Reef Discussion

[Synodontis]

morning all,

Thought we might jump on the LED build treadmill. This will be a work in progress for awhile but would like to think I will get it finished and up by the end of January. I have to learn how to solder first. It's easy just buying the part's.

Have done lots of reading and it made my head hurt. I have lost count of the night's I sat here reading Magic the Zombie Brain Sucking Moderator, @CreepyMattGreen, n0rk and others, till midnight, then trying to go to sleep with a head full of idea's, questions and thought's.

I'm not the greatest at planning as I have said before. So as usual this is in my head and final decision's are made just before I complete the action :)Not the greatest way to do thing's but it seems to work for me. The plan so far for LED's is outlined below, not final but it's floating around the head. Magic the Zombie Brain Sucking Moderator has been SO helpful in his post's and influenced a lot of my thinking so if it all goes pear shaped we know who to blame, just clearing that up now ;)

Besides, if you guy's watch me f$&k it up, at least you wont make the same mistake's lol.

Drivers-
12x Mean Well ELN-60-48D

LED'S-
52 Cool White
52 Neutral White
52 Royal Blue
52 Blue

Lenses-
104x 60deg
104x 80deg

We will start with the bit's I got together at the moment. Not much but it's a start.

Each heat sink is 1.49m long by 30mm high by 98mm wide. We have 8 them that will be joined into pair's. This will make 4 heatsink's in total.

Kinda big bit's of alloy huh. Each one is 3Kg giving a total of 24Kg in 6Kg block's above the tank. Not sure how we are going to hang these, get to that when we have it all together and working.

So far we have 8 of the driver's so still he to find 4 more.

Ordering the blue LED's this Tuesday so until then,that's about it.

HooRoo

K&J

 

[rockerpeller]

Wow gonna be a great build. Any particular reason as to why you picked the D drivers? I've got the D's myself and am now looking at an Arduino controller. Found a couple circuits to pair it up to the controller but now wishing I had of gone for the P drivers instead as the Arduino has 5v PWM outputs which is alot easier to pair. lol.

 

[Synodontis]

rockerpeller,
Nice to see you here mate. :welcome Thanks again for your help in finding the live rock when we first started our tank's.

Gone the D driver's for the Arduino like yourself.

Have you read the thread Magic the Zombie Brain Sucking Moderator has going... Arduino Microprocessor - Questions and Answer

With people that share their knowledge freely like they do here we have learnt so much and the only reason we would attempt the build in the first place.
:D

 

[rockerpeller]

No I haven't seen it yet, although I'll be opening that thread as soon as I've finished this post lol.
I'll be posting the details of my build as I do it.
Anyway enough of that. Where did you get the heatsinks from? I don't need such a big heatsink as my tanks footprint is only 45x45 but the fact its 75 tall means I'm going to have to get creative with the LED's I use.

EDIT: Oh and thanks for the welcome. Sorry its a Friday night lol

 

[Synodontis]

rockerpeller, I have a friend that work's in the energy dept lol. They get some really neat stuff, especially the wind/solar sections. Let me know what your after and I might be able to get something for you.

Look forward to seeing your build posted, it's not the size of the build most are interested in, it's the way you go about it. The trick's & tip's you find to get around certain problem's. There are a few people here starting or thinking about a LED build, so the more people that post their build's, the more help we ALL get.

 

[rockerpeller]

:worship I'll definitely keep that in mind Syno. I was reading through one of Evilc66's insane LED builds on nano-reef that throws out 1500PAR at 18" through air. His builds always get me thinking lol

 

[DavidS]

Synodontis, if you do get stuck with the light build - feel free to yell out. My soldering skills have been average since I stopped using a soldering iron all the time, but I'd be happy to show you how to go about it. Once you get the knack down, you'll find that the electrical side is actually pretty straight forward, even if it takes quite some time!
If you suck at soldering them when you start, you'll usually wind up a pro by the time you're finished - especially with that many LEDs :)

 

[Synodontis]

Thank's Sir Psycho Sexy, I think I was in the 20's range the last time I played with a soldering iron, god damn life time ago :D

 

[MagicJ]

@Magic the Zombie Brain Sucking Moderator has been SO helpful in his post's and influenced a lot of my thinking so if it all goes pear shaped we know who to blame, just clearing that up now ;)

It's lucky you don't know where I live then :p

 

[MagicJ]

Gone the D driver's for the Arduino like yourself.

Are you planning to dim these LED's.

The 'D' drivers require an analogue 1-10v source for the dimming which is normally controlled via a Potentiometer (Pot) - this allows for the leds's to be dimmed manually i.e. to set the overall colour spectrum, but does not easily allow for sunrise/sunset automatic dimming.

The 'P' drivers require a 1-10v Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) source for the dimming - this can provided via a commercial product or a microcomputer such as the Arduino. The only problem with the Arduino is that it outputs a 5v PWM signal and this needs to be boosted to 10v to provide the full dimming range to the driver. This can be done via a seperate 10v plugpack and a simple transistor circuit - a bit fiddly but only requires 3 components per channel (2 resistors and a transistor).

The Arduino can produce a 10v analogue voltage by smoothing out the PWM voltage but this requires a more complicated circuit (primarily using capacitors) and is not something you want to do unless you have to. There have been a number of reports of using the 'D' drivers with an Arduino with no ill effects but, once again, not something you would want to do unless you have to.

 

[Synodontis]

See, that's what I'm talking about. There you go again making me think @ half past ten on a Saturday morning. :D

 

[MagicJ]

I would try to get the blues from a couple of different bins - B3 (465-470nm) and B4 (470-475nm) were the two that I used which output at slightly different spectrums.

I am looking to use some NW's (I use all CW's at the moment) and trying to source some real purples - some purples are actually just seperate red and blue led's, they might fool our eye's into thinking it is purple but it doesn't fool our corals!!.

 

[MagicJ]

From my perspective, having the ability to automatically control the LED's was a prerequisite - you may have different requirements but now is the time to make the decision.

 

[rockerpeller]

Just in case you haven't found one Syno, I found this in my arduino travels through MASA lol. Could be good info for people here if they run into the same thing. All credit goes to Armen from MASA for posting this little gem. This circuit will let you dim a D driver with the PWM outputs from the Arduino.

 

[Synodontis]

Thanks rockerpeller, that may very well come in handy, hehehe.

 

[Synodontis]

Morning all,

Well interesting Sunday I have had. Searching for info on LED's, how to read that bloody Cree binning sheet lol and finally making a decision on what LED's to order tomorrow or Tuesday.

So here is the first lot.....

52x XPEROY-L1-D50-16-0-01 (460-465nm)
26X XPEBLU-L1-B30-M2-0-01 (465-470nm)
26X XPEBLU-L1-B40-M2-0-01 (470-475nm)

Well that's the decision today anyway, who knows, might change tomorrow :)

 

[MTG]

Will be an interesting build mate good luck !

 

[Synodontis]

Had a bugger of a week at work so I never got around to ordering the LED's. You think that one would find the time to do personal shit during work hour's wouldn't you? Oh well, let's try for a Monday order huh. :)

 

['vspec']

You think that one would find the time to do personal shit during work hour's wouldn't you?

haha, you kill me bud.

 

[Woody Mackay]

Any updates on the build mate?