Cheap & easy DIY lights

[Sam Maghsoodloo]

I'm getting a bigger tank, and setting up a much better lighting system, so i figured i'd start documenting the DIY stuff i did for this tank before i break it down. First up, the cheap ghetto lights i made for it back when it was a FW african cichlid tank. I made these before i really knew about reefing or had any intention for salt water. It's going to be really hard to do a DIY for something that's already built, because alot of it i can't take apart. Sorry if the pics are confusing! Oh and also sorry for the crappy cell phone pics. Crappy fixed focal length junk... Anyways, here we go..
Here they are off:

and here they are when they're on:


These lights don't have crazy output, but they're actually decently bright, and make the tank look pretty good. My tank is basically fish only , and the fish look real nice in the light(they're hiding in the pics cuz i was messing with the tank). The couple pieces of coral i've got have been growing too, but not super fast. These lights use the Coralife 50/50 compact flourescent lights. There are 3x20 watt bulbs, each of which is half actinic, and half 10,000K. However, they're the kind that you screw into a standard bulb socket, that's the secret to making this setup so cheap.


To do this project, i highly recommend that you be able to solder and heatshrink wires together. There isn't room in the tube for bulky connectors.

[sandiegan]

I'm guesing 3" ABS?

[Sam Maghsoodloo]

First, you get a piece of black ABS drain pipe.

At home depot, they have pieces that are cut to length already, i got a 36" which is the exact length of my tank. I think they have 48" and others too, or you can cut your own piece down to the length you want. The diameter is 3". Pick out a piece that isn't scuffed too bad.
This is the part where you need access to a table saw. You need to cut the pipe in half, length wise. I actually cut off a little less than half just to give it a little more room inside.

Be sure to do this slowly, or the edge looks crappy. Then remove the burrs and sand the edge WITH A BLOCK. Or else you'll get scratches on the visable side.

Why ABS? Well, it's black and shiny, for starters, hehe. But also pretty strong and heat resistant. It doesn't warp under load until it approaches 200 degrees F.

[sandiegan]

woohoo I was right!

[Sam Maghsoodloo]

Then you need the sockets for the bulbs. The best ones are these:

They have them at homedepot for a couple of bucks. They have the little tab which will make it ideal to mount in this assembly.

You need to bend the metal to look like this:

This is so that the socket won't sit right against the inside of the pipe.
The easiest way to bend this piece is to take it out first by unscrewing the screw that's holding it. You access this screw from inside the socket:

[Sam Maghsoodloo]

now you need to measure and line up the sockets inside the pipe, so you can find where to drill the holes to bolt them. Put the bulbs in the sockets to get a good idea of size. I mounted 2 facing one way, and one facing the other. That way it's all pretty symetrical on the sides, but the center one is a bit offcenter. It doesn't matter when they're on, trust me.
Find where the holes need to be, and drill them.
Then push through a small bolt to make sure the hole was big enough. (you need 4 of these, size isn't important, just have a matching nut and washer for them)

[Sam Maghsoodloo]

Now pull the bolt out, and put it back in using a screw cap for the top of it:

You can get these screw caps at home depot. They're in the hardware section, in the drawers under the various bolts and screws. Just look a little, you'll find them.
Then put the bolts back through and secure the sockets on the other side with a nut and washer:

Now here's a little dirty secret. See how there's 4 screw caps on top of the lights? (look at the first pics) But there's only 3 lights right? Well, i drilled the extra hole, and put a bolt and screw cap in it so that it looks symetrical. One of them is non functional.

[Sam Maghsoodloo]

Now for the electrical. First gather all 3 black wires from the sockets and solder them to a common black lead and heat shrink them:

then do the same for the white wires on the other side:

It's really important to use solder and heat shrink, because this makes a straight, water tight connection. I don't have glass under this thing (ideally, it should have glass or acrylic under it, but eh). It gets moist sometimes from bubbles popping under it, but nothing's ever come of that. I've never had a problem with these connections, and i'm guessing it's because of how careful i was with the heat shrink when i built it.

[Sam Maghsoodloo]

Now the lights are run in parallel and you can solder the two leads to wall power because the bulbs are self ballasted. If you put them on a timer, you don't need a switch, but i decided to put in a toggle switch because my cichlid tank wasn't on a timer at the time.
Get a lamp cord from a donor appliance. I used one of those standard ac cords with the "figure 8" plugs that you can get from radio shack in any length, and i just cut off the connector so that it was live wire.
Also, get a simple toggle switch, with 2 terminals. Get a good sized one, not the micro switches. I did the math, and the small switches are ok for the current, but their shafts don't fit all the way through the pipe.
Drill a hole just big enough for the power cord and run the end through. Then drill one right next to it for the toggle switch (i don't think I need to type how to mount the toggle switch).


Now solder one of the leads from the lamps directly to the power cord. Then solder the other power lead and the other lead from the lamp to the toggle switch. (this is a complicated way of saying, hook it all up in series)

Make SURE you heat shrink the connections to the toggle especially well. Squish the heat shrink down over the terminals before you heat it, so that nothing is exposed once it shrinks. Also, wrap the toggle switch with a layer of black electrical tape so that its metal sides aren't exposed (i didn't do that in mine, i thought i had. hmm....)

[Sam Maghsoodloo]

Now to secure the wires inside the pipe. The easiest way to to this is to epoxy the wire at many points. You need it to be heat proof, and durable. Superglue will crack, and the fumes might mess with the plastic, and hot glue will melt. So use epoxy. The easiest way to do this is to chose the spots you're gonna epoxy, and then tape the wires down with scotch tape on a bunch of other points. Then epoxy, let dry, and remove the tape pieces.

[Sam Maghsoodloo]

Now you're done! Plug the lights in and hit the switch.
Here are the lights sitting on the groung. You can see how the bulbs are not perfectly symetrical. The important thing is, the end bulbs are the same distance from the edge, this makes the light inside symetrical.

[Sam Maghsoodloo]

Here they are on the tank.

Remember, these are lights for people looking for a cheap DIY solution to lighting a tank. They're bright, but not as bright as legitimate reef lighting (VHO, T5, MH). They're about as bright as a 65w PC. The total cost of this project minus the bulbs was about 20 bucks (less if i remember correctly). The bulbs are kind of a rip off, but all bulbs are. These are the 20 watt (they also make a smaller 10 watt bulb), and they cost 20 bucks at the lfs. They're about 10 or 12 bucks each online i think, so i recommend ordering them online.
The sleek low profile of the lights was what i was going for when i thought the idea up. It sits right on top of my tank a half an inch above the water. This leaves a good view to look down on the open top tank, which is my favorite part of the whole thing. Being low, they don't reflect too much light off the surface of the water and blind you if you're standing near the tank.

[Sam Maghsoodloo]

If i were to built it again i'd do a few things different. First of all, i'd probably cut and screw in an acrylic cover for it. Too many screws, though, would make it a pain to change bulbs if they burn out, and you might need a fan to run air through it. I'd also paint the inside of the pipe white for reflection.
I thought about capping the ends, but it actually looks pretty cool with the ends open, and the light leak out of the ends is surprisingly little. If i painted the inside white, it would look weird on the ends where you could see inside. It wouldn't be as slick and black looking (i really wish my crappy tank wasn't wood trimmed :/ But that's why i'm upgrading, haha)
This design is scalable; I think a single bulb one would be nice for a fuge. Also, i think i'm going to use ABS pipe to do the same thing with a PC inside for another tank i'm setting up in my bedroom later. That build would be like, 1 step, haha. Next DIY thread will probably be how to paint the back of the tank that pretty blue.

Power to the DIY people!!!

[iVgOnMaD]

I used those bulbs before, nice DIY

[DaChrisDude]

Very good documentation, and good diy work.

Adding some simple reflectors around each bulb would help the total light output some. Even aluminum foil would work decently.