2.5g Mini-Bow - LED Illuminated

After giving up my 50g SPS reef in the last move I decided to try my hand at something less complex and experiment with alternatives in lighting.

Initially I was after a 2-4g cube but couldn't find what I was after... at some point I guess that I will build my own cube but figured I'd proof the concept in a pre-made tank.

I have been wanting to try LED lighting for quite some time seems to me the small 2-4g tank and the new Luxeon LEDS are logical match.

Thus begins the nano-saga of outfitting this little acrylic goldfish box for use as a Nano Reef using Luxeon's as the sole light source.

Pulling out the useful components.

Plans for the tank:

Simple Natural System - Jaubert Plenium

Air-Driven Lifts - NO Powerheads

Luxeon LED lighting - Safe 12v system virtally no heat!

The LED lighting and lack of powerheads should make it simple to keep this guy cool. Heck I may have to invest in a tiny heater... LOL!

I have planned to run a Jaubert type system this little goldfish bowl came with a nice UG filter that locks to the base of the tank... it also came with an airpump I plan to run an external airdriven lift-tube so I'll be rigging some sort of tube monstrosity on the back of the tank to keep the lift tube out of the aquarium and experiment with ways to reduce the salt creap when running bubblers... so for now the UG filter plate, pump, and tube stays...

Lighting the hood will be rigged with an assortment of luxeons. I have planned for 8 luxeons 4 of the 5500K white and 4 of the 455nm Royal Blues.. All 1wt for now.. though I have a handful of 3wt 5500k and 5 wt 455nm luxeon stars to play with so I may try a setup with 4-6 3wt whites and 3 of the 5wt blues. I chose this mini-bow as the hood looked right and was easily gutted to outfit the reflector / heatsink for the luxeons.

Here is a shot of what I was able to keep from the original kit contents.... and the stuff I'll be loosing (right).

Here is a shot of the nice UG filter tray that will double as the plenum - hopefully it will prove to be large enough.

And the gutted light fixture... ready for the luxeons... post man should bring the first batch tomorrow.. until then I am off to find some bulk heads for my external lift tube monstrosity.

-Bill

Hrm... I like where this is going. I scrapped a 1ga. LED project b/c I found out I can't solder to save my life.

-Justin

iam planning on wiring LED moonlite and would like to know...

if you can plz show pics of installing the LED.

where did you get the LEDs? and are LED strong enough for corals to know that light are on?

I'm also awaiting to see LED pics. Also where did you get the white leds and what kelvin temp are they?

I'm thinking about adding a white LED to my nano cube to light the built in sump part, so I can use it a refugium light.

Anymore LED info would be awesome.

I have all luxeon LED's on my 4gal. The effects are good but you suffer long time effects and the novelty wears off. I don;t recommend it unless you got a lot of money.

What long time effects?

I'm just looking to have one really to light my fuge area. Would it promote growth?

Will do... I am waiting on my first shipment to arrive today. Went shopping for PVC parts last night... I have a renewed disrespect for Home Depot... going to a real plumbing supply today.

You should seriously consider www.ledsupply.com just buy thier 1wt driver and a suitable wall wart.... then string your led's till your heart is content.

The Luxeons are pretty strong... in a small tank a standard white led should be enough for a moon light.

-Bill

Originally posted by Kingpin

iam planning on wiring LED moonlite and would like to know...  

 

if you can plz show pics of installing the LED.

 

where did you get the LEDs? and are LED strong enough for corals to know that light are on?

The White LED's I have are Luxeon III 3wt 5500k and Luxeon III 1wt 5500k... I am going to stick with the 1wts for now then build another hood for the 3wt Whites and 5wt Blues...

The blue LED's are listed as Royal Blue and peak at 455nm.... not the 420 of the Philips 03 that we are used to.

I picked up my luxeons from 2 different sources.

www.futureelectronics.com (Got Luxeons and a pair of the Advance Xitanium ballasts here) www.ledsupply.com (for some 12v Drivers) I also picked up a custom driver board from a guy on the LED chat boards it has all sorts of bells and whistles... Dimmable etc...

I'll cover the parts in detail when I do the retrofit... that was the whole point of this thread... I have seen a few references to LED's but the threads didn't really expand upon the fixture / retrofit / long term usage... I also didn't find anyone using the 5500k whites...

The luxeons are offered with a reflector unit and lense... the reflector unit limits the light throw to 10 degrees which I felt was unacceptable... unless you are trying to get point light to a particular area.

-Bill

Originally posted by static69static

I'm also awaiting to see LED pics.  Also where did  you get the white leds and what kelvin temp are they?

 

I'm thinking about adding a white LED to my nano cube to light the built in sump part, so I can use it a refugium light.

 

Anymore LED info would be awesome.

What long term effects have you encountered... I noticed from your review that you were only using the 455nm 1wt royal blues... did you ever get around to mixing the blue and whites?

Originally posted by supernip

I have all luxeon LED's on my 4gal. The effects are good but you suffer long time effects and the novelty wears off. I don;t recommend it unless you got a lot of money.

No, I never did. I can tell you from experience what I've noticed so far. There are three most noticable cons. The first one is the spectrum is too pure. It's both a gift and a curse. You need diversity or your corals may die off. I started noticing slower growth/die off after a few months. The second thing is the novelty of LEDs die off. Your eyes will adjust to the light so if you get more blues or whatever, your eyes will see them as white after a while. The third thing is, they hurt your eyes... way too bright

Good news, no hair algae. Coloration is also better but thats just an optical illusion cause the mixing of colors will make your stuff look more vibrant. Another good thing is the actinicism (ultraviolet light emmission) is great, most things flouresced. You can also get nice color effects with the light. at about 1.5watt/gal, my corals opened but that was limited to anthelia, cloves, and zoos. Xenia did not do well under the light.

If there's any specific question you wanna ask, let me know. I hope this has been helpful.

-Nip

Thanks for the info Nip...

No doubt they are too pure!

Here are the wavelength characteristics... notice that the white 5500k chart already has a pronounced peak at 455nm... this leads me to believe that suplimental blue 455nm light is not required... Again looking at the charts the blue is way too pure.. however the whites look pretty good!

And here is a chart of the radiation pattern... Figure 7b shows the patten for the white Luxeon... notice that without a reflector most of the availiable light is thrown forward 40degrees... for a small tank this is going to provide better illumination then a focused 10 degree optic.

Looking at everything, I would suspect too you wouldn't need the blues. I hope they will give my refugium plenty of light and promote growth. I'm really interested in hearing your pros and cons on the setup, especially white LEDs.

You talk about a ballast and a driver? Essentially the same, right?

Which one are you planning on using to drive the LEDs? Also you have any info on the ballast or a link to where I can dive in?

Good luck on your install and hope everything goes well.

I hate running into small problems.

Justin

Some other Luxeon Tid-Bits (Lambertian) if others are looking to experiment:

Most all luxeons have an operating life of up to 100k hours... however the Lumen Maintenace is what we want to key in on (listed below). The standard luxeon 1wt has throws about 16x the light of the brightest Ultra Bright White led's on the market.... the luxeon V is about 50x as bright.

Luminous Flux (lm) or Radiometric Power (mW)

Luxeon Star 1wt 350ma

(Lumen Maintenace 70% at 50,000 hours)

-----------------------------------------

White 5500K - 25 lm

Royal Blue 455nm - 150 mW [Class 2 Eye Safety]

Luxeon III Star 3wt 700ma

(Lumen Maintenance 70% at 50,000 hours)

-----------------------------------------

White 5500k - 65 lm

Royal Blue 455nm - 340 mW [Class 2 Eye Safety]

Luxeon V Star 5wt 700ma

(Lumen Maintenace - Not listed)

-----------------------------------------

White - Not Availiable*

Royal Blue 455nm - 450 mW

*Lumen Maintennance on the white V was pretty bad.. luxeon has rerelaease the original white V as the V portable which only has as useful life of 500hrs.

Yes essentially the same... the Xitanium ballast distributed by Advance will drive the LED's from a 120v AC source.... worried about the heat from the transformer I am driving my setup with the small 12v drivers from www.ledsupply.com and will power the drivers from a wall-wart style transformer... this will keep the heat and high voltage components (have a 3yr old - nuff said) away from the tank.

You can dive in here: www.luxeonstar.com - they are a Canadian company but will give you an idea of price and availiablility... If you want more technical detail go to www.lumileds.com

Another consideration for a luxeon install is to mount the star units to a suitable heat sink... www.lumileds.com has a nice document on thermal design.... Basically I intend on mounting my 1wt LEDS to a length of aluminium stock.. and will mount the 3wt leds to a suitable length of heat sink stock.

-Bill

Originally posted by static69static

You talk about a ballast and a driver?  Essentially the same, right?

 

Which one are you planning on using to drive the LEDs?  Also you have any info on the ballast or a link to where I can dive in?

 

Justin

The Luxeons arrived! Here is a shot of the "tree" of whites and driver board.

-Bill

And another shot with a quarter thrown in for reference.

-Bill

I wanted to clean up the inside of the reflector and install a nice base to mount the lights from... I whipped this up in AutoCAD and fired it off to the cutter.

Here is a shot of the 1/8" white acrylic reflector (wish I had some mirrored acrylic on hand) shortly after cutting.

-Bill

And the finished reflector mounted inside the 2.5g Mini-Bow hood. Spent more time scheming the lift tube situation and thinking about cutting the mini-bow... looks like it may be easier just to cut out my own cube tank - it sure would look alot better then the PVC mess I have planned. Asside from limiting salt creep the lift tubes have me concerned as they are not very tall... not certain they will move the water volume that I am after.

-Bill

Wired up the test batch of luxeons....

Got some interesting measurments using the heat sensor.

My 13wt Compact flourescent measures 330deg f. at the base of the bulb....

I am currently letting the luxeons burn without a heat sink to see how hot they get.

More to come.

These things are very bright - still seeing green spots - did some retnal damage taking heat measurments... The light is exceptionally white - they look like a 10,000k bulb not a 5500k bulb.... I burn a 250wt Iwasaki over my 50g reef with two 36" 03's... the 6500k Iwasaki is greenish in color... the light from the luxeons is far more pleasing pure blue/white... and not overly blue... I think suplemental blue 455nm lighting will not be required... I'll hook up the blue ones as soon as they come in to confirm...

Here is a shot of the first array ready for mounting:

-Bill

Lights Off! My test driver was supplied by a hobbyist... it offer 7 levels of intensity plus a moon light mode. Here is the moon light mode.

-Bill

And at the brightest level... presently power is from a 12v Li-Poly battery... Need to dig up that 12v wall-wart. Notice how little light is being thrown off to the sides the light is very directional.... exactly what we are after. 12 of the 1wt light is going to be spectacular over that 2.5g tank... 12 of the 3wt variety should be awesome!!! Unfortunately this test driver board is only capable of driving 4 luxeons... I may have to go with the Xitanim ballast afterall just to drive a sufficient number of 3wt lights without going broke buying drivers.

-Bill