herring_fish
Crazy Designer
I want a good LED controller but I don't know what features goe into one.
I am starting a new 180 gallon tank (72" long by 31" tall and 18" deep). I have been reefing for a long time but now I am looking into re-starting my tank from scratch with LEDs. I have a little knowledge of electronics and know how to get more when I need it, having cobbled together a robot plankton feeder but am no expert. I had lots of help from others. I have done lots of research on LED lighting because I want to build my own.
I need help deciding what I want for an LED controller system whether I build or buy. I think that I want to build it and I just want to start picking features that I would try to incorporate into the design. I may want to buy sub-systems and string them together into one finish system that does what I want or I might want to build it from a lower level.
As I started planning this system, I quickly understood that I don't even know what I would want or need to have.
I think that I want to be able to tune my coloration. Can I assume that I want to be able to dim lights, perhaps to 0%, with multiple channels? If so, how many would I typically want? I think that I would want to be able to tune the lights with knobs as well as remotely "¦say from the computer with sliders via WiFi?
This might me a lot to handle. I don't know.
Now this might be rather far out there but I might want to be able to get the pulses to fire at different times during a given cycle, instead of all at the same time. If this is just too much, please circle back to the more normal questions above.
From what I have read, photo inhibition can be greatly reduced if cells get dark periods. Even if those periods are extremely short like milliseconds. Now I'm not talking about having the light too bright for too many hours. I'm talking about timings that are perhaps far less than a second.
It has also been shown that a second color can be pulsed later in the cycle without greatly decreasing the processing of the first pulse. In theory, you could turn up the power of the lights without burning the corals if the different colors are staggered. This is because those plants and animals that have different types of chlorophyll in them at the same time, can process different wave lengths at different times without getting in the way of each other. This is believed to be true, again, even if the time period is very short.
Photosynthesis is a multi-step process. Although not all of these processes are fully understood, I'll try to over simplify an explanation so please excuse me if I don't get it perfectly right.
One phase of the process receives light photons until it is saturated. Then another part of the process creates an intermediate resulting product before passing it on to still another part of the process. There may be more and/or there might be other sub-processes at play but the bottom line is that the chain gets backed up until at least part of the process is completed. Only then can the first phase effectively use any more light photons. It's like trying to drink water from a fire hose. You can only swallow so fast and so often.
To dim an LED, I think that LED controllers already take advantage of pulsing the light and having it off part of the time rather than actually reducing the intensity of the light output of a constant beam.
I don't know if simple software could get this done on a mini-controller like an Arduino and I don't know if it would be worth the effort but this is an example of what I had in mind.
The white might fires for the first 10% of the cycle. This might be followed by some secondary colors like, green or amber, for perhaps 3% bursts. Then at the 50% mark in the cycle, the blue would fire for 15% of the cycle; follow by some out secondary colors like orange. Finally, there might be a burst of ultra-violate for 5% of the cycle, at the 75% mark. Then of course, Then the cycle would repeat.
Well, I have blathered long enough. What is realistic and what is not? What would you think should be in a good LED controller?
I am starting a new 180 gallon tank (72" long by 31" tall and 18" deep). I have been reefing for a long time but now I am looking into re-starting my tank from scratch with LEDs. I have a little knowledge of electronics and know how to get more when I need it, having cobbled together a robot plankton feeder but am no expert. I had lots of help from others. I have done lots of research on LED lighting because I want to build my own.
I need help deciding what I want for an LED controller system whether I build or buy. I think that I want to build it and I just want to start picking features that I would try to incorporate into the design. I may want to buy sub-systems and string them together into one finish system that does what I want or I might want to build it from a lower level.
As I started planning this system, I quickly understood that I don't even know what I would want or need to have.
I think that I want to be able to tune my coloration. Can I assume that I want to be able to dim lights, perhaps to 0%, with multiple channels? If so, how many would I typically want? I think that I would want to be able to tune the lights with knobs as well as remotely "¦say from the computer with sliders via WiFi?
This might me a lot to handle. I don't know.
Now this might be rather far out there but I might want to be able to get the pulses to fire at different times during a given cycle, instead of all at the same time. If this is just too much, please circle back to the more normal questions above.
From what I have read, photo inhibition can be greatly reduced if cells get dark periods. Even if those periods are extremely short like milliseconds. Now I'm not talking about having the light too bright for too many hours. I'm talking about timings that are perhaps far less than a second.
It has also been shown that a second color can be pulsed later in the cycle without greatly decreasing the processing of the first pulse. In theory, you could turn up the power of the lights without burning the corals if the different colors are staggered. This is because those plants and animals that have different types of chlorophyll in them at the same time, can process different wave lengths at different times without getting in the way of each other. This is believed to be true, again, even if the time period is very short.
Photosynthesis is a multi-step process. Although not all of these processes are fully understood, I'll try to over simplify an explanation so please excuse me if I don't get it perfectly right.
One phase of the process receives light photons until it is saturated. Then another part of the process creates an intermediate resulting product before passing it on to still another part of the process. There may be more and/or there might be other sub-processes at play but the bottom line is that the chain gets backed up until at least part of the process is completed. Only then can the first phase effectively use any more light photons. It's like trying to drink water from a fire hose. You can only swallow so fast and so often.
To dim an LED, I think that LED controllers already take advantage of pulsing the light and having it off part of the time rather than actually reducing the intensity of the light output of a constant beam.
I don't know if simple software could get this done on a mini-controller like an Arduino and I don't know if it would be worth the effort but this is an example of what I had in mind.
The white might fires for the first 10% of the cycle. This might be followed by some secondary colors like, green or amber, for perhaps 3% bursts. Then at the 50% mark in the cycle, the blue would fire for 15% of the cycle; follow by some out secondary colors like orange. Finally, there might be a burst of ultra-violate for 5% of the cycle, at the 75% mark. Then of course, Then the cycle would repeat.
Well, I have blathered long enough. What is realistic and what is not? What would you think should be in a good LED controller?
