DIY LED Lighting... is it worth the effort?

[Whacked]

My local fish store has these strip lighting bulbs that have LEDs in them, so you just replace them w/ your regular bulbs.
They look kinda like this


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I've seen those.
a not-so-LFS sells them. I know a 36" bulb was going for around $100. The store set up a 24" deep mixed reef tank to help promote the sales, the PAR was good, the color was good, only thing was they had like 9-ish bulbs over the tank.
They are interesting, I'd rather DIY a good LED setup than use those over a reef. I can see they could do well over a planted FW tank

 

[chipmunkofdoom2]

So it's been a while since I've looked at this thread, what with losing my job and having tank issues, but I've done a lot of reading since then.

Basically, what I've learned is that the typical LED like these:

are not the best solution. I went to school with a guy who says he built his own fixture at the LFS he works at with these LEDs, but I don't trust them. All other sources say you must use a high powered Luxeon or Cree LEDs if you want to get good coral growth. As another previous post said, the guys on Nano-Reef.com, especially EvilC66, have really paved the way for DIY high powered LED fixtures. Here is a general guide about high powered LED fixtures. This is more of a how-to. Really, the fixtures are great. If you browse the Nano-Reefs site, you'll see they usually just implement these fixtures on picos since they're so expensive.

At the end of the day, I think it would be worth it to build one for a larger tank, however, you can't start out making a fixture for your 125 or 250 gallon tank. You should start small and make your mistakes with 5 or 6 $10 LEDs instead of hundreds.

 

[BigAl07]

......the guys on Nano-Reef.com, especially EvilC66, have really paved the way for DIY high powered LED fixtures.....

Yeah they are now selling "Evil Lighting LED" kits at NanoTuners and they are SWEET!

.....they usually just implement these fixtures on picos since they're so expensive.

At the end of the day, I think it would be worth it to build one for a larger tank, however, you can't start out making a fixture for your 125 or 250 gallon tank. You should start small and make your mistakes with 5 or 6 $10 LEDs instead of hundreds.

I think that's going to be the SPEAR HEAD in LED advancement! Get it right on small systems and once it's tweaked just scale it up to fit larger systems. I'm seriously considering an "Evil" LED system for my 12g NanoCube. Maybe, just MAYBE Santa is reading this and if so it's a JBJ NanoCube 12DX and I've been ESPECIALLY good "today".

 

[bskinn77]

Yeah they are now selling "Evil Lighting LED" kits at NanoTuners and they are SWEET!



I think that's going to be the SPEAR HEAD in LED advancement! Get it right on small systems and once it's tweaked just scale it up to fit larger systems. I'm seriously considering an "Evil" LED system for my 12g NanoCube. Maybe, just MAYBE Santa is reading this and if so it's a JBJ NanoCube 12DX and I've been ESPECIALLY good "today".

I am not sure how much the retrofits go for on NanoTuners but they are so incredibly easy to build you should give it a shot Al.

 

[BigAl07]

I am not sure how much the retrofits go for on NanoTuners but they are so incredibly easy to build you should give it a shot Al.

I would LOVE to but I don't have the time (full-time job M-F, own 1 business M-Sun, just started another M-Sun) unless I get less than 4 hrs of sleep a night LOL!

The problem is the individual components needed to get them BRIGHT enough to make a difference in the components are expensive. I'm shooting for more than "high-end" moonlights...

Here's a link to the NC12 fixture kit (not cheap)


Nanotuners.com


I'm open to other options for sure though. I even have my own soldering iron around here somewhere LOL!!

 

[chipmunkofdoom2]

Al,

I understand the time constraint thing, but this guide has the same thing on a Biocube 14. Should be about the same for the Nanocube

 

[BigAl07]

COD can I ship mine to you and you do it? I would love a "turn-Key" system

 

[chipmunkofdoom2]

Haha, I love tinkering and I want to try a system like this for myself, but I don't know how comfortable I would feel messing with your equipment. Maybe one day I'll make systems for people, but I don't foresee that happening in the next 10 years.. haha.

 

[BigAl07]

hmmmm maybe I can "acquire" a spare hood for my NC12 and you can play with that? Is that feasible? I'm game if you are

 

[chipmunkofdoom2]

Hm. Yeah, if you can find an extra for cheap I could give it a shot. This has been something I've wanted to do for a long time, so it would be a fun project.

 

[BigAl07]

After the weekend I'll start looking around for a spare NC12 DX hood. Maybe we can have some FUN with this one!!

thanks bro!! This is EXCITING!!

 

[chipmunkofdoom2]

Yeah I agree

The failure of the Solaris system was a downer. I feel LEDs have a lot to offer and while they might not be profitable for companies, I think we can make them work.

 

[bskinn77]

The one I build was identical to the one from that guide(I actually used that guide to build mine) it cost me a little over 200 and that was including a soldering iron and a drill/tap set. It took me a little over 5 hours to build and 3-4 hours of it was spent on drilling/tapping the heat sink on a difficulty from 1-5 I would give this a 2 really a very very easy DIY hardest part being soldering the wires to the LEDs.

The LED's they use on the retrofits they sell on nanotuners are also a little lower quality then the Cree's that are used in waterproofs and evil's guides.

 

[chipmunkofdoom2]

Yeah, the tapping is the hardest aspect I see of this project. $200 seems to be the going rate. Now did you use 2 power supplies for yours? The way I see some guides done is they use one 24v power supply to power both Buckpucks in parallel then wire the LEDs in series off each driver, but then you can't have the blues come on before the daylights. Is yours set up like this or did you get two drivers?

 

[bskinn77]

Yeah, the tapping is the hardest aspect I see of this project. $200 seems to be the going rate. Now did you use 2 power supplies for yours? The way I see some guides done is they use one 24v power supply to power both Buckpucks in parallel then wire the LEDs in series off each driver, but then you can't have the blues come on before the daylights. Is yours set up like this or did you get two drivers?

I only got one power supply. It does suck not being able to get the blues on before. I will definitely be getting another power supply soon.

 

[BigAl07]

Any updates?

 

[chipmunkofdoom2]

Nope, none yet. The LEDs from ETG Tech shipped and the UVS from Kaidomain shipped a while ago.. that's all we're waiting on really. That and the hood from you, Al