cptbjorn Posted September 30, 2009 Author Share Posted September 30, 2009 I was just trying to bend a basic u-shape like I have done several times before for overflows etc. I think the oven would work great if I had the equipment to vacuum form but I just couldn't get the 1/4" acrylic to lay down around the form by heat alone and I ended up totally screwing up the surface finish when I used gloves to force it into shape while the whole thing was semi molten. I dunno I know I can do it with a blowtorch though, I'm not exactly sure why I decided to try it with the oven but second attempt will be with a blowtorch. Link to comment
airman_verde04 Posted October 2, 2009 Share Posted October 2, 2009 sweet tank!!! I'm setting up to do the same thing. what light did you use before you got your LED set up? how do the seals work out on those edges? Link to comment
cptbjorn Posted October 3, 2009 Author Share Posted October 3, 2009 Alright new fts then Today I just added a couple mushrooms (completely brown and stretched out at lfs, completely blue and tiny in my tank) a couple clove polyp frags (blue and palm tree), and looks like a couple zoas got tossed in the bag as well but they haven't opened yet. Not everything is happy right now but good enough I guess. Also hopefully this is the last pic taken before the LEDs go on: The acrylic bending went as planned on the second try but after seeing it I've changed my plan a little and need to borrow my Grandpa's router table this weekend to chop it down shorter and have to wait for smaller fans to come in the mail now. But it looks like I'll have LED lighting by this time next week. And pics of it by this time next month @airman- The light on there now is the stock light from a JBJ picotope. In a tank this small it is enough light to keep zoas etc from stretching but I want more of course And the silicone seams work great, I think it is important to use a high strength silicone if you want to do it with gaps though. I used Dow Corning 732 and there is no noticeable sagging or movement so far. Link to comment
cptbjorn Posted October 5, 2009 Author Share Posted October 5, 2009 Spent most of the day yesterday working on this little guy: For people not familiar with Arduinos etc, it's going to be the brain inside my light fixture that will gradually fade in/out my lights for sunrise/sunset, vary the moonlight according to the lunar cycle, buzz at me when the temp is too high/low, stuff like that. Only limit on what I can do is my programming skills. Which at this point in time is a pretty severe limitation, hopefully that will change as I try to figure this thing out Kinda OT for this forum and I'll probably have to do a light build thread for this once I'm done, but I started out with the schematic/layout for the Boarduino, which is an Arduino compatible clone, and rerouted to my liking and added in a RTC, a 512k eeprom and a DC jack and regulator so that everything in the light fixture will run off of a single 19v laptop charger. Got the board etched and stuffed and cleaned and now I just need a battery for the RTC and I can power it up and start playing with it. In other news I added a small powerhead. The HOB filter/fuge was giving probably enough flow, but it was also causing a lot of tiny, fast ripples on the water surface which was actually causing too much of a not-so-good shimmer effect when testing the LEDs. At full power it was an almost hard to look at fast disco ball type of thing instead of the calmer slower shimmer I get with the HOB dialed back about halfway. Plus the flow seems more random and even this way and everything looks happy. Link to comment
bird Posted October 5, 2009 Share Posted October 5, 2009 Nice build. Got my head churning with all sorts of pico thoughts and getting one started myself. Always goes that way when you see a new build though, doesn't it? Link to comment
cptbjorn Posted October 6, 2009 Author Share Posted October 6, 2009 The acrylic enclosure for the light is mostly done, there was a little bit of cracking on the joints but overall it came out better than I expected. Waiting for the fans to come in the mail and then I'll be able to weld in the cross braces that will hold the circuit boards and that the bottom will velcro to. Here's a pic: Probably going to make a new LED driver board, the acrylic is a little more transparent than I thought and I didn't make the first driver as pretty as I would have if I knew it would be visible. Guess I'll just have to do an LED conversion on the 12" satellite on my picotope with the first board One plus though is that mounting the 16x2 LCD should be much easier now, I can just have it pressed up against the acrylic instead of having to cut a neat looking square hole. Everything in the tank has acted a little weird since the beginning, I'm assuming due to the concrete rock, but in the last week or so though something just kinda clicked and I'm getting little buds on pretty much every zoa frag and one of the GSP frags has gone from 2 polyps to like 8 seemingly overnight. I've been a little hesitant to spend much on livestock but now I'll start adding stuff; I'm getting a couple ricordias tomorrow and I'm on the lookout for some cool looking small LPS, probably a frogspawn or hammer and maybe a trumpet or candy cane. We'll see. Link to comment
cptbjorn Posted October 8, 2009 Author Share Posted October 8, 2009 Got the fixture done enough to start using yesterday and attempted to get some good pics taken today but I just can't figure out how to get my camera to take a picture that accurately depicts what it looks like. The light is BRIGHT, I tried to do a side by side comparison with a multimeter and it matches the light level of the stock picotope lamp at around 20% of the maximum current, and judging by some cree efficiency charts I found I guesstimate I'm getting roughly 4 times as much light at maximum brightness Anyways the pics don't really do it justice because the camera removes most of the brightness increase but here's a side by side of a pic taken today with one taken last week: And here's a new FTS. The ceiling lights are actually on in this pic and the wall behind was white when it was taken, the camera has to adjust for the pico light so much that it looks like the lights are off in the room. One of the closeups came out alright, I've never gotten a pic of these zoas before that looked right but now they show up just fine. Guess I should start taming the hair algae forest they normally live in... Still working on actinic pics... Link to comment
evilc66 Posted October 8, 2009 Share Posted October 8, 2009 Welcome to the club... of not being able to take good pics of LEDs Link to comment
cptbjorn Posted October 12, 2009 Author Share Posted October 12, 2009 So I had some fun last night First I did some surprise reaquascaping, I was poking around with a skewer getting a little slime off one of my zoa frags and noticed a little crack in one of the little ledges. For some reason I decided it would be a good idea to poke at the ledge which then broke off which messed up the whole somewhat symmetrical look of the tank so I spent like an hour restacking the left side to get it how I like it again. I ended up removing the rock from the sandbed on the left because I need more lower light spots in the tank. A couple things aren't too happy about the LEDs etc. Secondly, right at the end of my aquascaping I knocked my spankin new light into the water! t(*_*t) I got it unplugged, pulled apart and everything rinsed with RO in roughly .25 seconds, blew what I could out with a can of compressed air and let it sit in the hot exhaust stream of my (400w constant draw) heater computer overnight. Did some reassembling and testing and then hooked it back up a couple hours ago (my photoperiod starts at 1) and... works like nothing happened! I thought for sure the fans and the pots were toast, I guess this is why I try to always keep backups. Nothing ever breaks unless it's your only one... Anyways a LFS is having an anniversary sale this Sat/Sun so I'm probably going to get some new stuff this weekend. 30% off everything plus a bunch of even better deals like 6 ricordia for $60 and and raffles etc. With my luck if I win something it will be the SPS frag pack... I am thinking about some sort of encrusting monti or something for the top of the arch though. Link to comment
Weetabix7 Posted October 12, 2009 Share Posted October 12, 2009 Just read through this whole thing. I'm really liking what you're doing with the tank so far. I actually just got a very similar Pico in the mail a couple of days ago, which is what prompted me to read this thread. Mine looks just like yours, except it's a 10" cube. For mine I will initially just use sunshine from a large, sunny window for a light source, but I want to eventually do something with LED's. Something very similar to yours, in fact. My only problem is that I have NO DIY skills at all when it comes to LED. I'll figure something out. Anyway, keep up the good work and I'll be following this thread. Link to comment
sammy113 Posted October 13, 2009 Share Posted October 13, 2009 Spent most of the day yesterday working on this little guy: For people not familiar with Arduinos etc, it's going to be the brain inside my light fixture that will gradually fade in/out my lights for sunrise/sunset, vary the moonlight according to the lunar cycle, buzz at me when the temp is too high/low, stuff like that. Only limit on what I can do is my programming skills. Which at this point in time is a pretty severe limitation, hopefully that will change as I try to figure this thing out How hard is it to do something like this for my LED lamp? I'd love to have fade in/out. I have no experience with programming though. I Do have some patience and kinda handy but don't know if thats enough lol Looking good so far Link to comment
cptbjorn Posted October 13, 2009 Author Share Posted October 13, 2009 Thanks for the kind words, I'm just copying what I see and read here and trying to pretend I'm not a noob as best I can @Weetabix: I nearly bought that cube myself when 121a sold it the first time lol. My keyboard already hangs off the edge of my desk as is though and if my tank was another inch bigger I'd have to hold it in my lap. @sammy: I have never used an arduino before either and my programming skill is pretty limited but I will get it done somehow. If you are technically minded at all I'm sure you can; at the very least I bet you could mooch some code off of someone else here in fact I think someone posted an example of an LED dimming program on the DIY forum here somewhere. I haven't had time to mess with the software yet or I could tell you more. Link to comment
airman_verde04 Posted October 14, 2009 Share Posted October 14, 2009 i LIKE THE LED's! looks sweet!! Link to comment
Weetabix7 Posted October 14, 2009 Share Posted October 14, 2009 i LIKE THE LED's! looks sweet!! Inorite? Link to comment
Weetabix7 Posted October 14, 2009 Share Posted October 14, 2009 You mentioned that a couple of things in the tank weren't happy about the new LED's. I'm assuming they're having a hard time adjusting to the increased brightness. However, you made this dimmable. Doesn't that compensate somewhat? Can't you start it out at a lower intensity and gradually increase the brightness to acclimate everything? Link to comment
cptbjorn Posted October 14, 2009 Author Share Posted October 14, 2009 Yes it is dimmable, there's just something about it glowing like a tiny sun at full power It was just a couple of the zoas and the mushrooms that took more than a day or two to open again fully but I probably should have been a little more careful about acclimation. Everything is still on frag plugs/rubble and easy to move though and I kinda thought of it as an opportunity to find out where everything needs to be; I found shaded areas for everything that looked unhappy. One of the mushrooms is already starting to lean out a little bit and part of its cap is getting full light, and I know it can come out farther if it wants to because that thing had a 3" long stem at the LFS and now its almost flat on its rock. The LFS having the sale this weekend keeps adding stuff to their raffle and now has a frag of one of the the most awesome montiporas I have ever seen, I'm hoping everybody else goes for the more expensive prizes because it appears to be an encrusting type and would be perfect. Appleberry is what they are calling it. I've never been much of a gambler but I'm considering buying raffle tickets besides the two free ones I'll get for going to the sale both days And finally I got my arduino board working and am working on a program to control my LEDs This could take weeks Link to comment
Weetabix7 Posted October 14, 2009 Share Posted October 14, 2009 Raffles are AWESOME!!! GL on the Arduino. Link to comment
cptbjorn Posted October 15, 2009 Author Share Posted October 15, 2009 Wow, I just spent an hour or two messing with the arduino and have a basic working program to fade in the blue and then the white in about an hour each, wait 10 hours and then fade out in the reverse order. Still a *very* long way from all the things I want to do but these things are pretty fun and it's so much less frustrating than the couple times I've tried to mess with PIC microcontrollers. So I guess this means if I can get up early tomorrow and cut a couple holes in my light enclosure before the lights come on to install it I can have my first day of reef controller action Here's the code if anybody wants to see or use it. Link to comment
pismo_reefer Posted October 15, 2009 Share Posted October 15, 2009 this is the pico of my dreams..... please, please keep this thang goin'..... p.s. i LOVE the new scape, it jawesome! Link to comment
cptbjorn Posted October 15, 2009 Author Share Posted October 15, 2009 Things are working on the first try, this is freaking me out... @pismo Thanks! I'm hoping to keep this up for quite a while, the plan is to only add tiny frags and then give them time to do their thing LMK if you want a pico cube or whatever, I've got a shop and spare time and not enough corals Link to comment
cptbjorn Posted October 16, 2009 Author Share Posted October 16, 2009 For the first time since the pico's inception I did a full clearing and cleaning and have staged a picture to show what my desk looks like in theory 99.9% of the time I have to move something to set down my coffee but here it is: Basically what happened was my cat and I had one of those moments where our vastly different customs collided a bit last night; he thanked me for a couple chinese takeout prawns by busting inside a half hour later and presenting me with something he thought I would want to eat right on my desk in front of his door. But I did not want it and after that I wanted to clean a little bit In other news coralline is starting to form in a couple spots on the cement rock so I took a quarter-sized piece of rock that had a super thick coating of coralline and scraped off as much as I could while the HOB pump was unplugged, then just ran the powerhead for a couple hours until there was no trace of suspended particles left in the water. We'll see what happens with that. Link to comment
cptbjorn Posted October 16, 2009 Author Share Posted October 16, 2009 I got the arduino and LCD all packed into the light last night and here's a pic from today during sunrise: The clock and temperature are fake for now but I have the sunrise/sunset is working and it displays the LED dimming value from 0-99. In the software the dimming is actually between 0 and 255, and I did some testing last night and the blues are useful as moonlights from 1/255 to around 8-10/255, and the whites are probably a good "full moon" effect at 1/255. I have a couple ideas to get better resolution at low light values with the blues and the whites though since one of the things I really want to have is seamless dimming from noon at the equator down to new moon. The effect of the sunrise is incredible, after it gets above the very low moonlight levels the "jumps" are undetectable and you don't see anything happening even if you are looking for it, just when you look away and do something else for 10-15 minutes and then look back it has gotten brighter. Screw patents, I think everybody should be able to have this Link to comment
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