Full spectrum LED layouts

[jedimasterben]

no they don't, I can just solder them to wires, I know how to check and make sure I have them oriented correctly with a simple multimeter, and am confident enough in my soldering ability to solder to the wings instead of the pads provided on stars. I don't see an issue on that front.

All I will say then is good luck

[cocojakes]

All I will say then is good luck

I'm not mistaken then, and that was the main issue you were raising, is they are harder to solder? do you think I'll have an issue mounting so many of them so close together? they won't ship any orders until the 27th as they're reorganizing their warehouse, so I'm taking until then to explore other options (like custom multi chips from factories in china) but other than the tedious soldering and thermal gluing, do you foresee any major issues here?

[Nano sapiens]

Read this, especially note the steps taken to ensure that heat is dissipated as efficiently as possible:

 

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2014/4/lighting

[cocojakes]

does anyone happen to know if 700mA drivers will be sufficient, and not overkill, for 12 bridgelux LEDs? from reef breeders?

[jedimasterben]

Overkill? If you're not mounting them to a star with solder, then I would think that even 350mA is out of reach.

[cocojakes]

Overkill? If you're not mounting them to a star with solder, then I would think that even 350mA is out of reach.

would you care to elaborate? Whats going on in the stars that I'm unaware of?

[jedimasterben]

Contact. Spreading the heat more efficiently to the star that has more contact area with the heatsink.

[cocojakes]

okay, so its nothing to do with anything electric, like theres no mini circuit with diodes and resistors and such in there? its just to help with heat transfer? then how do fixtures like the reef breeder use it, when its just mounted in a hole in a printed circuit board on the heat sink? could one not just use thermal glue to attach it and wire them up like normal? they'll be on the heat sink, with a fan over each puck, will that not be enough heat dissipation? I feel like I'm missing something. I'm trying to think back to my physics classes on how electricity works with DC loads.

if I understand correctly, you're saying that with the worse thermal conductivity between the LED and the heat sink, vs the LED to the Star to the heat sink, that running them at 700mA will be too much power for them and they'll over heat?

[cocojakes]

so is it just that the stars are better (but more expensive) heat conductors than the heat sink itself, and so you use them to transfer heat to a larger surface area to then transfer to the larger but less efficient heat sink? thats the only way it could make sense, because you still only have the small surface area of the led on the star to conduct the heat?

[welight]

Couple of points, can you mount your led direct to a heatsink? sure you can. Issues your thermal pad on the led needs to be electrically isolated, some aint. You need to find a way to isolate your anode and cathode from the heatsink, you could mount them on mica or some form of insulating materlal, also possible but since the leads assist with thermal path to ambient and its fiddly, you need assess its value and then you have to solder wires to very small legs, possble but your entire string(s) are hanging on your solder skills. These are some of the reasons why a metal core PCB(star) is an effective piece of the assembly process.

 

 

One of the first things that will happen if your led is not well heatsunk is the colour of your leds will shift and your output will diminish, so all the work in gettiing the right leds will be a wasted effort. I am not having a go at you but you use the same constants as many people on the forum

cheap+cheap+cheap=awesome lead fixture.

Nothing wrong with getting the best value for hard earned dollar, but those that use that constant seem to burn hours post build trying to figure out what in the constants dont seem to function.

 

Led builds are an ecosystem, all parts are inextricably linked to each other, use 50 LPW LED and you need twice the heatsink of 100lpw, cheap power supplies can be different in efficency by 50% to better rated parts. What I am saying is if you try to cut corners on a functional block you will be backfilling somewhere else. There is a lot of sage advice here about products that will work, not to say you cannot come up with something new and better but you need to wet your feet with things that will build confidence in the led Model

[cocojakes]

The difficulty I'm running into is not enough readily available base knowledge. All the information I find is "hook up X LED stars to X driver powered by X power supply" never any comprehension of whats actually going on. No information on the thermal constants of the heat sink to allow one to find a suitable substitute, or on the power rating of the LEDs. I just noticed the metal disk on the bottom of the LEDs (had yet to take them out and take a good look) which clearly means they're not insulated, so finding a thermally conductive insulator would be a must. I want to be able to mount them close together, hence not wanting to deal with stars. I have 3- 9cmx9cm aluminium heat sinks ordered, along with 3- 8cm fans to cool them, which I would think to be sufficient for 3 groups of 14 LEDs. Everything is coming from LEDgroupbuy other than the heatsink/fan combo, and LEDs which are coming without stars, from reef breeders, they're all trusted brands that everyone on the forum seems to like, I'm just having difficulty getting real information about whats going on deeper than just "plug this into this"

 

I appreciate your advice and time spent trying to help me though, any further insight is extremely helpful and appreciated

[jedimasterben]

If you want to make pucks of LEDs that are much smaller than having lots of individual 20mm stars, then you should instead look into getting a custom PCB printed or use high-powered diodes such as the Luxeon M, which replace four XT-E or Rebel ES at the same current, and will replace over 7x of the Reefbreeders diodes you're looking at purchasing. At $1.50 each, that's $10.50 for 7x LEDs you picked, and a Luxeon M costs at most $11. Those seven Reefbreeders diodes will use almost 18 watts of power, the Luxeon M will use less than 8.

 

Hell, using Bridgelux Vero 10 for the white LEDs, at the same current, one Vero 10 replaces 18x Reefbreeders diodes and costs less than $6, and the color will be orders of magnitude superior. The Vero 10 die is on a 20mm star. 20 watts at 700ma, versus 46 watts for 18x Reefbreeders chips.

[cocojakes]

where do you get these high power luxe on M diodes?

If you want to make pucks of LEDs that are much smaller than having lots of individual 20mm stars, then you should instead look into getting a custom PCB printed or use high-powered diodes such as the Luxeon M, which replace four XT-E or Rebel ES at the same current

 

okay, so my original plan was 2 3up stars, 1 OCW, and 4 TV stars per puck, what would you suggest that would come out to cheaper than $40/puck and have the same effect? I know 40/puck seems cheap, but I have 3 pucks, and am a student, 120 on top of the 240 of all the rest of the stuff, gets costly. I was trying to keep it under the 300 dollar mark, but after doing a bunch of research into thermally conductive insulators, it would likely be better to just get the 7 stars unless you have a better idea?

[cocojakes]

sorry, its actually $55/puck if I get the stars from LEDgroupbuy, vs $20/puck of reef breeder bridgelux diodes (+ some kind of insulator) this is my issue, now I'm gonna be back up to 450+ for my light

[jedimasterben]

where do you get these high power luxe on M diodes?

LEDgroupbuy should start selling them in the next couple days, Steve's LEDs has them, you can get them unmounted from several places.

okay, so my original plan was 2 3up stars, 1 OCW, and 4 TV stars per puck, what would you suggest that would come out to cheaper than $40/puck and have the same effect? I know 40/puck seems cheap, but I have 3 pucks, and am a student, 120 on top of the 240 of all the rest of the stuff, gets costly. I was trying to keep it under the 300 dollar mark, but after doing a bunch of research into thermally conductive insulators, it would likely be better to just get the 7 stars unless you have a better idea?

sorry, its actually $55/puck if I get the stars from LEDgroupbuy, vs $20/puck of reef breeder bridgelux diodes (+ some kind of insulator) this is my issue, now I'm gonna be back up to 450+ for my light

Is the Reefbreeders stuff a value to you if you destroy them? At half the cost per puck and you kill the LEDs, to do it the right way once is now costing you 150% of doing it the way you originally wanted.

[Paleoreef103]

Is the Reefbreeders stuff a value to you if you destroy them? At half the cost per puck and you kill the LEDs, to do it the right way once is now costing you 150% of doing it the way you originally wanted.

This.

 

Feel free to do it this way: 2 Vero 10 (run in parallel off a 700 mA driver $20 with shipping), 4 total Rebel M ($12 a pice), 4 XP-E2 Blues ($15 total), and 2 HV 3-UPs ($12 each). Your LED cost just dropped to a total of $95 dollars and it will easily light your 20L.

[cocojakes]

I'm so torn between wanting to just do it the easy way, that I know will work, and not wanting to spend another 200 dollars on LEDs alone after just spending 240 on all the rest of the components. Am I overdoing the number of LEDs I'm getting? is 14/puck times 3 pucks overkill for a 20 long?

 

I guess I'm just having a tough time pulling the trigger on this, because its just so expensive, and I'm worried I won't be happy

[markalot]

The primary reason for DIY LED fixtures is not only money but the ability to change it easily if you don't like the results.

 

Just duplicate the colors of the Maxspect Razor, and use 2 different channels for blue and white, and go from there. IMO. Go ahead and overkill, what the hell. You can dim if too bright.

[cocojakes]

This.

 

Feel free to do it this way: 2 Vero 10 (run in parallel off a 700 mA driver $20 with shipping), 4 total Rebel M ($12 a pice), 4 XP-E2 Blues ($15 total), and 2 HV 3-UPs ($12 each). Your LED cost just dropped to a total of $95 dollars and it will easily light your 20L.

that looks like a lot of white?

 

aren't the veto, and rebels both white, plus each of the 3up HV have a white, thats 8 white to 4HV and 4B not counting the fact that the veros are more than 3W if I'm not mistaken. Also the only things there that I can find on LEDgroupbuy are the 3ups and XP-E2 blues

[Paleoreef103]

that looks like a lot of white?

 

aren't the veto, and rebels both white, plus each of the 3up HV have a white, thats 8 white to 4HV and 4B not counting the fact that the veros are more than 3W if I'm not mistaken. Also the only things there that I can find on LEDgroupbuy are the 3ups and XP-E2 blues

Nope. There Rebel Ms come in RB which is what I was suggesting. The Veros can replace a huge amount of LEDs, but they won't when they're run at 350 mA. You're looking at the wrong 3ups. The ones that I was suggesting are 3 hyperviolets on a 3-up board (3-ups just mean they have 3 LEDs on them. Often they are 2:1 RB to NW, but not always). You'd have to order from multiple places to get those components, but it'd be cheaper anyway.

[cocojakes]

do you think 2 pucks of:
1-OCW
2-RB3up

2-HY3up

 

would be sufficient over the 20 long?

 

thats at least just over 100, which is more reasonable, have a separate 700mA channel each for white, RB, HV, and OCW?

[cocojakes]

what about, from steves LEDs, two pucks each of:

 

1-luxeon M 12W at 1000mA

2-dual core hyper violet at 1000mA

2-3up RB (all 3 RB)

 

maybe even do a 3rd hyper violet

[jedimasterben]

You won't have to run anything at an amp. Six NW, twelve royal blue, three blue are all you need, you can add to it later. If you want to use the M and Vero, use two vero and four M along with four blue.

[cocojakes]

so, everything at 700mA, 4 channels:

 

channel 1 - 2x luxeon OCW

channel 2 - 2x luxeon M 12W

channel 3 - 12x luxeon RB

channel 4 - 4x semiLED dual core hyper violet

 

does that seem reasonable for over a 20 long? in the form of two pucks. it comes out to 115USD including shipping

 

vs

 

3 pucks, totalling: 170USD

 

channel 1 - 3x bridgelux OCW

channel 2 - 6x cree neutral white

channel 3 - 12x cree RB

channel 4 - 12x exotic hyper violet

[cocojakes]

or for 120USD, two pucks totalling

 

channel 1 - 2x bridgelux OCW

channel 2 - 8x cree neutral white

channel 3 - 8x cree RB

channel 4 - 8x exotic hyper violet