Trooper182
Active Member
So before I state what happened I want to emphasize that the manufacturer of this product states that it is not water proof and should not be submerged. The issue is the way its designed and the materials used. So I am running this product in my system. I have a canister system that this is plummed into. A few days ago I started to smell an electronical smell in my house. I searched all around my tank and found nothing overheating or burning. Well I decided I wanted to switch the lights on my phyto tank with some different grow lights. During disassembly this is what I found.
I work with LED lights a lot and this honestly is a failure and seems like a cost cutting measure. The LEDs used are not the waterproofed type. The way this is setup there's a layer of double sided foam tape on the top and bottom, the LEDs are in the middle covered with a silver tape. All this is rapped in a rubber cover. The problem is when you take the lid off to harvest, water will inevitably drip down the side as the tank fills to the absolute top. What I was doing was wrapping a towel around it to catch water but even then water would still get past and under the rubber cover. Well this ended up with saltwater contacting the exposed LEDs and started shorting them out as you can see. This could easily be mitigated by using enclosed LEDs like I showed in the pictures that I replaced the stock leds with. Yes it may cost a few dollars more, but I would rather pay a few extra dollars for a safer product vs having a potential fire while im sleeping. So I would say just be careful with the products you use.
I work with LED lights a lot and this honestly is a failure and seems like a cost cutting measure. The LEDs used are not the waterproofed type. The way this is setup there's a layer of double sided foam tape on the top and bottom, the LEDs are in the middle covered with a silver tape. All this is rapped in a rubber cover. The problem is when you take the lid off to harvest, water will inevitably drip down the side as the tank fills to the absolute top. What I was doing was wrapping a towel around it to catch water but even then water would still get past and under the rubber cover. Well this ended up with saltwater contacting the exposed LEDs and started shorting them out as you can see. This could easily be mitigated by using enclosed LEDs like I showed in the pictures that I replaced the stock leds with. Yes it may cost a few dollars more, but I would rather pay a few extra dollars for a safer product vs having a potential fire while im sleeping. So I would say just be careful with the products you use.
