So I'm fairly new at the hobby but have always had an interest. My brother has had many a tank running for years so that's where I got the itch. I got the opportunity in January to pick up a BC14 from a friend who needed the money, $100 plus a subwoofer which I valued at about $150. He got the better end of the bargain, but he needed the money and I knew he would give me frags for retarded cheap so I went with it. I had quite a battle with what I originally thought was a pH issue (mainly because my friend said it was)..for the first couple months I did everything humanly possible (except aerate the water outside..doh!) to try and get the pH to even stay above 8.0. I've since given up and it runs at 7.7-7.9.. has been for months and looks great!

I've been on the forum for a few months and it's time to put up some photos. I actually picked up a new P&S camera and got to take some shots with it. Still don't know if I like the camera.. but here's the pics anyways.

FTS 07/22/2009
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Clownin Around
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Eagle Eye Zoas
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Candy Cane 'n Stuff
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Looking good.

Notice the German blues on the sandbed.. with growth? They're hiding behind the isolated GSP. It is possible to grow some SPS with the BC stock lighting. Wanting to give some green birdsnest a try, but I'll probably put that up higher.. Before I do I want to put a little bit more flow in the tank. Looking for a smaller powerhead like a Catalina Mini to create a bit of turbulence. It's mostly softies in here so I haven't wanted to blast anything with a Koralia. Also just picked up a JBJ ATO and Aqualifter that I'll be installing this weekend.

Livestock includes:
Orange and Blue FL Rics (splitting!)
Red,Purple, Green Striped Mushrooms
GSP
Frag of Blastomussa (hiding behind GSP) has grown 5 new heads!!
Candy Cane
Toadstool Leather
Eagle Eye Zoas
Other various Zoas and Palys
Kenya Tree
Xenia
German Blue Digitata
Hammer Coral
Feather Duster
BTA anemone (was fairly bleached when I obtained the specimen, starting to color up)
8 Blue Leg Hermits
2 Scarlet Hermits
5 Astrea snails
Some unknown yellow hitchhiker polyps.. they are cool, they suck all the way into the rock.

Here's a pic of the yellow hitchiker polyps... Can someone ID? They suck back into the rock.

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Here they are sucked into the rock.
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Just posted pics of hitchiker. Please ID.

They really look like zoas to me. Where did you get the rock?

Got the rock out of a tank at the LFS.. they were removing a bunch of rock to catch shrimp.. They don't have any type of mat like a zoa does.

Reminds me of majano.

Hopefully not Haven't seen it spread anywhere else though.. I haven't even noticed if they've multiplied. They do look like they've grown larger since I've first gotten the rock.

Can anyone ID the polyps?

could be an ornamental zoanthid like tubeworm, less feathery. maybe a hydoid?

have never seen these

Some updated shots. Took out some of the palys and rearranged the zoa garden a bit. Have a few additions as well. Had a few casulties with the digitata..

FTS: 09/01/2009
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Orange Delights
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Bam Bams
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Candy Cane (can see a few heads have split since the last pic)
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Hammer coral looks way better since I moved it up in the rock work..
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Wow great looking tank! I really like your layout. Can you give us some of the specs? Lights, skimming? ect...

Thanks

+1 ^

Did you ever ID your hitchhiker?

Thanks.. it's come a long way in 9 months. Lighting is just the stock 24w 10k and Actinic. Only have a few mods.. media rack in center chamber running floss on top, chaeto with 5w submersible light 24/7, purigen/chemipure on the bottom. Have a JBJ ATO installed. Evap is about 1/2 gal/wk. For water movement I upgraded the return pump to a maxijet 600. I've considered adding a koralia nano again..but when I had it before I thought it was too rough on my softies.. also I took the feeding lid off in case a fan goes bad it won't heat the tank.. that happened once and toasted some stuff. I dose 2.5ml of B-Ionic almost daily.. I skip a day here and there. pH is always low.. 7.65-7.8 due to indoor CO2 issue.. darn newer homes. I'm patiently waiting on some birdsnest colonies.. and for some tubs blues to recover. Can't wait!

Hitchhiker is still a mystery.

LED Build.. coming soon.. WOOOHOOOOOOOO

OK so maybe I should have went to bed a little earlier last night.. while I was sitting on the couch I felt this sharp pain in my ass.. SPS bug bit me and I bought 8 Cree Q5 XR-E Royal Blue, 8 Cree Q5 XR-E Cool White, and 3 BuckPuck drivers. I've got a few leads on a spare hood so I can take my time on the build..I believe this is what's left to buy.. 2 pots for dimming, 8.5" x 5" Heatsink from heatsinkUSA, some wiring, and probably lunch for our maintenance dept at work to drill and tap the heatsink. I have a couple older Dell powersupply's..need to check what they are.. but they'll probably work.. anything else I'm missing?

i wanna do this so bad i might be getting that same bite

Is it too late to tell you to use 2 Meanwells instead of 3 pucks?

Well i bought the drivers already... what's the advantage of using the meanwells besides not needing a power supply? I should mention I'm only going to run 12 LEDs. Decided to have a few spares handy if needed.

The meanwells can handle 13 LEDs each. If the pucks can handle 6 each and your old PS works and can handle it then theres not much advantage at all besides the Meanwells remove one component and some wiring.

LEDS came in the mail a few days ago.. just waiting on my heatsink and these slackers on this forum to find me a spare hood so I can start the build!

New additions 09/09/09.

LFS had it listed as Red Meteor Shower.. looks like war coral to me..I thought it was a steal at $25. The eyes were a bright green under the LFS lighting.. the LEDs should bring this out. Can't Wait!!!
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Blue Cloves.. (not in this tank though) FINALLY!!!!
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Blastomussa Welsi.. not really new, but never had a good shot posted.
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FTS.. the anenome was looking fat and happy at lunch today.
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led's will make this tank look awsome!

like the nem

Here is what the nem looked like at the beginning of May when I purchased the specimen. If I had known then what I know now.. I might have gotten a healthier one, wasn't aware of the bleaching at the time. But after scrutinizing karensroseanemones.com for a while.. i quickly figured out how to save him. Just stable parameters and twice weekly feedings. I think it even lost it's stickiness for a week or two.. which made it even more difficult to feed, I just carefully placed the silverside in its mouth during that period.

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And for those that care... you can definitely see the benefit of running chaeto and chemipure.. look at all that algae!!! Don't have that problem now.

So I almost have everything I need for my build.. just need to find some pots, fans, and get our machine shop to tap the heatsink for me. I really don't have the desire to drill it myself . I'll need to order some pots as our local radio shack is a hole in the wall and the selection sucks. Everything they have has got a 2" post..or some that are labeled audio with some extra hookups.. unsure if those would work..in either case none of them are the 5K. Only 10k on up. I was able to test that all the LEDs fired.. i'm hoping I didn't ruin anything by lighting them individually at full blast. I used the luxeon 1000ma driver powered by the supply mentioned below and just touched the wires of the puck to each LED for a few seconds each and blinded myself 16 times. Fun! It's a good thing I ordered a few extras as one of the plastic lenses is loose.

I have some questions on how many fans I can wire up.. or if I may need an additional power supply. I had planned on using 2 20v 3.5A dell branded PS so I can run the whites and blues separately. I was hoping I could run 4 fans (2 on the heatsink, and the stock fans) but I think that if each fan is 12v, I'd need a 24v supply to run 2 fans off each supply along with the 6 leds.. some input req'd here..

Can't run 6 LEDs per driver on a 20v power supply. You will need at least a 24v unit.

Also depending on the power of the fans you can run all 4 on a 24v. 2 sets of 2 fans in series running parallel with each other.

Does this look right? And can I run all this off a 24V ps? Assuming 12v fans and 6 XR-E Q5 LEDs?

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That looks good. As long as you have enoughg amps in the PS then you can even run 2 more fans in parallel to the first two. The fans are very low current so 2 sets in parallel will not require that much current. The LEDs pull the most.

Then again if you are running 2 sets on 2 power supplies just put two fans on each.

Almost. Just make sure you never connect anything other than LEDs to the driver output positive and negative. The fans will go straight to the power supply terminals.

If you are using two supplies to do dawn/dusk effects, hook the fans up to the power supply for the blues, seeing as they will turn on first, and off last. This will make sure that the LEDs stay cool.

Nice catch on that evil. I didn't even notice there was no driver in that diagram lol. The fans would go in parallel to the + and - going from the driver to the power supply, not in parallel with the actual LEDs.

Need to decide on a layout for LEDs.. perusing the build threads it looks like most have gone with option B.. a few with Waterproofs layout C.. and only 1 that I could find with option A. I would really like a good blend and don't want any spotlighting.. I actually have 16 LEDs total if I need to add more. Heatsink is 8.5 x 5.. upgrading to a larger sink is also an option. Opinions?

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Any of them will work well.

your "meteor shower' is actually a war, youre right.

I think option B is the one I'll start with as I think it'll be a more uniform blend.. I think option A would be just a tad bluer to the right side edge than on the left. My project hood should be arriving some time in the next week or so.. I'll have some time to play around with both patterns.

I am a little concerned about using the arctic silver thermal paste and wonder if anyone has a thought?. I have used the arctic silver on CPU heatsinks numerous times, but find that after about 6 months it loses it's effectiveness? I find the CPU running at about 50C+ before I usually do anything about it. Reapplying the paste, brings it back down to 38C. Is there an easy way to measure the LED temps?

It's not as big of a problem. We are dealing with much higher clamping pressure than with PC heatsinks, so the layer of paste is a lot thinner, and acts less as an insulator once it dries out.

Moving along quite well.. after a small issue with a few lenses coming off.. here be the mounted LEDs. PS's to arrive this week along with the spare hood. Anticipation is building!

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Spare BC hood and Power Supplies have arrived.. The supplies are Potrans 24v 6.5amp from MPJA.. they happened to be in Florida so I got them quick! When I do get around to the test fire.. how long are they safe to run without a fan on the heatsink?

A few minutes at least.

Hope to have this finalized by next week. Just received my mounting brackets. Had them fabricated by our maintenance dept. Nice to have a full service machine shop at your disposal.

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Initial fit looks good.
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My tank saw the first shimmer of the LEDs tonight.. I fired it up for a test run over the tank. wow! The colors are crazy..

I should have this finished up very soon. I'll be picking up a couple fans tomorrow. Hopefully it won't take too long to get them mounted on the heatsink. I'm still not sure if I want to mess with venting the air out the top (which means cutting and adding a fan grill) or just pull air through the heatsink and let the stock fans exhaust it. Either way I think I will plan on keeping the stock fans. Wondering if I need to reverse one of them so they both blow out?

I took some updated pics to show how far I've progressed with the power compact bulbs. I'll post them later. It will be interesting to see the difference in a few months after the switch to LEDs. This switch comes at a perfect time as would be about due to change the PC bulbs.

Nice thread you have here, Mike!

I just finish reading your post in our club website, about your thread here at NR. The post made me curious and decided to take a peek at your tank and LED project.

Hope you get good benefits from this upgrade, I'll be following to read your results.

By the way, welcome to the club. Where in SWFL do you live? Which LFS do you visit the most?

Last of the pics with PC bulbs.

FTS 11/01/2009
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Blastomussa
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Candy cane
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War coral
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Zoas
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This guy has come a long way..
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OK time to stop making excuses and get this done already.. What's left to do.. mount fans, mount dimmers, clean up wiring w/heatshrink tubing, and borrow a PAR meter from our local marine club.

I've come to a standoff on fan placement.. In either case I'll be using 2 12v fans connected in series on the heatsink. I have the option of either mounting the fans on top or on the side of the heatsink . If I mount the fans on the side then it saves me the work of cutting holes in the hood, though I don't know if it will provide the ventilation needed. I think I would need to keep the stock fans as is (intake & exhaust). This would give a total of 4 fans, with two of them sucking air across the heatsink.

If I cut the hood then most likely I'd do away with the stock fans and just have that area open for vents. This will take quite a bit longer to complete the build as I'll have to hunt down some decent looking fan grills.

Which option should I go with, side or top?

Awesome work! What was the total for the led buildout?

I would think side, to keep the outside aesthetically pleasing, if you run into heat issues, THEN cut the hood. with four fans though, I cant imagine that will be a problem.. especially w/ the feeding cover off.

Total cost: (not including spare parts)

12 LEDs $60
2 Drivers $30
Heatsink $22
Pots for dimming $5
24v 6a Power Supplies $38
Spare Hood $50
Wiring, Solder, Heatshrink tubing, Connectors, Bits & Tap - $35

I'd say right around $240. If you wanted you could buy some stuff now, and the rest later. I spent a little extra on spare parts, a few extra LEDs and 1 extra driver.. If I decide to sell my old hood I can make some $$ back.

Lots of work to get done on this tonight.

How hard is the LED upgrade to do? I got a spare hood when I bought my tank. Only thing wrong with it is that the moonlights are dim. I might look into this more,and get pieces over a period of time.

I didn't find it that challenging. More research than anything. The one thing that really slowed me down was that I got excited, mounted and soldered all my LEDs, then realized I needed 4 more holes on the sides to mount them. Throwing caution in the wind, I went ahead and tapped these myself with a great deal of care with the LEDs mounted. Was surprisingly easier than expected. I did have someone else drill & tap the majority of the holes though. I've got to give some of the credit to Waterproof for following his build, but I took ideas from others on here as well.

Should be getting my hands on a par meter soon.. hopefully things will work out and I can pick it up this weekend.

Picked up the par meter yesterday and the LEDs are up and running on the tank. I was able to match the par output of the PC bulbs plus about 25%. Acclimation will be a snap this way. The array has been on for the past 2.5 hours and I'm reading 84.5F in the hood and the heatsink is not warm to the touch at all. The LEDs are running at about 30% of full brightness. Tank temp is at 77.. was a little above 80 with the PC bulbs. I've taken a bunch of pictures and an HD video which I'll post up later on. I've got a few more shots to take.