I wanted to thanks a few people not in particular orders (thecowkid, evilc66, chipmuckofdoom, my2girls and a few others I have forgotten). I am building a JBJ Nanocube 12g DX retrofit. I am currently running the led in the hood with the fan running to test if there is any issue with wiring or heat problem. I have yet to figure out how to attach the heatsink onto the hood itself.

Parts:
Cree Q5 CW XR-E LED Qty = 6 $46.74
Cree RB XR-E LED Qty=6 $35 (price included 1 Buckpuck)
1 700mA Buckpuck Qty=1 $20
1000mA Buckpuck Qty=1 $included with the royal blue LEDs
Potran 24V@ 6.5A Power Supply $15
Thermal Paste $9 (use like 10% of it LOL)
5k Potentiometer Qty=2 $6.50
Stainless steel 4-40 screws and nyloc nut Qty=24 $3.50
Project box - $1 box from Dollar Tree
Cables - free
4-40 Drill and Tap $4
Mothers Aluminum polish -$5.23 (use like 10% of it too LOL)
Heatsink $30

Total Cost $170.74 included shipping.

What Did I do on the wiring?
1) I wired the LEDs in series for both white and blue
2) I wired the JBJ stock fans in series
3) I wired the white LED string onto 1000mA driver and the blue string onto 700mA.
4) I wired the outputs of the drivers with the fan outputs together in parallel

Tips for myself in future:
1) Use W40 or any kind of non-flammable oil during drilling and tapping to make life easier. I spent approximately 2.5 hours to drill and tapped 24 holes. I broke one of the drill bit but luckily my friend has one extra.
2) Polish your heatsink with Mothers Mag and Alum polish. I use a power drill with a cloth attached to it and add some polisher onto the cloth. I spent only about 20 minutes total including cleaning the heatsink after.

Soldering wasn’t my forte and I really suck at it! I need to use a better cable than that.

Enough said, here are the pictures:

Heatsink before polish


Heatsink after polish


Buckpucks


LEDs attached to heatsink with artic thermal 5 paste


Ghetto “project” BOX


All wired up, ready to fired up


All light up


Angle bracket



Questions:
1) How hot the heatsink can gets? The cable is rated 90C or 100C (one of them). Can this be a problem with melting if the temperature gets about 100C.
2) Any help with attaching the heatsink onto the JBJ NC12 hood? I can’t figure that out yet….I have two holes each side of the heatsink drilled and tap and I have 2 angle bracket attached to it right now. Can I use those + something else?
3) The 1000mA buckpuck run a little hot …almost too hot to touch…while the 700mA is not, what should I do?
4) When you guys saying you are adjusting the light to 50%, 60% or 70%, how can you tell from the potentiometer you have? LOL
5) How about those summer months when AC is not on?

heat shouldnt be a problem with that big of a heatsink, do you have good ventilation?

I am using 2 stock JBJ fans right now. I am thinking about 1 sucking air in and 1 blowing air out...good?

Looking good.

1. You will never ever get that hot to worry about the cable. I like to keep my heatsink temps under 140F (measured right at the LED). Use an IR thermometer for this.
2. Look at some of the NC12 and BC14 builds for inspiration.
3. Ventilate that project box. The 1000mA drivers do run pretty hot. Adjusting the power supply voltage up to about 26v may help also.
4. There is a slot in the end of the pot. Use that as a guide. The pot turns 270 degrees, so inthe middle is about 50%.
5. ??? It takes very little airflow to keep the heatsink temps in check. You won't see a lot of change in the summer months, and it still won't transfer heat to the tank.


Both blowing in.

Thanks for your answers.
I will change the fans attachment later today. I just need to swap it around and get it to suck air in instead.
1) I used wiring nut inside the hood in order to connect the fan in series and attached to a longer cable out to the PS, should I swap the wiring nut to the more expensive water proof wiring nuts or should I get some electrical tape (got that) and tape it around it?
2) I will try adjust the Potran PS to a lower voltage.
3) Also the POT is pretty darn sensitive.
4) I am trying to find inspiration on the hood LOL

Ideally for the fan wiring, you should be soldering and heatshrinking the connections. Waterproof wire nuts would be a good alternative.

Thanks for the idea. I will go with the waterproof nut as I have a few laying around. I only need 3 of them anyway.

here is what i did on my NC12 , just bent up some alumn. flat stock, used stock holes in hood and all set. hope it helps.

Thanks for the tips. I will try to do it this week

awesome stuff, do you plan on sticking any optics on there by anychance?

This is perfect -- I have a 12g JBJ nano and would like to swap out my viper MH.. did you purchase the parts from nanotuners?

Thanks

I purchased thru Rapidled for some LEDs, LEDsupply for the driver and a few LED + driver from a member here. I would buy it from Nanotuners but their shipping kills!




probably not

A mishap as I accidentally yank one of the solder for the V- on the led to driver

Also should I use any optics for the setup?

You shouldn't need optics for an NC12, its shallow enough that the bare emitters will penetrate just fine.

Thanks

I am lazy to drill another 4 sets of holes in my heatsink so I can attached the heatsink with my 2 U aluminum brackets like the picture above. Is there anyway I can just epoxy that bracket to the heatsink?

Get off your ass and drill it. Do it right.

OK. I definitely like the shimmering effect like MH. Will post FTS soon

I got it drilled and attached to the hood. It has been running for a day or so..with 10-20% intensity i think





How should do the acclimation with the new light? I previously running PC

Start low, and slowly work your way up over a few weeks.

Thanks Evilc!

The buckpuck have been running pretty cool as I check it periodically. I want to tuck everything away. Currently I have my project box sitting behind the tank. From what I read on the spec sheet the max distance from buckpuck to led is 18"? I am pretty it has to be depend on cable size as voltage drop if the line is longer.....

No bleaching yet..but I notice my organ pipe been shut off for past 2 days, GSP is open about 90% but everything else including zoas are fully open

a quick updates..everything is responding well with the new light. I still need to clean up the wiring from the leds to the buckpuck though.
1) what's the maximum distance from 1st led to buckpuck without overworking the driver?

its negligible, i have like ten feet between my drivers and leds and its been running for a year, the resistance per foot is like .000 something or other, it doesnt make much of a difference till you get up to like a hundred feet

Well, that's all dependant on the wire gauge used. Smaller wire, higher resistance per foot.

here is a fts shot

End result looks pretty nice.

Yep - it turned out pretty nice. Good job and thanks for sharing your build with us.

i just got my NC12 up and running today at my office.Im going to copy your led build .Im going to order parts on the 30th. any idea how long led bulbs last before needing to replace?

Thanks guys! I have rescape the tank a little bit. I removed a lot of the xenia to another tank and move a piece of lr back, open up the front for zoas, like a fruit stand lol. I have added since the last pics

sunflower zoa
sunburst zoas
some green paly
blue tip stag
some green acro
christmas clove
purple yuma

I will be removing kenya tree next..taking way too much room

Will take some pictures soon

Great looking mod, any pics with the new light in action?

i can't take picture worth of anything lol

'



been growing

Updates

Some of my zoas


GBTA




added a couple days ago


Sunburst zoas


toadstool


see those extension


purple yuma

wow - really nice stuff you got there

how is the GBTA doing under LED?

thanks

gbta is reacting good. Constantly having bubble tips also it's green with pink tip with 50/50 light and blue tip with blue only

The only thing, it's not reacting good is mushroom...

You have PM about how you made the frag rack. Love the LED build BTW...Awesome colors in the pics, and I bet they are better in person!

Looking good ,hows the GBTA doing?

A little update
Thanks

GBTA is doing very good. Nothing much update except moving a few corals and the zoas been growing like mad! I have to trim some xenia and removing some shrooms. I will ban all mushrooms in that tank soon. But once I have a Maxijet 900 and a stand for my MRT12 tank....I am moving everything there.

A little update:

everything growing really good. I have to banned the shroom and kenya tree out of the tank. they are growing like week. The SPS are growing really good. The GBTA is respond real well on LED so does the zoas on the bottom. They are growing too!

I will rescaping real soon. I am getting rid of the GTBA as it's taking up way too much room. Picture to follow soon. How to take good picture on LED?

I have added
1) Pink ring zoas
2) Garf Bonsai
3) a Robokiki chalice
Some updates
Zoas are growing..so are the sps (over a span of 1 month)
Before


After


Before


After

Were did you buy all your supplies from? do you have a web site? I think I spent to much on my build and im only using 8 leds.

I have listed on the front page...the price of led went a little since lol

New addition. I took the big boy occ clown out and I bought 2 black clownfish from a local breeder (Almon). One of them has normal bar and the other has a misbar. The misbar is on the front bar by the grill where it only go like a sideburn on both side either top or bottom are connected.
They are still juv, about 7 months old according to breeder.



i need to get rid of those cheato! I think i should move to thread to AIO tank instead lol

what was the purpose of polishing the heatsink? It's not really reflecting anything since the LED's are glued to it, unlike a bulb which sits off of its reflector base... unless of course you're thinking there is some back reflection from the water surface? Just curious as i didnt do this with mine and am wondering if i should have.

You don't have to. It can re-reflect some light back into the tank, but it can also help with thermal transfer. The difference is negligable.

Where did you end up getting the heatsink and what size was it?