the tank and it does look yellow and un-even, but it looks NOTHING like this in person. (i've heard ppl say that before and thought they were blowing smoke, but now i've seen first hand at how the color changes in pics)
 
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eric b 125

Guest
i've had the fixtures for a week now, and everything has been going well. since i'm at work a lot of the time, and partied on halloween, i've pretty much just been running actinics. i havent really burned the MH for more than a few hours at a time. i also had some heating issues that i thought were from the halides, but came to find out i one of my heaters set a little high. today i'm going to do a long burn on the MH since i have the day off and can monitor the heat just in case. i am noticing my rock starting to show some of it's color again and sometime this week i'm going to get some corals.
 
andezzzy

andezzzy

Member
Originally Posted by Eric B 125
http:///forum/post/3163012
andy: i'm glad to hear you are having a good experience. i plan on getting the phoenix bulbs as well, but the ones that came with the unit have good color to them so i may keep them. i was given 2 free ice-cap ballasts that are direct plug and play with the odyssea, but i want to see whats up with the stock ones, so i'm going to run them for a few weeks just to see whats up.
I was thinking about going with the icecap ballasts but i wasn't sure about the wiring or anything. Where did you get it from that it was plug and play? The Stock ones have worked great for me so far and i have no complaints. i'll post a couple pics when i get a chance the phenoix bulbs give a nice blue but i have two uvl super actinics complimenting the MH and i couldn't be happier with the outcome. From what i understand Odyessa has the same exact parts/peices as a coralife fixture but more cost less naturally.
 
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eric b 125

Guest
i read about the plug-n-play with icecaps on another forum. the thing is that the ice-caps cord isnt really long so you have to get a longer cord from a computer store.
 
andezzzy

andezzzy

Member
Originally Posted by Eric B 125
http:///forum/post/3166230
i read about the plug-n-play with icecaps on another forum. the thing is that the ice-caps cord isnt really long so you have to get a longer cord from a computer store.
cool.. i think i'm goning to stick with the factory ones for now since there hasn't been a problem with them, when and if they ever go i'll probably end up going with icecap.
 
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eric b 125

Guest
i've been using the stock ballasts, too. they seem to work good. the entire package runs quiet and cool. i'm very pleased with the product.
on a side note: i got an e-mail from the place i ordered the lights from. they have a reputation of bad customer service, but my experience with them has been on the contrary. i hadnt contacted them since i had the screw incident so they sent me an e-mail to see how things panned out and if there was anything they could do. i thought that was pretty cool of them.
 
coral keeper

coral keeper

Active Member

Originally Posted by Andezzzy
http:///forum/post/3163003
Ive had the 48" (250w) Mh fixture with the 12 moon leds for about 6 months now. Ive never had a problem. The only thing i didn't like was the factory bulbs. I thought they were a little too yellow, so i ordered the pheonix 14000k bulbs for them. Im very happy with the product. People say you get what you pay for, i'm happy i saved hundreds of dollars and have a great reef growing.
The pheonix bulbs you got are working with the stock ballasts? I read that the stock ballasts wont fire up the more expensive bulbs like pheonix, not 100% sure if that's true or not.
 
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eric b 125

Guest
i've started noticing my rocks purple-ing up a bit. the company i ordered the lights from, who are said to have horrible customer service, sent me the bulb for my troubles. still running the stock ballasts with no heat issues and i'm still very pleased with the color of all the bulbs.
 
coral keeper

coral keeper

Active Member
I have a 60" light fixture over my 180 gallon and have no complaints so far. They have been running for about 7-8 months with no problems so far. I am growing all kinds of corals from SPS, anemones, clams to softies, ect with no problems. Color is pretty darn good IMO. My fixture has 3x 250 watt MH's with 322 watts of Actinic PC, so its a total of 1,072 watts. If you want to check out my 180 gallon diary, here is the link.
https://forums.saltwaterfish.com/t/355514/coral-keepers-180-gallon-reef-diary
The fans are a little on the loud side IMO, but I got used to them and don't notice it anymore. My fixture has 2 fans which do a good job in cooling down all 1,072 watts on the fixture when ALL the lights are running at the same time. I read that expensive bulbs like the phoenix bulbs wont run on the stock ballast, not 100% sure if that's true or not. I also agree with Eric, I don't believe all the crappy reviews about the fixtures, they are VERY nice fixtures IMO.
 
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