Quality LED's

L

lifesworksataol

New member
anyone know where i can find cheap quality led's? either units or diy stuff. i am looking for all the resources possible so i can check them all out.
I have a 210 gallon tank (30inch deep) and i want to try to do led's, what would you all suggest?
1w vs. 3w?
buy reds as well?
are some better then others?
dimmable or not?
which controller?

any info would be very helpful, even if you just link a website where you got yours.

Thanks Everyone!
 
I was in the same boat as you about 3 weeks ago. I wanted to go with all LEDs as well but the price for units is kind of high. I have read and researched this topic for hours. He is what I have found out. DIY kits are the way to go. Cree LEDS are the best if you can afford them. You deff. want 3w not 1w. I would go with the dimmable for sure because you are going to have to start with the light turned down low when you first start useing it or you will kill everything. Most will say go 50/50 blue white but depends on what look you are going for. I went with 14/10 blue/white with my 24 bulb light but I like the more blue look. There are a few good site to order from. I will post the links at the end. If you are buying a kit try and make sure the lights all come from the same bin. Basically means they will all be the exact same color if they have and if not there shades may be off a bit. Look around in diff. forums there are several DIY LED builds tht have a ton of informaiton that will help you! Here are the sites most people order from the 3rd one down is for heatsinks........Hope this helps!

http://reefledlights.com/

http://www.rapidled.com/servlet/StoreFront

http://www.heatsinkusa.com/

I only needed a 24 bulb set up for my 20g cube so this site worked best for me. They had the best prices and there customer service has been very helpful so far. They even sent me extra LEDs with my order. The best thing about there kits is they include everything you need including the heatsink and everything to wire up and get running. They don't advertise large set ups like you need but email them and see if they can put 1 together. LINK:

http://www.aquastyleonline.com/
 
i'm about to order 108 LED's from LED group buy. by far the cheapest prices I have found but the trade off is you need to be a little patient. going to do three 36 cree 3w pendants over my 180 with inventronics dimmable drivers and hopefully have enough left over in the budget to get a RKE or RKL with an ALC to control them.

~Will.
 
That seems like a real cool project.

Heres a pic of my setup.

IMG_0724.jpg


this is the pic with just the Actinic's on.

Ken
 
back to the OP...I have only used Cree's so I have no other reference but I do have some experience with the red Led's. I purchased 4 (1 watt) led's from rapidled and have really like the color that it provides. With only blue on some colors do appear washed out..but with the red colors do improve.
 
I skimmed through the is link - very nice set up. I wonder if we could start a group buy through ORCA? I've already replaced my VHO actinics with LED's, and would love to do the same with the MH's.
 
i want to keep softies and lps on a standard 210 gallon tank, anyone have any idea what i will need?

it would be nice if they had one long wide heatsink instead of those thin 1 or 2 inch by 60 inch, so you have to buy like 4 of them.

i am getting closer to setting it up, so i am very interested in a group buy right away!
 
heatsinkusa has all kinds of different shapes and profiles. for the 180, I went with 108 total for my mixed reef and I'll prob only run it at 50% max for a while (after an acclimation period). I went heavier on the LED's that I had originally planned so if later I decide I want to start adding SPS I can turn up the juice some and it will leave me some extra wiggle room to play with the color.

~Will.
 
yea 18 days 10 hours till the next one. good lord! i love the heatsinks they have though 10x12 for 40 bucks, thats a nice size. what size did you end up getting? how long till your stuff gets here will? i cant wait to see pics!
 
i made my own heatsink pendants out of some aluminum ballast boxes I had lying around my shop, there going to be 10" x 15" with 24 royal blues, 10 cool whites 2 neutral whites and 2 moonlights each pendant. drivers should be in next week, doing 6 total 60-48p's with 2 PWM dimmers so I can ramp up each color individually for a nice dawn / dusk effect without dropping a butt load of cash on an apex. i'm expecting to have all the parts in front of me in 2 weeks.

~Will.
 
iLLwiLL said:
i made my own heatsink pendants out of some aluminum ballast boxes I had lying around my shop, there going to be 10" x 15" with 24 royal blues, 10 cool whites 2 neutral whites and 2 moonlights each pendant. drivers should be in next week, doing 6 total 60-48p's with 2 PWM dimmers so I can ramp up each color individually for a nice dawn / dusk effect without dropping a butt load of cash on an apex. i'm expecting to have all the parts in front of me in 2 weeks.

~Will.
Click to expand...

Will,

Where did you order all your stuff from?

Jack
 
i looked it up, its something like groupbuyled.com or something like that. they ship when the clock gets to 0 which is like every 20 days or something. i think its like 2 weeks away now though. maybe we could contact rapidled or some of the others and get a group buy discount?
 
got the LED's from "LED Group buy", and the drivers, dimmers, and moonlights from RapidLED.

~Will.
 
iLLwiLL said:
doing 6 total 60-48p's with 2 PWM dimmers so I can ramp up each color individually for a nice dawn / dusk effect without dropping a butt load of cash on an apex.

~Will.
Click to expand...

Will,

Question... if you plan long term to do an APEX, why not go with the D's and use the potentiometers to ramp them up and save $120 bucks? This is what im thinking of doing, any reason you opted not to go that route?

Jack
 
decided against the apex as all I would really need it for is my lights with how my tank is setup. so the 120 in dimmers gets me the same function as the apex while keeping hundreds in my pocket.

~Will.
 
Here is what I found.

Dealextreme.com when I was buying them had the best price on whites. However you still have to find the blues somwhere.

nanotuners sell a cool driver I like a lot. It drive up to 15 leds.
http://www.nanotuners.com/product_info.php?products_id=751&osCsid=1r5tnrecjjljkse1vf5mat1pf2


Also, the controller I have been using for about a year is a reefangel which seems to work great so far. I haven't changed the program on it in over a year but it has work great for me.
 
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