fiber optic lighting-free light?

boxfishpooalot

boxfishpooalot

Active member
This idea has been in my head for at least a year. And to be honest its driving me nuts! I need some help because one day im going to make one of theese things and spend probably 200 bucks on fiber optic cable to light my tank with the sun. Seriously this would be sweet, think about it. Moonlight for free, sun for free, no bulb replacement ect. And the best darn spectrum out there!

Well truth is I know absolutly nothing about fiber optic lighting. But i need anybods advice/knowledge on the subject to make this happen....

Ok so heres the plan. Im going to emulate this idea:
http://www.himawari-net.co.jp/e_page02.htm

Its a sunlight piping system that tracks the sun. Now that would be sweet but its going to take a degree in engineering to diy one of those. So i doubt that can be made easy, if sombody thinks it can chime in.

Then i thought of simplyfying it. Perhaps make an acrylic dome, with a base, then have fiber optic lights sticking out in all directions so that it "tracks" the sun. Sort of.

So basically im confused on what kind of fiber to use. Core fiber sounds good as its a solid core, and there another kind thats many fibers called jacketed fiber.... here some pics.

Think this a good idea for somone living in an aparment? :)

This is a fiber optic cable
<a href="http://photobucket.com" target="_blank"><img src="http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y178/salwaterfish123/nsl_fiber-optic.jpg" border="0" alt="Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket"></a>

Heres a guy on ebay selling another kind:
http://cgi.ebay.ca/Fiber-Optic-Ligh...oryZ3201QQrdZ1QQssPageNameZWD1VQQcmdZViewItem
 
Well, with a degree in accounting instead of engineering, all I can say is: I'm curious and I'll come along for the ride.
 
No ideas how to implement it, but I have a feeling the most difficult and expensive part would be the sunlight tracking device...

I'd be interested to see what you come up with though. :)
 
there's a reason those arent more popular for lighting homes, because they are extremely expensive. just looking at it, it looks extremely difficult to diy and probably not worth it....

with that said, go for it!

eric
 
there's a reason those arent more popular for lighting homes, because they are extremely expensive. just looking at it, it looks extremely difficult to diy and probably not worth it....

with that said, go for it!

eric
 
Your going to spend more than $200 on fiber and supplies.


You will need a collector at the roof end (something to get the light into the fiber) and a lens at the other end to get the light into the tank.

It is a nice idea, but in reality it is not going to pan out. The amount and quality of fiber needed will be substantial. Aiming the fiber will also be a problem.

Lets put it another way:

You said Its a sunlight piping system that tracks the sun. Now that would be sweet but its going to take a degree in engineering to diy one of those. So i doubt that can be made easy...

Read that again a few times and take what you said in a very literal sense :)
 
To me, the biggest hurdle would be the time required to tinker with this.

I did a quick Google search on "sunlight tracking", and things got pretty complex pretty quick.

I'm wondering if you could fashion a light collector on a motor that follows the sun's path during the course of a day. If it were mounted on something that would allow you to manually adjust the azimuth for the seasonal changes at your latitude, I'd think you'd be in business.

I envision something that you could mount on a 4x4 pressure treated post near your house, much like a satellite dish.

Just some thoughts...
 
Sunflowers do it, even the birds and bees do so why don't we...

Seriously, there is fiberoptic out their that is about 3/4" diam. several years ago trimming a 45mil mansion the owner had colour light piped all over a 55k f2 house from the basement. This was the old stuff and I'm told the new stuff is far better. The problem as I was told with the stuff were bends; light would gather stricking the wall in too sharp an angle burning the cable out. I wonder if a dandelion head array channeled to a main series of cables by way of some sort of reflector chamber might work.
 
It is not just a matter of traking the light, it is a matter of having a collector of the proper shape, enough fiber to transmit the light, and a lens system to refocus the transmitted light.

There is a reason that the systems that are available cost a small fortune.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=10546035#post10546035 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by BeanAnimal
It is not just a matter of traking the light, it is a matter of having a collector of the proper shape, enough fiber to transmit the light, and a lens system to refocus the transmitted light.

There is a reason that the systems that are available cost a small fortune.
Click to expand...

Collector and fiber aside, why is it necessary to refocus the light as it exits the fibers? I realize most applications (medical, etc.) require a narrow, focused beam. Wouldn't it be more effective to let the light simply "spill" out of the end of the fiber, especially if you used the money you saved on lenses to buy more fiber?

Let me qualify this by stating I know next to nothing about fiber optics. ;)
 
As far as data grade optical cable goes, I have around a thousand feet of multi-fiber cable that has around 100 fibers in it.

I will donate as much as anyone needs, includeing what is left on the 6' spool, but I'm not willing to ship it for free.
 
I should also add, that in my own crude experiments with a very poorly polished entrance end and a magnifying glass to collect sunlight from a 6" disk and focus it onto the end of a fiber, the other end of the fiber glowed painfully bright and stayed quite cool to the touch. Sadly, the other end melted into goo after about 10 seconds. I don't know what sort of prep the ends require to last, but I would love to donate cable to someone with the time to figure it out. Natural lighting has always been something I would love to use.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=10547115#post10547115 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by liveforphysics
I should also add, that in my own crude experiments with a very poorly polished entrance end and a magnifying glass to collect sunlight from a 6" disk and focus it onto the end of a fiber, the other end of the fiber glowed painfully bright and stayed quite cool to the touch. Sadly, the other end melted into goo after about 10 seconds. I don't know what sort of prep the ends require to last, but I would love to donate cable to someone with the time to figure it out. Natural lighting has always been something I would love to use.
Click to expand...

Wow thats awesome! I will pay for shipping for some of it! But ill have to wait till some $$ comes in.

I envision something that you could mount on a 4x4 pressure treated post near your house, much like a satellite dish.

Im thinking along those lines too. I dont want to make a tracking system unless it can be done easily. My main thoughts are to just let the fibers run in all directions in a home made dome. This way some fibers get direct light, while others get say 50% of the light.


Collector and fiber aside, why is it necessary to refocus the light as it exits the fibers Exactly, i think sunlight is strong enough for aquarium purposes with a reflector/collector.
 
Remember, you need to be collecting sunlight from an area of direct sunlight at least 4ft^2 to light a smallish tank.

This means you either are going to require around a few million fibers to have that amount of cross sectional area to directly capture, or you are going to require some lens to gather light from a larger area and get it into the fibers.

Bare fiber ends in sunlight are not going to be able to provide useful light. It would provide the same amount of light that takeing your tank out in sunlight, covering it with a thick black tarp, then poking pin holes matching the diameter and quanity of the fibers you will be using. Having it not track the sun would also be quite similar to the tank sitting outside with a tarp and pinholes. Once the sun passes the critical angle of reflection point on the end of the fiber, no light will be entering it.

This is why a lens is critical, unless you wish to have few million fibers, but at that point useing a solar tube would be much more practical for logistics.

Sun tracking with a lens setup would make this a reality. Fixed mounts wont work with a lens setup, and the whole concept is bunked without a lens.

Big projection TV screne lens front objective lens would be excellent for captureing a useful amount of light and focusing it onto a 2-3" bundle of fiber ends, perhaps a few hundred thousand fibers of the diameter I am able to offer you.

The problem is, if you dont track the sun, you are only going to have a couple of minutes a day where the lens focal point actaully happens across the area the fiber ends are bundled to receive light.
 
Tracking the sun with an intensity feedback 2 axis design would not be very tough to be honest. A 2 foot long 3/4" PVC tube with a solarcell blocking the bottom would be all you really needed for a sensor. The x-y servos just keep adjusting to hold that value maximized. Make the lens focal point align with the tube, so the tube always aims into the sun and its fixed with the lens. Obviously it would take some software and a little work, but it doesn't seem to be impossibily difficult. I just dont have the time.
 
What if you add the top of a solatube in your roof and then just collect the light from there. Youre going to need a lot of fiber optic cables though.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

M
'05 24g JBJ Nanocube Resurrection (I'm Back!)
2 3 4
Replies
75
Views
4K
Dustin07
D
M
ESP32 - AQma WiFi LED Control - 8 x LED Channels, 3 x SSR. FOR FREE!
Replies
2
Views
2K
danielch2008
D
R
Hamilton Cebu Sun for free
Replies
1
Views
377
waterman78
W
HumbleFish
  • Sticky
Chemoprophylaxis vs. Observational Quarantine
Replies
1
Views
1K
JohnL
JohnL
Smite
Smite's Stout CDA- 205g acro dominant system
4 5 6
Replies
102
Views
7K
Smite
Smite
Back
Top