Looking for 10W LED Help.

[jedimasterben]

I was looking for some zip ties last night to make a little holding jig for my PAR sensor. Well, long story short I couldn't find any so I just hot glued the sensor to the PVC (since it will pull off really easily) and about 10 minutes later I find about 3 dozen of them just chillin' out with the rest of my LED stuff lol

 

[Poseidon]

^^^ That is the way it works for me too.

That set up was an old tank, I no longer have it. The new tank has a lonely 30 gallon sump, with barely enough room for the heater and skimmer.

One day I'll get back to a house with a basement, until then it is apartment living. I did ask my downstairs neighbor if he would mind a filtration system for my aquarium in his dining room, sadly he declined my request. ROTFLMAO!

 

[Stlouphil]

Question about dimming. Currently I have a phone charger attached to the PWM inputs of my board and I get 100% power to the LED’s. Not sophisticated, but can I add a analog dimmer to the phone charger to dim the LED’s?

 

[Poseidon]

Nope.

You need a square wave, not reduced voltage.

 

[Stlouphil]

Doh! If only life was that easy. Lol

 

[zachts]

I was looking for some zip ties last night to make a little holding jig for my PAR sensor. Well, long story short I couldn't find any so I just hot glued the sensor to the PVC (since it will pull off really easily) and about 10 minutes later I find about 3 dozen of them just chillin' out with the rest of my LED stuff lol

Ha! same here, as soon as I give up the hunt for something and proceed to jury rig, I find what I was looking for!

 

[zachts]

Doh! If only life was that easy. Lol

You could use one of those cheap ebay LED dimmers properly wired up. the plastic box type would do the trick I think, but I've not tried it on an LDD, just some similar PWM drivers that work with arduino, (should work though) EDIT: although as I recal they work by connecting ground like the resistor does so it may not work on the boards with resistor in place, doh) just to get your hopes up and then rethink myself, I almost deleted the post but............

 

[zachts]

Question about dimming. Currently I have a phone charger attached to the PWM inputs of my board and I get 100% power to the LED's. Not sophisticated, but can I add a analog dimmer to the phone charger to dim the LED's?

after a bit more thinking there is an arduino, bare basic method that uses a potentiometer for manual dimming and some super basic code originally posted by asid61 I think if memory serves. It's floating around somewhere on one of the LDD threads on RC.

cheap ebay arduino mini and a pot would run you about $12 and could be turned into a full blown controller latter........

 

[Poseidon]

Well? Did you get it fired up Phil?

I had those extra pair of hands last night, my tank is covered in sharpie marker PAR numbers now. I'll post up the results once I have time to make something internet worthy.

Strange thing, just using the readings straight from the PAR meter, my tank with the LEDs and Halide on ranges from 400 PAR about 2" below the water to a low of about 250 PAR at the sanded. So, just about everywhere I have an average of 300. (Assuming 300 is the sweet spot for SPS, it seems to be.)

 

[Stlouphil]

Well? Did you get it fired up Phil?

Was not able to get to it last night. We had to take care of the real joy of my life last night. Our Grandbaby. : ) however I do work from home. Hopefully I can get distracted and get to some of it today. Problem is my wife works from home too. Lol

 

[Stlouphil]

BTW boy, those par numbers look good.

 

[Poseidon]

Grand babies are priority #1 for sure!

My first nephew was born on Saturday, babies are really COOL! LOL!

I was pleased with the numbers for sure, and we took them down the front edge, about 4" back from the glass, which is technically not under the halide reflector. I am sure the numbers are a bit higher, back about 12" from the glass.

I do have a shadow zone directly under the bulb. This is effect is documented in Sanjays tests from years ago, where the "spider reflector" develops twin peaks in par numbers. I was trying to find a Lumenarc reflector when I made my decision to go back to halides, and I couldn't find a used one at the time. 2 weeks later.. several of them. DOH!!!

 

[Stlouphil]

Having issues figuring out how to mount these. Initial thought was to line these up in front shining on the rock work, but I underestimated the PAR values of these little suckers. LOL I'm concerned about shading. I was thinking about Poseidon's build. I'm tight on space and was thinking I could mount 1 on each side of the Lumanarc reflector using the angle of the reflector to point the leds and eliminate the shadowing. Here is what I'm working with:

 

[Poseidon]

Can't see pics from work. I'll try from my phone at break.

 

[jedimasterben]

Just keep in mind that the wider the angle will keep more light out of the tank from the LEDs due to reflection on the water's surface.

 

[Poseidon]

Which according to the PAR meter... is a LOT!

My Par meter is pegged at 24XX about 8" below the LED, as soon as it hits teh water, it is a drastic reduction to like 600 ish.

 

[Stlouphil]

Well this is really starting to suck. The 90gal is killing me. Now I see why cubes are so popular. : ( What turned out to be a good idea is sucking more by the minute. Arrggghh. I don't think I can mount the LEDs inside the MH reflectors because of the heat. I can't figure out a way to keep the light at 90 degrees to the water surface. I just do not have the space. I have come across an engineering dilemma. Come on guys I need some ideas.

 

[Stlouphil]

Moment of despair over. :eek1: Proceeding with the original plan. Led's were only to be supplements so I'm nor going to go nuts about losing some PAR. I came up a simple idea that will allow me to manipulate the angle of the LED's in order to keep reflection as little as possible. I'm going to place the heat sink into a couple of old VHO end caps. That will allow the fixture to rotate freely so I can find the "sweet spot."

 

[zachts]

Moment of despair over. :eek1: Proceeding with the original plan. Led's were only to be supplements so I'm nor going to go nuts about losing some PAR. I came up a simple idea that will allow me to manipulate the angle of the LED's in order to keep reflection as little as possible. I'm going to place the heat sink into a couple of old VHO end caps. That will allow the fixture to rotate freely so I can find the "sweet spot."

Cool Idea!

 

[Stlouphil]

I'm such a hack when it comes to DIY. Funny, my wife looks at me and says "You're SO smart!" :lolspin: The real test is when I go upstairs with thermal compound all over the front of my jeans and she says "What's that white cream all over the front of your pants?!!" :mad2::eek1:

Well, mounted the LED's. Not very pretty. I have this fear that they will pop off into the tank sometime. I think I'll put a little dab of silicone on each side for peace of mind. Next is to work on the wiring. Will work on that this evening.