AquaIllumination teardown confirms Interchangeable LED puck

The newest AquaIllumination light is still one of the first aquarium LED lights using Cree XP-G LEDs to be widely available to reef aquarists. Since the completion of the ReefStock conference we’ve had a lot more time to give some serious attention to this and other LED lights. You might recall a story we posted a couple of weeks ago about a company called BridgeLux that is trying to bring a standard of interchangeable single LEDs for use in a variety of LED lighting applications. Within the discussion of that post it came to light that two familiar AI users Reefkoi and Cherry Corals had been having hot steamy LED interchanging action, swapping blue and royal blue LED with no sense of morals. Their surreptitious activity made us very curious about sneaking a peek of the AI’s internals. Last night we diligently set to work undressing the AI fixture, piece by piece until at last we found some semiconducting treasure. At 1:03 am this morning, Pacific Standard time, we successfully extracted the basic LED component you see above, and all of the hot, interchangeable LED action that it portends. Follow the break for the full frontal teardown of the AI light as well as analysis of the significance of this little disc of aluminium and silicon.

The reason we are so excited about this small easily removable LED puck is that once AquaIllumination catches up with the actual production of the second gen AI fixture, at some point it will inevitably turn it’s sights towards producing LED pucks in different color combinations, with new batches of the latest and greatest LEDs and it’s not out of the question that another company could also produce pucks for the AI light. Although this is all speculation, we believe it would be in the realm of reason to look out for new LED pucks from AI in the fall timeframe. How much you ask? At first the single LED pucks may be as $50 each but with the rapid advances in LED manufacturing the price could drop to $30 each within a year. Ultimately the price of a single puck would depend solely on what LEDs are riding it. In the meantine we believe that the AI light will be a versatile light, able to accomodate a rapidly changing LED-scape for a long time to come. Complete teardown photos below.

FTC regulations require that we inform you that we were given this product for review, but our opinion of a product is never affected by how we acquire them.

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Jake Adams

Jake Adams has been an avid marine aquarist since the mid 90s and has worked in the retail side of the marine aquarium trade for more than ten years. He has a bachelor’s degree in Marine Science and has been the managing editor of ReefBuilders.com since 2008. Jake is interested in every facet of the marine aquarium hobby from the concepts to the technology, rare fish to exotic corals, and his interests are well documented through a very prolific career of speaking to reef clubs and marine aquarium events, and writing articles for aquarium publications across the globe. His primary interest is in corals which Jake pursues in the aquarium hobby as well as diving the coral reefs of the world.