Advice fo small diy led
 

Hi, Im looking to make a small DIY led light for my 5.5g nano. I was wondering

Where is the most affordible place online to buy them while still getting quality lights?

Also which lights do you recomend?

And how many blue and whites do you think I should buy for a tank this size, the dimensions are 16" x 8"?

I would like the option of putting sps in the tank for quarintines (just for short periods before putting in the main tank) so want it strong enough for that but dont want that White look Iv seen on some.

Any advice is apprieciated.

I have used rapidled.com, ledgroupbuy.com they are both good. There is also a new comer modularled.ca which is canadian owned and operated. They seem to have a good product which doesn't need you to solder anything hence the word modular. I don't like soldering so if I wouldve known a little earlier my led wouldn't have been so ugly but they work fine.:redface: check it out, I just did my biocube 29 and my buddys, let me tell you, both tanks look awesome.
btw I use cree XPE royal blue and XPG neutral white with dimming function. Dimming was pretty cool when I first got it, but now I don't use it anymore unless someone is over and I am trying to show off all the flourcent LPS.

Hi Bblinks. Thanks Ill check ou the sites you mentioned. How many of each did you use for your biocube? I want to try to do my biocube next. Did you use a heatsink or aluminum?

http://www.rapidled.com/servlet/the-...its/Categories

How big is your bio cube? I used 12 led on my friends tank and 20 on mine. I have clams in the tank without any issue on 12 leds. let me know if there anything else you want to know.

forget to mention nano tuner. check them out too, expensive but nice.

FYI if you dont have a controller and want to do sunrise and sunset and power your LEDs and have moonlights, check this out:removed

Just plug in one of the power supplies depending on how many LEDs you want to run, and you dont need any extra drivers and you can fully control it. Its designed for the nano guys to have control on the LEDs and save you money on drivers.

lotsa cheap hong kong companies like http://www.aquastyleonline.com/ etc. just check our american counterpart sites like reefsanctuary, nano-reef, reef central etc.

msjboy

I just bought a 29 biocube off another member here. Theirs to many options on everything, lol. I feel like im going to be reading forever. The controler thing is neat. I read a diy journal and someone used a Arduino off ebay. Their only like $20 and it said you can buy seperate Buckpucks and hook them up to the one Arduino and controll how bright the lights are, like if the blue were to blue or whites were to bright you could lower them seperatly. It seemed like a cheap way to have that power lol. I was only planning on doing a led for my little 5.5g nano buy it sure seems like you can do an affordable one yourself for only a little more then it would cost to buy replacment lights.

Had anyone mixed in the true violet leds from the ledgroupbuy site.
Also for the ones you solder on, did you use a special soldering gun? I read you need a stronger gun and they looked to be about as much as the build would cost?

why not use one of those LED PAR 38 bulbs?

Id never heard of a LED PAR 38 bulb Mark. After a fast google It looked like they only have one Led in the bulb. Can you add more to them. I want some blue mixed in. The fixture lookes nice.

I am using an arduino to control my led lighting system. Its not a simple project. The arduino can turn the lights on/off at set times but as far as I know it cant dim a buckpuck directly.

If you want to just set the lighting levels to what ever pleases you and not change it then the buckpucks will work alone for that. They have a small current adjustment pot on them.

The arduino is good if you want to have a sunrise/sunset effect or led cooling system temp monitoring and dont mind figuring out a little bit of programming.

A couple of puckpucks would probably do a small system like that nicely.

I didnt use a special soldering gun just a cheap 100w one (maybe cost 25 bucks).

I think the best option and bang for your buck would be the rapidled bio cube kit. If you want to truly control it them opt for reef keeper system or apex. I am not very good at soldering but the offer solderless connectors for certain Cree LEDs that will make life a lot easier. IMO I think don't complicate things, try to make it as simple for yourself as possible. That way you have less chance of messing it up.

Also stick to the CREE LEDs that are proven to work.

Ive seen a some info on the bridgelux the aquastyle guys use and you basically need twice as many if not more, to get the same output as the CREE which throws the power savings out the door. Some guy had a comparison on them, ill link it if I can find it again.

The PAR38 would actually work real well for that tank. Just make sure you get a quality one like nanotuners sells. Only issue is you cant dim for sunrise sunset and you cant customize it to your tank.

I'm pretty sure they have reef par 38 bulbs. With 12 LEDs blue and white. Just google reef par 38

bblinks, I just wanted to double check... im going to order the leds tonight, did you go with the Neutral white or the cool white?

Go with 2 RB per 1 NW. That is the trend currently because of the warmer color the Neutral has.

Dimmable PAR38. MR16 base LEDs are now also available, run straight off 12VDC, no soldering, just need the MR15 sockets.

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/110646443892?...84.m1423.l2649

MR16 in cool white, I'm sure if you search, other colours are available, including blues. If one burns out, pull it & plug in another.

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/260807325869?...84.m1439.l2649

MR16 sockets

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/360261138385?...84.m1439.l2649

The idea is, if you are doing it right, none will burn out for at least 10 years.
The links you posted are very cheap LEDs and not worth the money on every single one of them ($65 for 1w LEDS?!?!). For close to the same price you can get the same par38s with the proven CREE 3w LEDs.

Your point/argument about 10 years will be valid in 10 years. Not sure it will be worth arguing the point by then, we'll probably all be using plasma. I just received some of the cool white MR16 lamps and the quality appears very good, aluminum construction with very clear optics. The bezel can be unscrewed and optics removed. Solder joints & wiring look good. They may last a year, they may last 10, my point is, with MR16 or E27 base lamps, there's no requirement to solder anything. For the $74 dimmer that will dim all of 3 LEDs you linked to, I can buy a lot of cheap hardware and take my chances that it may not last.

I just checked out modularled.ca, pretty cool! They are in Red Deer.

Sorry I think you mis understood me. I was implying if he was going to get a Plug and play light such as the par 38s then he shouldn't waste his money on your links and spend an extra $15 on quality par 38s. No point in getting cheap 1w LEDs when he can spend a couple bucks more and get proven ones. It's only corals we are talking about, maybe it's worth the risk?

No worries. I merely provided the links since the OP hadn't heard of dimmable PAR38s. Not saying he or she should buy what I linked to, merely showing that they do exist and there are alternatives.

I went with the neutral whites, hopefully I cought you on time.let me know how it goes.

Yes they are. Less soldering mean less human error which equates to longer service life. Now only if the can get larger printed boards...

Some additional alternatives from a company called Orphek. They use emitters exclusively designed for marine aquarium applications (not Cree by the way). They now offer MR16 & PAR lamps suitable for Nano & Pico systems. Again, no soldering required. Use 1 or 2 watt emitters, lower power than the current 3 watt Cree crop. They also run them at slightly less than 100%, less heat, better longevity. More power does not always mean better.

http://orphek.com/wordpress/orphek-p...ico-aquariums/

http://orphek.com/wordpress/pr-25-pe...now-available/

Hey, Bblinks, how big were you thinking? We actually have prototypes right now of up to 12 LEDs per board. I was leaning toward the next addition being a 4 LED board of 4 in a row. You could then lay those white, blue, white, blue etc.

Would love to hear some feedback on this.
Martin

I wanted to thank everyone for their advice. I am going to go with the
XM-L Neurtal white and the XPE royal blue. Because I want to do a light for my little 5g nano and my biocube I didnt buy the biocube kit. I think it will be cheaper this way, or more entertaining, lol. I kind of like the hunting for things @ good deals.
I Loved the idea of the modularled.ca but leaned away for two reasons. 1 beacuse I didnt see the XM-L leds which I read are much more powerfull (you dont need as many?) and their smaller and use less power also for similar pricing to the other types so I figured might as well pay the tiny bit more and a little more work for more light meaning more options on what I put in the aquarium down the road. My 2nd reason for not going with them was that I like that with the stars I can place they where ever, where as the boards with the two on them im limited to where Im spacing them since its two per board.

I was all ready to order from the ledgroupbuy site but found their shipping high. It must be a base rate because its $33 to ship one led by itself or 24 leds. Seemed high, but im cheap. So I called around and found a place ETGTECH that will do similar pricing and charge actual shipping, with no inflation even to canada. A bonus they will ship pritty fast. Im hoping to have the order placed by the end of the week. (Im tryin to decide if I should throw in a few violet leds) And have them by the end of next week. The only downside is you have to call or email for pricing but its not really a big deal.

Mike I really liked the par lamps. The reef par lights look slick and its not a bad price (I seen a similar light out here for close to $200 so the ones you pointed out seem like a good deal. It would have been nice for the smaller tank but I figured since I need to replace the lights and fans in the biocube I might as well replace them with leds and DIY allows for more options, and I think the expierince of the build will be neat....if it works out, and I dont kill my husband in the process lol. Who knows mabe ill do a led for my 90 gallon one day. :O) The not replacing bulbs for 10 year sounds great, heck id be thrilled with 5 years!

Hi Megs, thanks for the feedback its always good to hear what people are thinking. Glad you are getting it figured out with your LED build.

XM-L was one of our considerations when we were designing the Modular LED stuff. You are right they are brighter by twice as much as the XP-Es however the downside is they consume just over three times the power. So they are three times as expensive to run.

Good luck with the build, let us know if there is anything you need, happy to help.

Martin

I have a 6 ft tank with mostly sps. I was running 3 x 400W MH with extremely good results but since summer i had to take it down due to heat it produced in the living room, it's like a friken sauna. So down comes the 400 on goes the 250s for now. I dont really mind the 250s since it has 4x80 t5ho which allows me to play around with different colors of bulbs but What i would like to do is to retrofit the fixture with three panels of 36-48 led per panel in the place of the halides and keep the t5s. For me it would make more sense if they were 12 LEDs on a chip, with each individual 5.9 x 16 heatsinks to accommodate 3 to 4 chips. I like my mean well drivers but invertronics seem to be a much better choice in this case. Or I can make three casing for 4 mean well drivers each just so it's nice and clean, I hate having a mess of wires that look like some one just spilled their plate of spaghetti everywhere.

Anyways, bottom line is the modular idea is awesome. It not only make the whole diy job look professional, it will also eliminate human soldering errors. The only problem i see with larger chip is if a single led does burn out on a multi led chip it will render the whole chip useless.

I want to purchase a kit for my soon to be frag tank, and depend on how it turns out, the next project will be the 210.

FYI the cost of the shipping is going to be close even with ETGTech as we really dont add any mark up on the shipping (I believe its only a couple bucks to handle all the customs paperwork). I believe they ship via UPS so then you have to factor in the $50 or so for the brokerage fees for UPS.

UPS is 35.00 min charge. thats why I don't deal with any company that won't use USPS.

speaking of which Milad, how do you guys ship, I was looking on your site this morning and had a few questions so I'll send you a PM.

Steve

ETGtech asked me how I want to ship, I asked for USPS. They also beat the prices. I havnt recieved the final order so we will see. He had told me on the phone that they have many methods of shipping so im hoping they will go with USPS.

Ya, shipping is often a deal maker/breaker for me when ordering stuff from the US. UPS is outrageous with the brokerage fee, you simply have no choice, they just nail you with it. Fedex is similar but perhaps not quite as greedy as UPS. With a little planning & patience, USPS is the way to go provided the seller will do it that way for you.

What drives me insane is that my friend is a border agent and they watch UPS come in with a stack of shipments and they stamp these papers @ about 2 per second. Each stamp is that $50 charge. I need to get into that business!! LOL

We ship USPS express only for international shipments (outside USA)

yup min chard was 35, and once your over a set amount then it is a persentage of the value.

I was talking to a guy who does canada post boarder clearance.. they charge 5 bucks for the clearance, and they only charge duty on items over 100 bucks and that is a randome thing also. not everyone will pay duity which explains why some stuff I ordered for my truck had duty assigned and some didn't.

Steve

I have my LEDs so now im trying to get everything togather. Iv looked at alot of builds and wondered what the best route is on attaching the leds to the heatsink. Some of the threads had screws and some didnt. Could someone let me know what is best. And if I should screw what type of screws should I be using? We dont mind drilling and tapping if thats the way to go. I didnt know what the difference is. Also (sorry for all the questions) I should buy
20g wire? And Flux core solder? I just wanted to double check. Thanks again for any advice.

Tapping and screws allow you to move them later but it's alot of work. Easiest is adhesive pads.

22awg is easiest to work with.

Thanks Milad. Ill go grabe the 22awg now. I think Ill try the screws on the smaller light and if it goes ok them Ill use them on the biocube. That way if I need to replace an led I can. If its a total pain Ill use the tape on the biocube.

Just make sure the screws don't touch the solder pads. Also always do a diode test on all the LEDs once everything is mounted before you power them just to check nothing is shorting on the heatsink.