led dilemma

[w3ish3ng]

I'm planning to diy a led lightset for my 1ft cube tank

However I'm not too sure which way should I go.

1st setup
25x cree xp-g 3 watts led with 2x meanwell 1050ma driver.
This series is one of the brightest for 3 watts but sadly there's aint any lens for it
Cost wise will be in the middle

2nd setup
36x cree xr-2 3 watts led with 6x buckpuck 1000ma driver.
Not as bright as the g series but I will either put a 60 or 80 degree lens for it.
Cost wise will be the highest of all 3

3rd setup
49x china made star 3 watts led with 4x meanwell 700ma driver.
Least bight of all 3, but will made up in numbers, will get 60 degree lens for it.
Cheapest of all 3

Will drill holes on a aluminium sheet to mount them and stick it with thermal paste.
Ventilation will be provided with 2x 140mm fan
Casing will either be construct of stainless steel or acrylic.

So please input your suggestion on which way should I go.

Tia!

[w3ish3ng]

pricing for

first setup will be 338.45

second setup will be 344.74

third setup will be 182.10

all in SGD but without shipping yet

[boxedfish]

just buy 2-3 of those normal led clip on lights. yours is a 1 foot tank, should be enough to light up your tank. the most you spend is $50 to $90 without breaking a sweat to DIY. If your tank is 2 feet and above, can DIY

[w3ish3ng]

nah,

those aint bright enough for me.

if i ever upgrade, i just need to take the heatsink out, get another heatsink and diy somemore bulbs, the only thing that have to go will be only the casing.

[pentagon]

will it be too strong for a nano tank? i suppose led watts requirements should be less then pl or t5ho watts because of better par.

1. 75w
2. 108w
3. 147w

[eviltrain]

erm, DIY is normally for things to goes cheaper. i rather you get the 32+4 led light set for your 1 foot tank. 1/4 of your price for DIY list. next time if you wants to upgrade. just add 1 more of the led lightset.

[illumnae]

I believe he wants to use it for a marine tank, which has much higher light requirements than freshwater tanks, though I do believe his setup is too high even for marine standards, especially with optics.

However, he does have the option of under-driving the LEDs to get a dimmer output, or hanging it higher above the tank since there's not much loss through spread like MH or t5 sources do.

[w3ish3ng]

I believe he wants to use it for a marine tank, which has much higher light requirements than freshwater tanks, though I do believe his setup is too high even for marine standards, especially with optics.

However, he does have the option of under-driving the LEDs to get a dimmer output, or hanging it higher above the tank since there's not much loss through spread like MH or t5 sources do.

hey bro

im not using it for marine setup, thought i do have the thought of using it next time for it.

i was told that plant basically wont die due to excess of lights, just that algae might grow. that isnt much of an issue for me since the tank will be mostly shrimps and oto.

in the end i think i will go ahead with the first setup. might be reducing the numbers of led but nothing is concrete now.

[illumnae]

Just curious, but why would you want such high lights for a planted/freshwater tank?

[w3ish3ng]

Just curious, but why would you want such high lights for a planted/freshwater tank?

i used to do marine, so quited used to bright lights.

currently running 2x 13watts pl light for my 1ft cube and it just look quite dim.

so since im doing a led for this tank and they supposed to last long, might as well overkill it and let it be useful even when i upgrade my 1ft or move back to marine

[eviltrain]

err... shrimps don't really like high lights.

[w3ish3ng]

err... shrimps don't really like high lights.

its just some tigers and firered in there. aint going to breed them or anything. cheers

[Splutter]

Setup looks a little overkill. I'm planning to use 10 Crees for my 2ft myself, still waiting for them to touchdown

[fireblade]

for the price might as well get MH for your tanks..
wah really dedicated to your DIY hobby..

[w3ish3ng]

for the price might as well get MH for your tanks..
wah really dedicated to your DIY hobby..

mh need chiller, need to replace bulb yearly and will make my room into sauna.

[Cross]

i think your cheapest option may be out unless you do not mind the lead time of 4-10weeks for meanwell lpc 35-700 driver to be shipped to sg.

[w3ish3ng]

actually i will be getting the meanwell driver from oversea.

since i asked about the meanwell 1050ma and the shipping period is 8-16 weeks.

[illumnae]

One thing you may have failed to consider is that LEDs lose ALOT of their lifespan if you run them at full capacity, which you intend to do. Hence, your consideration about them being long lasting may not be so accurate. Even if you go with your (relatively) huge number of LEDs, you may consider driving them at 700mA instead. If you've read up on LEDs, you'd know that you don't lose THAT much output when moving down from 1050mA to 700mA as LEDs get less efficient as they increase in amperage. This would have the additional benefit of vastly improving the lifespan of your LEDs.

You really need to take into account that while you dismiss algae problems now, you may really regret having such high lights without sufficient plant mass, CO2 supplementation and fertilization. It will result in all sorts of algae problems (including green water, BBA, hair algae, green spot algae, staghorn algae, BGA) which will not only make your tank unsightly, but may completely obscure your vision of your shrimps and fish and scape.

Further, while the excess light may not be the direct cause of your plants' death, they will eventually die anyway as they get choked off by algae. From my time spent doing planted tanks, I've researched and found that excess light is the primary cause of problems in a planted tank. I believe that's what Tom Barr advocates as well, and he's one of the most knowledgeable people around on the subject of plant growth and keeping planted tanks.

I seriously urge you to reconsider. Someone in this DIY subforum did a test with a PAR meter and I believe he found that LED lights are 3x more efficient than PL bulbs of the same wattage. Hence, imagine your tank with the 2x 13w lights 3x as bright. You can achieve that with just 8-9 LEDs. Remember that the human eye perception of light is flawed. Just because something outputs 2x more lumens, the eye may not perceive it as 2x brighter. There's a "diminishing returns". Hence, your cramming on so much light may not even produce a visible difference over even 1/2 or 1/3 the wattage (I don't have statistics for this, but you get the drift)

You could perhaps split your LEDs into several buckpacks and, for now, just run 1-2 buckpacks worth of LEDs. When/if you go back to marine, then it's just a matter of a quick rewiring or, if you install switches, a flip of a few switches to get your lightset at the capacity that marine requires.

[w3ish3ng]

One thing you may have failed to consider is that LEDs lose ALOT of their lifespan if you run them at full capacity, which you intend to do. Hence, your consideration about them being long lasting may not be so accurate. Even if you go with your (relatively) huge number of LEDs, you may consider driving them at 700mA instead. If you've read up on LEDs, you'd know that you don't lose THAT much output when moving down from 1050mA to 700mA as LEDs get less efficient as they increase in amperage. This would have the additional benefit of vastly improving the lifespan of your LEDs.

You really need to take into account that while you dismiss algae problems now, you may really regret having such high lights without sufficient plant mass, CO2 supplementation and fertilization. It will result in all sorts of algae problems (including green water, BBA, hair algae, green spot algae, staghorn algae, BGA) which will not only make your tank unsightly, but may completely obscure your vision of your shrimps and fish and scape.

Further, while the excess light may not be the direct cause of your plants' death, they will eventually die anyway as they get choked off by algae. From my time spent doing planted tanks, I've researched and found that excess light is the primary cause of problems in a planted tank. I believe that's what Tom Barr advocates as well, and he's one of the most knowledgeable people around on the subject of plant growth and keeping planted tanks.

I seriously urge you to reconsider. Someone in this DIY subforum did a test with a PAR meter and I believe he found that LED lights are 3x more efficient than PL bulbs of the same wattage. Hence, imagine your tank with the 2x 13w lights 3x as bright. You can achieve that with just 8-9 LEDs. Remember that the human eye perception of light is flawed. Just because something outputs 2x more lumens, the eye may not perceive it as 2x brighter. There's a "diminishing returns". Hence, your cramming on so much light may not even produce a visible difference over even 1/2 or 1/3 the wattage (I don't have statistics for this, but you get the drift)

You could perhaps split your LEDs into several buckpacks and, for now, just run 1-2 buckpacks worth of LEDs. When/if you go back to marine, then it's just a matter of a quick rewiring or, if you install switches, a flip of a few switches to get your lightset at the capacity that marine requires.

thank you for your input.

i might just run 14 bulbs on this. and see how it goes, no harm having extra driver and leds lying around.

the xp-g im going to use can run up to 1500ma, thus running them at 1050ma is like running it at 70%, with that and with good cooling, i believe even though they might not last for 50000 hours, but will be close to that amount.

[illumnae]

Ah ok, I didn't know XP-Gs are 1500mA, i've only been looking at DIYing using XP-E Q5s