LED DO IT YOURSELF QUESTION.

[mseepman]

I am trying to put together the materials to do an LED light above the new 290G. It will probably be around $2,000 for me to do it all the way I want (dimmable, etc) out of new Cree's. Purchasing a similar light would have been Four or Five thousand.

I haven't gotten the stuff all together yet but I've bought some materials and I'm just getting used to the wiring and trying to figure out the coverage, the right optics and the right number of LED's.

I think DIY would be the only way to go now that I've figured out how to do it.

[NanoHuman]

I think I have a few pics from when I was building it. The unit is a 15" lighting system, running no optics since they are not required. By changing the config on my lights I could make it light as big as a 36" long tank. Depth could go to 20" with the optics that I own, but don't use.

It is currenly on a 30 gallon cube system, 14" deep. I purchased everything I needed from nanotuners, but you could also go to LEDSupply.

mseepman, for sure that is the best plan. Would be fun doing LEDs on that system since you can really setup a cool optics system. I own a collection of 40 and 60 degree optics that I can't run with my tank size.

[mseepman]

Would love to see those pics. I'm assuming that your fixture is made up of Cree XR-E led's since you built it a while back. I'm hoping to mix XP-G and XP-E's. I have a decent price on them from a supplier that's a lot cheaper than LED supply.

[NanoHuman]

I will take some pics of the setup this weekend and do a little write up about the parts. I did use XR-Es, as far as I know the XP series is smaller and more efficient which is great for heat.