I finally received my 4 Sol Blue modules that are going over my 90gal, 48" bowfront. To make matters even more complicated, they're going inside a canopy. Now you L7 tank owners have the rail system that is easily installed but remember, my tank is 12" front-to-back at the ends bowing to 18" in the center. A rail would leave the center of my tank under-lit. So long before my AI's arrived I had to come up with a mounting system.
As I said, it had to: 1. fit in the canopy; 2. look good 3. be adjustable and 4. easy to move out-of-the-way for tank maintenance and feeding. Here's what I came up with:
I fabricated 4 of the braces shown above: two 12-1/4" long and two 15" long. These were made from 1/4" acrylic and 1" square acrylic tube (1/8" thick). As you can see, the mounting pads have a slot routed in them to accommodate 10-32 screws and the bottom side of the square tube is routed to within an inch of the back to accommodate the 10-32 AI Sol mounting screws.
The power supplies were velcro'd to 1/4" acryylic pads that were mounted to the wall behind the tank. (let me tell you how difficult it was to make those screen frames!)
The mounts are secured to the canopy using 'T' nuts. From inside the canopy:
And here you can see the 'T' nuts installed in the canopy top:
This system allows the mounts to be moved up to 1: side-to-side if necessary.
With the canopy back on the tank the AI Sols are just slid into the mount rails:
Plug it all in and we have light!
The AI modules can slide back to allow easier access to the tank and also to afford a certain degree of being able to put the light where I want it. The system is clean and puts the lights about 5" above the water. I have no spot-lighting and am running the stock optics (at least for now). Coverage is as good as I could ever want it and --- having come from a 4 x 65w PC fixture --- life is really good.
As I said, it had to: 1. fit in the canopy; 2. look good 3. be adjustable and 4. easy to move out-of-the-way for tank maintenance and feeding. Here's what I came up with:
I fabricated 4 of the braces shown above: two 12-1/4" long and two 15" long. These were made from 1/4" acrylic and 1" square acrylic tube (1/8" thick). As you can see, the mounting pads have a slot routed in them to accommodate 10-32 screws and the bottom side of the square tube is routed to within an inch of the back to accommodate the 10-32 AI Sol mounting screws.
The power supplies were velcro'd to 1/4" acryylic pads that were mounted to the wall behind the tank. (let me tell you how difficult it was to make those screen frames!)
The mounts are secured to the canopy using 'T' nuts. From inside the canopy:
And here you can see the 'T' nuts installed in the canopy top:
This system allows the mounts to be moved up to 1: side-to-side if necessary.
With the canopy back on the tank the AI Sols are just slid into the mount rails:
Plug it all in and we have light!
The AI modules can slide back to allow easier access to the tank and also to afford a certain degree of being able to put the light where I want it. The system is clean and puts the lights about 5" above the water. I have no spot-lighting and am running the stock optics (at least for now). Coverage is as good as I could ever want it and --- having come from a 4 x 65w PC fixture --- life is really good.
