LED as main light - Page 15

MadTownMax · 04/07/2004, 09:45 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by sfsuphysics
How much voltage is across each resistor? How much current is being drawn in? Do you have them hooked up in series? parallel?

I dont know what you consider dim, but ideally it should hurt your eyes if you look directly at the LED down the "barrel" so to speak.

well, since I'm not really into burning holes in my retnas (I have halides for that

) I'm not going to look directly into the LEDs. I just know that when I have them running side-by-side with my PCs, the PCs are at least an order of magnitde brighter than the LEDs, this won't change no matter how many LEDs you cram over a tank.

I tested the 12V 1.5A transformer using a resistor to supply 3.8V DC to ONE LED, and it was still dim.

I guess I could tell I could tell you that the world is round, but you probably still wouldn't believe me.

good luck in your own experiments, I'm sure you'll find them dim too, and you know the best experimental procedures involve reproduceability, so have fun!

69vette · 04/07/2004, 11:09 AM

I wired my LED's with resistors to use a 12v power supply. Even when I use a 9v power supply, it still hurts to look at them.

MalawianDude · 04/07/2004, 11:37 AM

I have a 50 gallon tank, and it came with a glass top with a strip light, now could i use a piece of acrylic for a new cover, and use Leds' for like evening for show of blue or purple, then have the White light for main lighting. Would have the new piece of acrylic made so i could also pry open to feed fish and so on.. what you think?

musicsmaker · 04/07/2004, 11:50 AM

MadTown, what LED's were you using?

MadTownMax · 04/07/2004, 12:08 PM

These:

BUWC333

binned @10,000 mcd

LED Spec Sheet

sfsuphysics · 04/07/2004, 12:15 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by MadTownMax
well, since I'm not really into burning holes in my retnas (I have halides for that ) I'm not going to look directly into the LEDs. I just know that when I have them running side-by-side with my PCs, the PCs are at least an order of magnitde brighter than the LEDs, this won't change no matter how many LEDs you cram over a tank.

I tested the 12V 1.5A transformer using a resistor to supply 3.8V DC to ONE LED, and it was still dim.

AHhhhhhhhhh ok dim compared to your PCs, yah well that's expected, I thought you meant dim in general. But a single LED obviously won't compare to a PC in anyway, although I'd be willing to bet that if you did stare down the center of one (it wont harm you permanently for short periods of time) it'll hurt to stare at it alot more-so than if you stared at your PC bulbs.

Don't know if I'd go so far as to say "no matter how many.." you cram over the tank, but hey each come to their own conclusions. I happen to have a dead spot over my tank (no lights directly above it) so LEDs would work perfect for that area (well assuming they work how I want *chuckle*.

MadTownMax · 04/07/2004, 12:18 PM

Yes, I guess I should quantify... as if you're just looking for a "light source" for a Fish-only system, these would be useful, but as for growing any sort of Macro algae, corals, etc, I just don't think there's enough light to fuel these things.

sfsuphysics · 04/07/2004, 12:30 PM

Ok I've done moonlights for my tank with LEDs I figure I might as well use the whites & 420nm violets I have up too. As mentioned in the previous post I have a 'dead spot' over my tank where there are no lamps directly overhead, the light comes in at an angle, my bubbletip seems to be doing ok in the area (he found a bowl like piece of rock he's not moved out of (either stuck or likes it). But some of the rock really isn't as "spectacular as the other, and this is noticable it still has coraline growth just not as fast as the other areas of the tank. So I have a bunch of LEDs I decided to start a project to fit that 2' x 1.5' gap (or atleast a good portion of it). Decided since I have an equal number of whites as 420nm violets I might as well make some 50/50 led lights

So I grabbed a piece of 1/4" plywood I had laying around, cut a piece roughly 17" x 13" and marked off ticks every inch along it, so I had 16 along one side and 13 along another. Then I got to drilling, first used a countersink bit so the led could fit down into the wood, then used a bigger bit make the hold just big enough so the led can fit through (it has a lip at the end so it wont fit completely through). So yes those of you doing the math, that's 208 holes total. The next step was to trace out the pathways of how I'm going to wire them, figured 12V is common I'd wire 3 leds in series with about 90ohms of resistance, then each of those in parallel, giving about 25mA to each LED more than the specs say is nominal, but less than the max. Then I'm going to (only about 25% done of this stage) put the leds in, and use a hot glue gun so they are secure and it'll make the soldering job alot easier. Now it might be a little while before it gets done, because 207 leds (wanted even numbers of 3, so 69x3 = 207) times 2 leads on each LED + 69 resistors x 2 (68 + 18 ohm resistor) x 3 (common lead of each resistor is soldered to each other so counts as one) = 828 solder points!!!!!!! (so might take a while to get this done), I'm hoping to bend some wires as close together or using resistors as wires (since it doesn't matter where they are in each series connection) to further reduce this number, but 400 points is probably the bare minimum.

Anyways I'm going with 99-10000 mcd whites, 99-420nm violets (actinic), and 9- 470nm blues (hey need to have moonlights over the area too!)

Here's a picture of all the holes I drilled last night, with the W meaning white, B blue (leaving the Violet out since I figure all empty spaces are violet), drew the connecting lines for the whites so I remember how to solder them when things start getting ugly fast.

micaheli · 04/07/2004, 12:46 PM

I was thinking of using a piece of 1/4" acrylic - cut to the size of my top, tons of holes drilled in it at the exact LED size, then wire it all up, lightly hot glue the bare wires (to insulate it), then put a sheet of tin foil over the back (shiny side toward LED's) to reflect whatever wasted light back to the tank. Then, over the back of that, pour epoxy resin. Wouldn't hurt to pour acrylic solvent over the front side with the LED's.. that way they are actually molded into the acrylic panel. I suppose this method would make replacement of any LED's impossible, but would make it much less vulnerable to failure.

MadTownMax · 04/07/2004, 12:50 PM

wow, that looks like quite the project.

I found when I was doing my wiring that it was easiest to put solder the common wires first, then to heat these wires and not the LED leads to melt the solder when attaching them - I didn't fry a single LED.

micaheli · 04/07/2004, 12:55 PM

How is that any harder than the plywood method?

The only difference is materials... and price obviously.

The hardest part is drilling - its tedious and boring, no matter WHAT material you are drilling into.

--Micah

MadTownMax · 04/07/2004, 01:00 PM

sorry, I was referring to sfs' plywood project, you just beat me to the post

acrylic is the way I went, for the same reasons, although you never know when an LED will go bad, so I went with a more "open-box" design - and extremely DIY as you can see by it's acute ugliness....

micaheli · 04/07/2004, 01:02 PM

lol.. Ugly is in the eye of the beholder.

sfsuphysics · 04/07/2004, 02:13 PM

Yah I was thinking of using acrylic too, but I didn't happen to have of that size sitting around. Plus drilling acrylic can sometimes be tricky if you screw up you might get a fracture through it (bleh). But all of this will sit inside my hood, and there's acrylic over the bottom of that (too keep moisture out), so sealing it up isn't an issue nor is ugliness.

The only issue I had is that I have to run two transformers instead of one like I wanted, as I wanted to run it all of one transformer than just split off the violet & whites & blues into seperate switches that I could switch off as needed. But I ran some numbers 207/3 = 69 parallel connections x 25 mA = 1.725 Amps. Still if this works, it'll be 20 watts of power vs 220 watts, it won't compare with MH I'm almost sure of that, probably not PC either, but I think it might provide enough "oomph" that there is noticable light over the area.. oh well time well tell, for all I know the light might get extingished completely after 4 inches of water

micaheli · 04/07/2004, 02:55 PM

No way after 4". I realize you were exaggerating, but seriously I have an LED keychain flashlight that doesn't have a reflector of any type.. just an LED sticking out of plastic and it shines all the way to the bottom no problem. If I had 100 of these, the tank would be bright. But, its hard to step up to the plate and buy that many LEDs and assemble them because its so expensive. Expecially if they are going to fail.

Plus, the intensity of light that hits the bottom of the tank will be amplified amazingly as you increase the amount (and density) of LED's... Getting LED's as close to each other as possible and as many as possible is the trick. Perhaps I'll make a hood for my 5.5g nano with a couple hundred LED's and see where that goes. At 200led's, thats like 300 bucks for LED's

thats a lotta dough for a 5.5 gallon. However, I could mix colors, intensities, set them up on different circuits so they simulate daylight movement, dimm them.. etc.. lots of possibilities still.

--Micah

sfsuphysics · 04/07/2004, 03:23 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by micaheli
Perhaps I'll make a hood for my 5.5g nano with a couple hundred LED's and see where that goes. At 200led's, thats like 300 bucks for LED's thats a lotta dough for a 5.5 gallon.
--Micah

NAH! www.besthongkong.com 200 white LEDs will cost you $53.50 (shipping included). Heck 1000 will only cost you $245.25

micaheli · 04/07/2004, 03:43 PM

Really? damn.. thats sweet! In that case.. I need to buy a drill press.. because there is NO way in hell I'm going to drill 200 holes by hand.

murfman · 04/07/2004, 04:31 PM

lowes has drill presses for $69

micaheli · 04/07/2004, 04:39 PM

Serious? Not bad.. I wonder if there is a such thing as a dremel drill press.. hmm.. to google I go.

-micah

micaheli · 04/07/2004, 04:46 PM

http://www.softwareandstuff.com/h_5minidrlpress.html

Seems like it would be great for this project, however.. not much REACH.. a larger press may be needed.

You could do a light set appx 8 inches wide with that drill.

most tanks are 12+.. Heck a 55gal is 13 wide.. So, possibly a 10inch one for 99 bucks at lowes or home depot.

--Micah

sfsuphysics · 04/07/2004, 05:29 PM

Bah, I drilled 208 holes by hand, plus had to redrill them all to increase the whole for the led, thats 416 holes!

Further update I finished gluing in all the whites in and soldered 30 LEDs woohoo, only 178 more to go *groan*.

micaheli · 04/07/2004, 05:34 PM

well, you aren't exactly a "bright fella" hehe.

bright.. get it? bright?... oh man, am I funny.....

I hate myself.

DennisRB · 04/07/2004, 06:01 PM

ugh...

sandisct · 04/07/2004, 07:35 PM

just ordered 300 whites and 100 blue for my additional panels..... can't wait to finish up the led arrays and saves some money on elec....

sfsuphysics · 04/07/2004, 10:12 PM

Ok last update of the night, because well my eyes hurt from staring at little wires all night long, finished soldering all the white series connections together, and about 1/3 of the parallel decided to quit for the night, but not before I did a test run

Here you can see it's getting messy (and I still have to put another 99- 420nm violets in there!)

Here's after putting resistors on about a third of the board and wiring them up in parallel, which turned out be easier than I thought would be since I was able to twist 3 resistors ends together then dab some solder on there, then twist a piece of copper wire around the group, and solder that all together. Although working around this mess to put the actinic leds in might be troublesome.

Here's a test firing on my tv table I was working on, no flash of course.

And finally I just HAD to put it over the tank to see how it'll look, now it was in no way as bright as my 220W of PC as that seems to light the room (although that might have alot to do with the fact a good amount of light shines out of the tank directly due to the bulbs, where as this lights up the tank only), but it was visibly bright enough to see everything in the tank without problem, even had some shimmer lines on the floor, although not as prevalant as MH bulbs since there are many point sources which cause overlapping shimmer lines, but still looks nice. This is a picture with no flash (obviously) in a pitchblack room, it is a little overexposed due to the camera taking it, but still is a nice brightness.

04/07/2004, 11:09 AM	#352
69vette Registered Member Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Butler, Pa Posts: 1,314	I wired my LED's with resistors to use a 12v power supply. Even when I use a 9v power supply, it still hurts to look at them. __________________ Bob I feel sorry for people who don't drink. When they wake up in the morning, that's the best they're going to feel all day. -Frank Sinatra

04/07/2004, 11:37 AM	#353
MalawianDude Registered Member Join Date: Apr 2004 Location: Beaver Dam, WI Posts: 1,066	I have a 50 gallon tank, and it came with a glass top with a strip light, now could i use a piece of acrylic for a new cover, and use Leds' for like evening for show of blue or purple, then have the White light for main lighting. Would have the new piece of acrylic made so i could also pry open to feed fish and so on.. what you think? __________________ 125g In the Making 33g Long Reef 12g Nano Current Tank Info: Too many to explain

04/07/2004, 11:50 AM	#354
musicsmaker Premium Member Join Date: Aug 2002 Location: Ravenna, OH Posts: 3,059	MadTown, what LED's were you using? __________________ "The best threads rest with The Ancients..." - The Ancients.

04/07/2004, 12:46 PM	#359
micaheli Registered Member Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Portland, OR Posts: 189	I was thinking of using a piece of 1/4" acrylic - cut to the size of my top, tons of holes drilled in it at the exact LED size, then wire it all up, lightly hot glue the bare wires (to insulate it), then put a sheet of tin foil over the back (shiny side toward LED's) to reflect whatever wasted light back to the tank. Then, over the back of that, pour epoxy resin. Wouldn't hurt to pour acrylic solvent over the front side with the LED's.. that way they are actually molded into the acrylic panel. I suppose this method would make replacement of any LED's impossible, but would make it much less vulnerable to failure. __________________ NORTHWEST REEF COMMUNITY -- NWREEF.COM Current Tank Info: 75Gal Mixed Reef, Nuvo 8, 29 Biocube frag tank

04/07/2004, 12:55 PM	#361
micaheli Registered Member Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Portland, OR Posts: 189	How is that any harder than the plywood method? The only difference is materials... and price obviously. The hardest part is drilling - its tedious and boring, no matter WHAT material you are drilling into. --Micah __________________ NORTHWEST REEF COMMUNITY -- NWREEF.COM Current Tank Info: 75Gal Mixed Reef, Nuvo 8, 29 Biocube frag tank

04/07/2004, 12:08 PM	#355
MadTownMax ***erately knowledgable Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Appleton, WI Posts: 2,750 Blog Entries: 1	These: BUWC333 binned @10,000 mcd LED Spec Sheet

04/07/2004, 12:18 PM	#357
MadTownMax ***erately knowledgable Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Appleton, WI Posts: 2,750 Blog Entries: 1	Yes, I guess I should quantify... as if you're just looking for a "light source" for a Fish-only system, these would be useful, but as for growing any sort of Macro algae, corals, etc, I just don't think there's enough light to fuel these things.

04/07/2004, 12:30 PM	#358
sfsuphysics Registered Member Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: San Francisco Posts: 9,103	Ok I've done moonlights for my tank with LEDs I figure I might as well use the whites & 420nm violets I have up too. As mentioned in the previous post I have a 'dead spot' over my tank where there are no lamps directly overhead, the light comes in at an angle, my bubbletip seems to be doing ok in the area (he found a bowl like piece of rock he's not moved out of (either stuck or likes it). But some of the rock really isn't as "spectacular as the other, and this is noticable it still has coraline growth just not as fast as the other areas of the tank. So I have a bunch of LEDs I decided to start a project to fit that 2' x 1.5' gap (or atleast a good portion of it). Decided since I have an equal number of whites as 420nm violets I might as well make some 50/50 led lights So I grabbed a piece of 1/4" plywood I had laying around, cut a piece roughly 17" x 13" and marked off ticks every inch along it, so I had 16 along one side and 13 along another. Then I got to drilling, first used a countersink bit so the led could fit down into the wood, then used a bigger bit make the hold just big enough so the led can fit through (it has a lip at the end so it wont fit completely through). So yes those of you doing the math, that's 208 holes total. The next step was to trace out the pathways of how I'm going to wire them, figured 12V is common I'd wire 3 leds in series with about 90ohms of resistance, then each of those in parallel, giving about 25mA to each LED more than the specs say is nominal, but less than the max. Then I'm going to (only about 25% done of this stage) put the leds in, and use a hot glue gun so they are secure and it'll make the soldering job alot easier. Now it might be a little while before it gets done, because 207 leds (wanted even numbers of 3, so 69x3 = 207) times 2 leads on each LED + 69 resistors x 2 (68 + 18 ohm resistor) x 3 (common lead of each resistor is soldered to each other so counts as one) = 828 solder points!!!!!!! (so might take a while to get this done), I'm hoping to bend some wires as close together or using resistors as wires (since it doesn't matter where they are in each series connection) to further reduce this number, but 400 points is probably the bare minimum. Anyways I'm going with 99-10000 mcd whites, 99-420nm violets (actinic), and 9- 470nm blues (hey need to have moonlights over the area too!) Here's a picture of all the holes I drilled last night, with the W meaning white, B blue (leaving the Violet out since I figure all empty spaces are violet), drew the connecting lines for the whites so I remember how to solder them when things start getting ugly fast.

04/07/2004, 12:50 PM	#360
MadTownMax ***erately knowledgable Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Appleton, WI Posts: 2,750 Blog Entries: 1	wow, that looks like quite the project. I found when I was doing my wiring that it was easiest to put solder the common wires first, then to heat these wires and not the LED leads to melt the solder when attaching them - I didn't fry a single LED.

04/07/2004, 01:00 PM	#362
MadTownMax ***erately knowledgable Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Appleton, WI Posts: 2,750 Blog Entries: 1	sorry, I was referring to sfs' plywood project, you just beat me to the post acrylic is the way I went, for the same reasons, although you never know when an LED will go bad, so I went with a more "open-box" design - and extremely DIY as you can see by it's acute ugliness....

04/07/2004, 01:02 PM	#363
micaheli Registered Member Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Portland, OR Posts: 189	lol.. Ugly is in the eye of the beholder. __________________ NORTHWEST REEF COMMUNITY -- NWREEF.COM Current Tank Info: 75Gal Mixed Reef, Nuvo 8, 29 Biocube frag tank

04/07/2004, 02:13 PM	#364
sfsuphysics Registered Member Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: San Francisco Posts: 9,103	Yah I was thinking of using acrylic too, but I didn't happen to have of that size sitting around. Plus drilling acrylic can sometimes be tricky if you screw up you might get a fracture through it (bleh). But all of this will sit inside my hood, and there's acrylic over the bottom of that (too keep moisture out), so sealing it up isn't an issue nor is ugliness. The only issue I had is that I have to run two transformers instead of one like I wanted, as I wanted to run it all of one transformer than just split off the violet & whites & blues into seperate switches that I could switch off as needed. But I ran some numbers 207/3 = 69 parallel connections x 25 mA = 1.725 Amps. Still if this works, it'll be 20 watts of power vs 220 watts, it won't compare with MH I'm almost sure of that, probably not PC either, but I think it might provide enough "oomph" that there is noticable light over the area.. oh well time well tell, for all I know the light might get extingished completely after 4 inches of water __________________ Mike

04/07/2004, 02:55 PM	#365
micaheli Registered Member Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Portland, OR Posts: 189	No way after 4". I realize you were exaggerating, but seriously I have an LED keychain flashlight that doesn't have a reflector of any type.. just an LED sticking out of plastic and it shines all the way to the bottom no problem. If I had 100 of these, the tank would be bright. But, its hard to step up to the plate and buy that many LEDs and assemble them because its so expensive. Expecially if they are going to fail. Plus, the intensity of light that hits the bottom of the tank will be amplified amazingly as you increase the amount (and density) of LED's... Getting LED's as close to each other as possible and as many as possible is the trick. Perhaps I'll make a hood for my 5.5g nano with a couple hundred LED's and see where that goes. At 200led's, thats like 300 bucks for LED's thats a lotta dough for a 5.5 gallon. However, I could mix colors, intensities, set them up on different circuits so they simulate daylight movement, dimm them.. etc.. lots of possibilities still. --Micah __________________ NORTHWEST REEF COMMUNITY -- NWREEF.COM Current Tank Info: 75Gal Mixed Reef, Nuvo 8, 29 Biocube frag tank

04/07/2004, 03:43 PM	#367
micaheli Registered Member Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Portland, OR Posts: 189	Really? damn.. thats sweet! In that case.. I need to buy a drill press.. because there is NO way in hell I'm going to drill 200 holes by hand. __________________ NORTHWEST REEF COMMUNITY -- NWREEF.COM Current Tank Info: 75Gal Mixed Reef, Nuvo 8, 29 Biocube frag tank

04/07/2004, 04:31 PM	#368
murfman Registered Member Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Colorado Springs Posts: 4,670	lowes has drill presses for $69

04/07/2004, 04:39 PM	#369
micaheli Registered Member Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Portland, OR Posts: 189	Serious? Not bad.. I wonder if there is a such thing as a dremel drill press.. hmm.. to google I go. -micah __________________ NORTHWEST REEF COMMUNITY -- NWREEF.COM Current Tank Info: 75Gal Mixed Reef, Nuvo 8, 29 Biocube frag tank

04/07/2004, 04:46 PM	#370
micaheli Registered Member Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Portland, OR Posts: 189	http://www.softwareandstuff.com/h_5minidrlpress.html Seems like it would be great for this project, however.. not much REACH.. a larger press may be needed. You could do a light set appx 8 inches wide with that drill. most tanks are 12+.. Heck a 55gal is 13 wide.. So, possibly a 10inch one for 99 bucks at lowes or home depot. --Micah __________________ NORTHWEST REEF COMMUNITY -- NWREEF.COM Current Tank Info: 75Gal Mixed Reef, Nuvo 8, 29 Biocube frag tank

04/07/2004, 05:29 PM	#371
sfsuphysics Registered Member Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: San Francisco Posts: 9,103	Bah, I drilled 208 holes by hand, plus had to redrill them all to increase the whole for the led, thats 416 holes! Further update I finished gluing in all the whites in and soldered 30 LEDs woohoo, only 178 more to go groan. __________________ Mike

04/07/2004, 05:34 PM	#372
micaheli Registered Member Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Portland, OR Posts: 189	well, you aren't exactly a "bright fella" hehe. bright.. get it? bright?... oh man, am I funny..... I hate myself. __________________ NORTHWEST REEF COMMUNITY -- NWREEF.COM Current Tank Info: 75Gal Mixed Reef, Nuvo 8, 29 Biocube frag tank

04/07/2004, 06:01 PM	#373
DennisRB Registered Member Join Date: Oct 2003 Posts: 388	ugh...

04/07/2004, 07:35 PM	#374
sandisct Moved On Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: Singapore Posts: 133	just ordered 300 whites and 100 blue for my additional panels..... can't wait to finish up the led arrays and saves some money on elec....

04/07/2004, 10:12 PM	#375
sfsuphysics Registered Member Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: San Francisco Posts: 9,103	Ok last update of the night, because well my eyes hurt from staring at little wires all night long, finished soldering all the white series connections together, and about 1/3 of the parallel decided to quit for the night, but not before I did a test run Here you can see it's getting messy (and I still have to put another 99- 420nm violets in there!) Here's after putting resistors on about a third of the board and wiring them up in parallel, which turned out be easier than I thought would be since I was able to twist 3 resistors ends together then dab some solder on there, then twist a piece of copper wire around the group, and solder that all together. Although working around this mess to put the actinic leds in might be troublesome. Here's a test firing on my tv table I was working on, no flash of course. And finally I just HAD to put it over the tank to see how it'll look, now it was in no way as bright as my 220W of PC as that seems to light the room (although that might have alot to do with the fact a good amount of light shines out of the tank directly due to the bulbs, where as this lights up the tank only), but it was visibly bright enough to see everything in the tank without problem, even had some shimmer lines on the floor, although not as prevalant as MH bulbs since there are many point sources which cause overlapping shimmer lines, but still looks nice. This is a picture with no flash (obviously) in a pitchblack room, it is a little overexposed due to the camera taking it, but still is a nice brightness.