Another NC 28 LED Retro

[willp2]

After months of plotting and scheming I finally was able to build my LED retro for my Nano Cube 28CF.

My mission was to keep it as simple and quite honestly as cheap as possible.

The parts:
12 Blue 3W 90 degree SemiLED 200lm
12 Cool 3W 90 degree Cool White SemiLED 200lm
4 Sure Electric 3W Drivers http://www.sureelectronics.net/goods.php?id=1035
1 Old Dell laptop power supply
556 based PWM for dimming
2 potentiometers for dimming
Thermal tape
3/8 inch aluminum plate / heat spreader

I miscalcualted when specing this all out and didn't realize that I need a couple more drivers or a bigger power supply to drive the LED’s at the full 700ma. So at the moment the best I can do is 350ma. So I'm currently running 4 drivers with 6 LED's each. I'll be adding a couple more drivers soon.

I wanted to see how this would do heat wise with just mounting to a plate and no external fins. I am still running a couple of quiet fans in the hood so there is good air flow across the plate. At full power after a couple of hours its around 115f in the hottest spots right on the heatsink and quite a bit less everywhere else. I’ll probably add some U channel to the back to get some more surface area when I add more power later. BTW - that plate looks filthy in the pics. It was actually quite smooth and clean.

The Sure Electric drivers are nice little units. Built nice and work well. I ended up stuffing them in the compartments in the back of the hood, that's not shown in the pics below.

So running at 350ma, I am getting about 130 PAR on the sand. Not bad I think as I can push a lot more to them if I want. Compared that to the old CF bulb that was way hotter and only gave me about 30PAR on the sand. Intereting also is that I have the LED’s mounted high in the light box from the old CF light, so there are sides all around. That and the directional properties of the LED’s make far less spilled ligaht in the room.

Not bad for $150 bucks, eh? Should be even nicer when I add the extra drivers and push the LED's to 700ma.

***EDIT*** My orginal PAR numbers were based on a quick measurement in one spot at the end of a long night. Tonight I had to pull the lid to move around some of my wiring as I ran out of time when I originally put it together and things were a bit sloppy. So I took the opportunity to remeasure my PAR numbers.

Tonight after spending some time cleaning the glass on the splash shield under the LED's and taking measurements all over the bottom I averaged 130 PAR across the sand.

Then I added some 60 degree optics and I got a 287 PAR average across the bottom.


http://img198.imageshack.us/img198/9273/img0797sy.jpg
http://img171.imageshack.us/img171/9497/img0800t.jpg
http://img294.imageshack.us/img294/3412/img0801p.jpg
See if you can spot the mistake(s) in my wiring :lol:


http://img541.imageshack.us/img541/814/img0802i.jpg
http://img812.imageshack.us/img812/9476/img0803t.jpg
http://img43.imageshack.us/img43/5148/img0804ug.jpg

[LotsaFishies]

very nice!

[superman858mm]

is it comparable to 150w or 250w mh? thanks

[willp2]

I'm not sure honestly, maybe someone else can chime in on how those PAR numbers translate? I suspect that its on the low side of a 150w mh as it is now. When I add the additional drivers and can push them all the way to 700mah and / or add optics I think we'll be looking at a much improved story. These things are running at only half their rated current at the moment.

[laffingcrow]

Very nice Will; I'd bet you don't ever need to run them at full power.
I'm also interested to know how the #'s translate to MH.
Anyone with a PAR meter running Halides???

[willp2]

I am very glad I made these dimmable. I'd hate to be stuck with the color of all the lights on all the time. The blue is pretty strong and makes the tank look purple at full power. I've seen this on other tanks and now I realize that this is likely a setup that couldn't be adjusted. I just back off the blue a bit to dial in the color. I find myself changing it slightly thoughout the day to match the lighting in the room.

[Acefspds]

Nice man I have a 28g 150w hqi but lack the PAR meter. I am really interested to see the difference. If someone has a PAR wants to stop by I will give you a frag or something if we can test my lights. Would be with water in the tank.

[Acefspds]

Doing research 97 PAR is probabley less than a 150w hqi in a NC28. Id guess your looking at 175+ PAR on the sand in a 150

http://www.atlantareefclub.org/forums/showthread.php?t=4695&page=2w hqi

[willp2]

Thanks. Tonight I had to pull the lid to move around some of my wiring as I ran out of time when I originally put it together and things were a bit sloppy. My originally PAR number was just me dropping the PAR meter on the bottom at the end of a long night.

Tonight after spending some time cleaning the glass on the splash shield under the LED's and taking measurements all over the bottom I averaged 130 PAR across the sand.

Then I added some 60 degree optics and I got a 287 PAR average across the bottom.

[willp2]

I should add in case it isn't clear from what I said above, I am still running at half power on these things. When I get my new drivers in a couple of weeks I should be able to bump up output quite a bit.

[willp2]

I love this, its heating up outside and I am getting ZERO heat into the tank from the LED's! I have a simple computer fan blowing over my filter and so far its keeping the temp nice and comfy. The room temp was 84 when I got home, tank was 78.

[Acefspds]

What are the prices for each light that you are gonna order? I am interested now that you say the par is alot higher. At 287 thats probabley more then my 150w HQI. I am all about getting my tank cooler since I do not run a chiller.

BTW how is all the corals under the LED's?

[willp2]

Just so its clear, that 287 PAR number was with optics. Without optics it was around 130 average at half power on the LED's. So both numbers should go up once I can run these things at full output.

I've only been running this for a week, but things are already going crazy and I've still got it turned down a bit as I'm trying to acclimate over time. I've got new growth and better color on just about everything already. Frankly I'm sort of shocked that I can see a difference already.

You must live near the coast if you’re not running a chiller and you are running HQI. My tank was getting hot just with the PC’s.

The LED's are $3.75 a piece, optics $1 each.

[Acefspds]

Optics are just lenses basically?

[willp2]

Yes it's just a lens that sits on top of the LED. They just focus the light into a smaller area. Most LED's put out light in something like 120 to 160 degrees, so a lot of light is going sideways. In my case the LED's are already pretty good at 90 degrees. The optics brought those down to 60 degrees

[klevur1]

sweet i like seeing this DIY with the LEDs. making your own saves money and is more enjoyable as well as you don't submit to buying an LED unit @ astronomical prices. theoretically this should drive down the price hopefully. LEDs have been around for a while now... still frickin' expensive which is a pity. since LEDs lower your carbon footprint and there's no bulb(s) to replace and polute the environment with mercury they really are on their way to one upping HID systems woot woot KUDOS on the LED build =)

[willp2]

Thanks!

While still pricey, they are affordable if you are willing to do a DIY setup. Not only affordable, but the power savings for light and cooling are so significant that at least on smaller tanks, I can't see any reason not to go LED. I think the cost to build is probably close to the cost of a good traditional light fixture, but then it’s all payback. No new bulbs all the time, far less power to run the lights and far less power to cool the tank.

While no doubt there will be some hold outs that swear that traditional lighting is the way to go, I think in 5 years we'll all be using LED's as the advantages far outweigh the perceived disadvantages.

[CCLansman]

For all the people asking about the par and how it stacks up here is a good set of measurements done by melev:
http://www.melevsreef.com/par_readings.html

So 97 par is more likely closer to 150MH while with optics and over 250 at the sand bend is near a 400wMH

I had 12 led over my old 12gal nano, at 1A and 3V and really fried everything in that old tank not realizing just how strong leds can be.

[Batman]

i'm curious if these could be set on some sort of a digital timer that will dim/increase the lights at certain hours to make it fully automated. that is a flippin sweet setup

[willp2]

i'm curious if these could be set on some sort of a digital timer that will dim/increase the lights at certain hours to make it fully automated. that is a flippin sweet setup
I'm slowly working on something like this. Trying to make something cheap and dead simple.


So 97 par is more likely closer to 150MH ...
Not that it matters much but I was at 130 PAR at 350mA on the sand:D

[splitkooks]

any update with your new drivers? Im engineering a like build for my BC14 w/15 CREE LED's and *hopefully* employ your timer ;)

[willp2]

I wasted a bunch of time with a bad batch of controllers. Once I finally figured out it was a hardware problem I ordered a different controller. That came in the mail today and I started putting this thing together finally and am testing it out now. So hopefully in the next day or two I’ll have this design wrapped up and well tested and can start looking at building a few more.

[DiverDave]

Hey Will. Where are the picts of the tank? I'd love to see and hear how the corals have been doing through out your project. How's the growth been since inception? Would you go back to other lighting options? Supplement the led's? Throw us a bone!

Dave

[willp2]

Hey Dave, thanks for reviving the old thread.

I'm all in on LED's and at this point. I love the control and versatility I can have. The power savings alone have made this whole thing worth it.

This tank was mostly softies and I've been adding SPS over time. I kept the light sort of low for the first few months, acclimating slowly and because at first I didn’t have much that needed more light. In the last few months things have really sped up a lot. SPS frags are showing good growth, even when on the sand bed. The few SPS in there all started as tiny frags. I've had to get rid of or heavily frag several things. The toadstool in back totally outgrew the tank and had to go. The green monti has had about a third of it taken out and is bigger than it looks in the pic, it pretty much dominates the tank at the moment. The hammer up top pretty much tripled its size and I got rid of most of it. The tank is in need of good cleaning now and I need to get rid of some more stuff to make room for more SPS and do some general redecorating.

Growth has been excellent I think. Here are a few pics from Mid November then today. Just cell phone pics but should let you see what’s happening.

November 2010
http://i1225.photobucket.com/albums/ee399/reefdiy/tankpics019.jpg

April 2011
http://i1225.photobucket.com/albums/ee399/reefdiy/WP_000269.jpg

November 2010
http://i1225.photobucket.com/albums/ee399/reefdiy/tankpics021.jpg

April 2011
http://i1225.photobucket.com/albums/ee399/reefdiy/WP_000271.jpg

[DiverDave]

Looks great. My 5 gal was only up for about 6 months beore I had to take it down. Growth was slow and almost seems retarded by the light's intensity; almost like a slow bleaching. I had a Garf Bonsai that grew low but it had more purple coloration where it grew into shade vice in direct light. You're looks awesome and I look forward to getting back to the states and starting up again. Thanks!