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Cultivated Reef

Royal blue led bulb


Giga

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I have a small office tank and looking to get some supplement led. For the life of me can't find just a simple 1 to 3w royal blue gu10/ez27 or the like bulb. I'll diy something if I have to but I'd rather not. I know they have to be out there but my google skillz seem to be down. All I find are blue ebay bulbs and the like but none royal blue.

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Why not pick a 5 LED E27 PAR16 (same diameter as an MR16) lamp and put your own LEDs in? You would be able to have a better variety of blue LEDs than just royal. A 5 LED lamp would look good with 3x royal, 1x blue, and 1x violet. You should still be able to get the generic package LEDs from the likes of Reefbreeders. Would probably take you about an hour to swap everything over.

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It varies a little from one manufacturer to the next as to how they end up attaching the LEDs to the board. Some will use thermal paste on the thermal slug and the only mechanical attachment is the solder on the leads. Others will use thermal epoxy on the slug in addition to the solder on the leads. The fancy ones (rare) will actually use MCPCBs that have electrically isolated thermal pads and will solder the slug to the board (thermal slug is usually electrically connected to the anode or cathode of the LED). Only way to tell how they do it is once you get the lamp and open it up.

 

Most of the time though, it's just the first method (thermal paste), as it's cheap and quick. Fortunately, that makes your job easier. If you do end up getting one that just uses paste, then you just unsolder each side of the LED from the board and lift the LED away. To replace it, I would actually use thermal epoxy. There are two reasons for that. If you add a thin coating of thermal epoxy to the slug on the LED and let it dry before mounting it, you create an isolation layer that prevents shorts to the MCPCB. Once that's dry, a quick swipe on a piece of sand paper to get it flat is all you need before epoxying it down permanently and soldering it in place.

 

If you don't want to deal with the hassle of thermal epoxy, then you can get adhesive isolation pads that stick to the thermal slug. I can't for the life of me find them right now, but I know they are out there.

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