Minimalistic multichip DIY LED build

[ronreef]

So what's the voltage drop across these "20W" royal blues? It says 10-11v, which to me says you could hook 4 of them up with a 48v meanwell (I happen to have these laying around)... ALMOST 5 could be run off one but that might result in some bad mojo happening with your driver as that's skirting the line of the 10v end of things.

Also is it just me or are the data sheets on the ac-rc page not working?

Yeah, some of the datasheets links don't work. Check this royal blue out:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/EPISTAR-20W...ultDomain_0&hash=item3f11354d64#ht_1661wt_906

Voltage drop across three of the 45mil leds would be about ~10.8V.

 

[bemenaker]

Is anybody running these chips inside a normal canopy? I would like to if I can but if I need to build a new canopy for proper cooling I can too. Lasse recommended I use square tubing for my heatsink but at his dimensions I wouldnt be able to use my canopy. Is there a recommended heatsink size from heatsinkusa.com that can accomodate 8x20w chips?

I'm also in the same boat as noplay180 with the glass brace in the middle of my tank.


Thanks,
Tony

I retrofitted our T5/MetalHalide hood to run these. I am still using the T5HO's but I replaced the MH w/ LED's. The LED's are substantially cooler than MH's. Currently I am using 1 50W LED in place of the 175W MH. I am about to add a 2nd 50W, and space them out wider because of the center brace, might have to turn off two of the T5's after that, four are running now.

 

[tronyony]

I retrofitted our T5/MetalHalide hood to run these. I am still using the T5HO's but I replaced the MH w/ LED's. The LED's are substantially cooler than MH's. Currently I am using 1 50W LED in place of the 175W MH. I am about to add a 2nd 50W, and space them out wider because of the center brace, might have to turn off two of the T5's after that, four are running now.

That's good to hear. I'm gonna figure out all the parts this weekend to completely switch from T5's to LED's. When everything gets here I guess I'll see how everything fits in the canopy and go from there.

Thanks,
Tony

 

[Lassef]

So I'm going to start with 2 100 watt 20000k surrounded by 3 455 and 1 420. Then work about the ends after seeing what spread I get. cooling these two monsters will be next problem

So what's the voltage drop across these "20W" royal blues? It says 10-11v, which to me says you could hook 4 of them up with a 48v meanwell (I happen to have these laying around)... ALMOST 5 could be run off one but that might result in some bad mojo happening with your driver as that's skirting the line of the 10v end of things.

Also is it just me or are the data sheets on the ac-rc page not working?

If you use 4 "20 watt" 45 mil you can use one HLG-100H-48B (you get 2000 mA) or one HLG-80H-48B (you get 1700 mA) to four of them in a serie conection (daisy chain)

Yeah, some of the datasheets links don't work. Check this royal blue out:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/EPISTAR-20W...ultDomain_0&hash=item3f11354d64#ht_1661wt_906

Voltage drop across three of the 45mil leds would be about ~10.8V.

Thats true in reality also - I have measured 21.6 V FV with 2 of these "20" W in a serie and 2000 mA constant current. If you run them in a lower amperage you get a lower FV (or voltage drop if you prefer that).

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Lassef]

Is anybody running these chips inside a normal canopy? I would like to if I can but if I need to build a new canopy for proper cooling I can too. Lasse recommended I use square tubing for my heatsink but at his dimensions I wouldnt be able to use my canopy. Is there a recommended heatsink size from heatsinkusa.com that can accomodate 8x20w chips?

I'm also in the same boat as noplay180 with the glass brace in the middle of my tank.


Thanks,
Tony

Wich dimensions will fit your canopy?

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Lassef]

Lasse,

Can u reccomend a starting point for a 125g mixed reef and a 250g mixed reef? U see I'm in the US Airforce and 4 of us in my shop have reef tanks. Myself and another guy have the same tanks and the other 2 have the sizes listed above. The 250g is 30" deep and 84" long and the 125g is 72" long. I

I didn't say earlier but my current t5's are 7" off the top of the water line. Would I need lenses?



Thank you again,
Tony

With 30" deep you probably need lenses, particularly if you use 20 watts chip (AC-RC style) With the 125g I would probable use "20 watts" chip; AC-RC - style. To the 250g maybe two of the combination I suggest for noplay180 ?

According to the ratio of blue and white´s its important to stress that there is no right and wrong - its depend of what you by yourself prefer.

I have my 10 and 20 watts chip´s around 5 " from the surface

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Lassef]

I want to make a multichip build, but I have no idea how to design it the way I'd like it, and be cost effective compared to what I have now.

How could I create a 14k like color, mixing in 450nm royal blue, with the added spectrum of warm white/neutral white, add 420nm violet chips into the mix... and have it properly blended, cooled, stay under 200watts, and fit onto an 18"-24" heatsink? I fear that they'll create different shades of color in different sections of the tank.

I do not really understand why its more problem with 10 and 20 watts (AC-RC-style) chip than with "3" watts? If you use 10 - 16 000 K white chip - and a ratio W/RB of 1:1 or lesser - why use warm white´s?

I have a 120 cm bar with both 10 Cree RB 3 watt and two "10" watt RB with lenses. Later on I shall try to take some pictures that show what happens if I run them i different way´s

Sincerely Lasse

 

[tronyony]

Wich dimensions will fit your canopy?

Sincerely Lasse

Hi Lasse,

My canopy is 60"(L)x19"(W)x9"(H)

Thank you,
Tony

 

[tronyony]

With 30" deep you probably need lenses, particularly if you use 20 watts chip (AC-RC style) With the 125g I would probable use "20 watts" chip; AC-RC - style. To the 250g maybe two of the combination I suggest for noplay180 ?

According to the ratio of blue and white´s its important to stress that there is no right and wrong - its depend of what you by yourself prefer.

I have my 10 and 20 watts chip´s around 5 " from the surface

Sincerely Lasse

Thank you very much. We're really just looking for a good starting point for quantity, Watt and type(spectrum) of LED chips and you have provided this. The main thing we are concerned with is PAR at the sandbed. We can tweak the color after we are good to go with growth from our corals.

Thank you again,
Tony

 

[Lassef]

Hi Lasse,

My canopy is 60"(L)x19"(W)x9"(H)

Thank you,
Tony

Sorry I was quite clumsy in my post 1556 I meant a square tube with cross section 25 mm x 50 mm and 1500 mm long. Wall thickness 2 mm. In Your Way 0.98 "* 1.97" * 59 ". Thickness -> 0:08." This you get into your hood i think.

And you need to make holes in the top (50 mm * 50 mm) so that you can fit into some 50mm fans that can blow air into the tube and out through the open sides. Do you use 3 fans then you probably also need to do some ventilation openings on the top between fan 1 and 2 and between fan 2 and 3


Sincerely Lasse

 

[tronyony]

Sorry I was quite clumsy in my post 1556 I meant a square tube with cross section 25 mm x 50 mm and 1500 mm long. Wall thickness 2 mm. In Your Way 0.98 "* 1.97" * 59 ". Thickness -> 0:08." This you get into your hood i think

Sincerely Lasse

Thank you very much. I will keep you posted on what I do.

Thanks,
Tony

 

[sfsuphysics]

Yeah, some of the datasheets links don't work. Check this royal blue out:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/EPISTAR-20W...ultDomain_0&hash=item3f11354d64#ht_1661wt_906

Voltage drop across three of the 45mil leds would be about ~10.8V.

Thanks for the info, I don't know why but it seemed I was choosing every LED he had that had a bad datasheet link. Might have to get a few of these to play around with, I like to cluster my LEDs anyways rather than having a uniform array of them (my corals need light not the bottom pane of glass mindset).

I am curious though you (I believe) mentioned 3 LEDs were run in parallel, could a hybrid one (whites and blues) have each color powered independent of the others? Looking at the picture I seem to see 3 bars on either side of the emitter connected with one long bar, and was thinking if you could cut that separation you might be able to power each parallel string by itself, or am I looking too much into the design.

 

[marspeed]

sfsuphysics i was thinking the same thing if you look at some of the RGB CHIPS you will see the separation cut

 

[noplay180]

@lasse I'm thinking about using 3 of these to keep them cool

 

[noplay180]

I would then just attach the aluminum plate to it correct

 

[ronreef]

Thanks for the info, I don't know why but it seemed I was choosing every LED he had that had a bad datasheet link. Might have to get a few of these to play around with, I like to cluster my LEDs anyways rather than having a uniform array of them (my corals need light not the bottom pane of glass mindset).

I am curious though you (I believe) mentioned 3 LEDs were run in parallel, could a hybrid one (whites and blues) have each color powered independent of the others? Looking at the picture I seem to see 3 bars on either side of the emitter connected with one long bar, and was thinking if you could cut that separation you might be able to power each parallel string by itself, or am I looking too much into the design.

I've pondered the same thing, and it's definitely possible. For a clean cut, it would probabaly need to be milled through with a very small fine bit to create the cut for separation, or some other way to make a precision cut.

It makes sense for this to be the next step in the evolution of multichip panels. A multicontrollable multichip!

 

[tomservo]

It's possible to cut the outside bits of the bus bars but if you look at the central area they are also connected there - and it's covered with silicone. I've tried asking for these to be made RGB style but for some reason no one wants to do it..

 

[JohnnyAirtime]

It's possible to cut the outside bits of the bus bars but if you look at the central area they are also connected there - and it's covered with silicone. I've tried asking for these to be made RGB style but for some reason no one wants to do it..

I'm obtaining 80W RGB chips in a custom 3 color combo; 12,000K/460nm/440nm

They aren't hard to obtain.

What chip are you referring to when you say "these"? ... I must have missed the post to which one your referring to.

 

[ronreef]

I'm obtaining 80W RGB chips in a custom 3 color combo; 12,000K/460nm/440nm

They aren't hard to obtain.

What chip are you referring to when you say "these"? ... I must have missed the post to which one your referring to.

We were talking in general. So, any multichip... in general. Preferably, a 50W or greater. Share some info...

 

[Jeroen89]

How you fix the multichip to the heatsink?
With thermal glue or drilling holes, tapped and screws (and normal coolpaste)?