CoraLed is a relatively new company building LED aquarium light fixture in the UK that will build your lights to order in lengths up to 10 ft. Granted, most hobbyists won’t need that much span but its good to know companies are willing to give you more than just a standard fixture to make you happy. A recent review of a unit in Practical Fishkeeping caught our attention so we started looking into the company more.
Boasting 118 lumens per watt of power consumption, the CoraLed uses a modular approach with a bank of 12 LEDs consuming 27W of power. The custom-built fixture can be as simple as a single module or up to eight packed into one fixture. The company wasn’t clear if the 27W per module includes power loss from the plug to the LEDs, where you lose power through the transformer or cooling fans.
Speaking of cooling, we didn’t see mention of fans in the product page or in the PFK article. Passive cooling with a robust heatsink is adequate but air movement is always welcome to dissipitate the heat and extend the life of the LEDs. As for the LEDs themselves, they did not give specifics in the brands but mention using LEDs from five of the top companies. The boards can be ordered with a specific blend of white and blue LEDs to give you the color rendition you chose.
The CoraLed unit is fed with one power cord and does include a built n computer module to adjust the lighting. Similar to what we’ve seen in the Acan Lighting LEDs, the CoraLed allows you do adjust the percentage of intensity in the white and blue spectrum to dial in a true dawn-to-dusk cycle.
Overall we like the custom built, modular approach under one hood but we’d like to see some more details on the LEDs themselves along with options for other colors down the road. More details on the cooling system would also be appreciated. The fixtures do come with a five year warranty on the LEDs and a one year warranty of the power supply. As with many of the full-featured LED fixtures, the CoraLed will run you a bit more right off the bat. PFK lists a 1 meter unit running around £800 (about $1258 USD).
[Image via PFK]
