Can I Build a Good LED for a 100g on A $400 Budget

[TropTrea]

I'm currently waiting on multichips to arrive to put together my less than $100 LED for one side of my tank. if it does well, I will add to it for the rest of the tank and add some red and green. The way I see it, I can't afford the big name awesome LED lights, but if this doesn't work, I'm only out $100, not up to $800 when the other lights don't work as good as I had hoped.

For standard tanks up to 24" tall I'm not real found of the multichips. But for taller tanks like 36" tall they do have a big advantage. If your using some neutral whites (4,000K to 5,500K) there is no need for red LED's. But if you go with the 20,000K whites then you need not just the reds but also ambers to help fill in the longer wave lenghts. for austetic purposes.

 

[TropTrea]

Here another revised layout does this look right plus went with 20 LEDs for 20gal

Looks much better. Sorry I was not online and hung up on other things the last couple weeks.

 

[TropTrea]

Looking at maybe doing 5 single rows on another style heat sink I really like. Its not too much more than the cost of what I was going to build

Going a different direction with my fixture going to go with this 4ft heat sink kit its pretty sweet. Also I tinned all 4 pads on all 140+ LEDs today to prep them for install what a long process...

and thinking about this layout since it can do 5 rows of LEDs max 30 per ft

this is still 80 leds

With the 5 rows you will be at roughly at a 3" spread between your LED's. Add to that the fact that these heat sinks have multiple fins the cooling will be very good without even using fans as long as there no obstructions over the fixture. So the fans are optonal at this point.

And yes the LED layout should work fine for you this way.

 

[gunlocators]

Apparently I cannot build a good LED set LOL

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?p=20687760&posted=1#post20687760

 

[TropTrea]

Yes if your trying to set it up to a comptroller plus using high current drivers on your first build you are opening up a lot of doors for mistakes all at once. What would advise you to do is back up and tackle on thing at a time.

First recheck your LED wiring. Second open up the drivers and turn won the current on an internal pot. Then wire up and power up your leds one string at a time. (do not have the controler connected) The LED's should light up very dim for you. Now measure across the two 1 ohm 1 watt resistors and look for the one with the highest voltage reading. keep your meter on this resistor and slowly turn up the pot current adjustment in the driver. You want to turn it up only till you get a reading of 0.5 volts or 500 mv on that pot. Then go back and check the other pot. again look for the one with the highest voltage and monitor that one turning the driver adjustment now till you get 650 mv or 0.65 Volts on that resistor. Then go back and recheck the other pot it should have a reading very close to what you had on the prior resistor.

If the difference is great then you will have to play the game of matching and sorting LED's. But to date I have not had to when I use CREE's even when mixing colors on a string.

I'm telling you to only set them to 650 ma on the driver not the full 750 ma the driver is capable. This is to allow a small safty buffer area.

do not play with your controller untill you have all five of the drivers lighting up your LED's properly. When we add in the comptroler we are adding another possibility of issues that we then have isolated to the comtroler circuit rather than the LED circuit. Because we already know the LED's are working properly.

If you need I can draw you a schematic for how your LED's should be wired.

 

[gunlocators]

That would be awesome just to compare what I have

 

[gunlocators]

I got this issue resolved everything working great......

 

[gunlocators]

Just a Update I went with 4 rows of 12 LEDs using 2 drivers. I have about 100 LEDs left over and 3 drivers for future projects or adding to exisiting setup.

After powering the LEDs up I am really sckeptical of running any more LEDs 48 LEDs really look like they light the tank up really good.

 

[TropTrea]

Just a Update I went with 4 rows of 12 LEDs using 2 drivers. I have about 100 LEDs left over and 3 drivers for future projects or adding to exisiting setup.

After powering the LEDs up I am really sckeptical of running any more LEDs 48 LEDs really look like they light the tank up really good.

The LED's may look bright but remember LED's are narrow spectrum light sources. So they actualy look brighter than what the corals need. For a tank your size 100 LED's I agree is a lot but 48 LED's may limit which corals will flourish for you.

What was your final ratio of LED's between the Royal Blues and your Whites? How did you like the final color balance at this point?

Dennis

 

[gunlocators]

1:1 ration I think its about the perfect color light. I do have 3 more drivers maybe I should do another driver with 24 more LEDs but which LEDs RB 6500k 10000K? what mix