BJBass BC14 LED Build Thread

[ericster]

Hey BJ, I think your build thread here has me convinced to go with this kit. Are you still happy with how everything is performing? Your tank looks great btw, and your moonlight setup is REALLY awesome!!

[bjbass]

Hey BJ, I think your build thread here has me convinced to go with this kit. Are you still happy with how everything is performing? Your tank looks great btw, and your moonlight setup is REALLY awesome!!

 

Eric,

 

Thanks for your reply and feedback! Yes, I am very happy with this kit. I even sold off one of my old ballasts on Ebay. I am going to sell the other one now. That will definitely help pay for the LED kit and supplies. I didn't think that it was very expensive and the reward is fantastic. My lighting is bright and there is little to no heat at all. I have the lights on for 8 hours a day and the lid only gets warm to the touch. If you need any help I will do my best to assist!

 

BJ

[bjbass]

Got a nice shot of my RBTA under the moonlight.

 

[hn777]

Nice work BJ! How are you powering the moonlights?

 

Got a nice shot of my RBTA under the moonlight.

 

[bjbass]

Nice work BJ! How are you powering the moonlights?

 

Thanks for the feedback! I am actually powering the moonlights with the stock AC adapter that came with the Biocube. I kept the little circuit board that was in the hood and attached the AC adapter to it. Let me know if you need anything else!

 

BJ

[BBOSS]

Hi BJ,

The detail information on this thread has convinced me to retro my BC29, also give me the confidence to actually do it. Thank you so much. BTW, I love your moonlight setup, I would like to copy it with my build if you don't mind.

 

I have ordered the 36LED dimmable kit and heat sink from Aquastyleonline.com, and is in the planning stage on the detail retro at this moment. I have couple questions if I can seek your opinion.

 

1. What is your experience with the heat coming from those dimmable drivers? Do they give out a lot of heat? With my BC 29, I have little more room under the stock hood that I would like to mount both drivers inside the hood if possible, but I am concerning the heat given out from the drivers.

 

2. You have kept the little stock PCB for your moonlights, but opted to go with external power adapter to drive your fans. The stock transformer and the little PCB board should be able to drive all four of your fans already; I was wondering your reason to go with the external power adapter?

 

Thanks

[hn777]

Thanks for the feedback! I am actually powering the moonlights with the stock AC adapter that came with the Biocube. I kept the little circuit board that was in the hood and attached the AC adapter to it. Let me know if you need anything else!

 

BJ

 

Thanks for the quick response. I was also wondering what size/diameter solder did you use?

[bjbass]

Hi BJ,

The detail information on this thread has convinced me to retro my BC29, also give me the confidence to actually do it. Thank you so much. BTW, I love your moonlight setup, I would like to copy it with my build if you don't mind.

 

I have ordered the 36LED dimmable kit and heat sink from Aquastyleonline.com, and is in the planning stage on the detail retro at this moment. I have couple questions if I can seek your opinion.

 

1. What is your experience with the heat coming from those dimmable drivers? Do they give out a lot of heat? With my BC 29, I have little more room under the stock hood that I would like to mount both drivers inside the hood if possible, but I am concerning the heat given out from the drivers.

 

2. You have kept the little stock PCB for your moonlights, but opted to go with external power adapter to drive your fans. The stock transformer and the little PCB board should be able to drive all four of your fans already; I was wondering your reason to go with the external power adapter?

 

Thanks

 

Thanks for your feedback! I am glad my thread was able to inspire people and help them!

 

You are more than welcomed to take any of my ideas and put them to use!

 

The heat from the drivers is actually pretty minimal. I have them out in the open though underneath my tank in my cabinet. I don't have any fans blowing on them at all. As I am writing this my two drivers have been running my lights for 5 hours and they are both just warm to the touch. My light intensity is almost full bore too. I just have them kicked back a little.

 

As far as using the PCB to run the fans, I didn't think of that to be honest with you. The only thing might be the connections. As you can see I upgraded to some better fans from Newegg and I think they are a bigger connector. However, you could easily solder your own by taking the connectors of the old stock fans and soldering to the wires of the new fans. That should work. Hopefully there is enough power as you said. I think you should be fine. Keep me posted on here as to your progress!

 

You guys are great!

 

Thanks for the quick response. I was also wondering what size/diameter solder did you use?

 

Great question. I will take a look at what size it is, but it is probably just your standard size because it came in a crappy $20 Walmart soldering gun kit. It does have the flux inside it. I ended up buying a cheap $20 one from Radio Shack then and it melted the solder instantly. I learned my lesson! I spent like 6 hours trying to solder with that one from WM and I had the whole thing done in like 2 hours once I got the new iron. Yikes!

[ApiratenamedJohn]

Nice build. I like it. The rbta looks good too.

[bjbass]

Nice build. I like it. The rbta looks good too.

 

Thanks!

[BBOSS]

Thanks for your feedback! I am glad my thread was able to inspire people and help them!

 

You are more than welcomed to take any of my ideas and put them to use!

 

The heat from the drivers is actually pretty minimal. I have them out in the open though underneath my tank in my cabinet. I don't have any fans blowing on them at all. As I am writing this my two drivers have been running my lights for 5 hours and they are both just warm to the touch. My light intensity is almost full bore too. I just have them kicked back a little.

 

As far as using the PCB to run the fans, I didn't think of that to be honest with you. The only thing might be the connections. As you can see I upgraded to some better fans from Newegg and I think they are a bigger connector. However, you could easily solder your own by taking the connectors of the old stock fans and soldering to the wires of the new fans. That should work. Hopefully there is enough power as you said. I think you should be fine. Keep me posted on here as to your progress!

 

You guys are great!

 

It is good to know the LED drivers do not produce a lot of heat, Thank you.

 

With this knowledge, I am going to proceed with my current retro plan A, which is to incorporate your moon light setup, upgrade the stock fans to Silenx, mount the drivers behind the clear splashguard, all with AquastyleOnline's 36 LED kit and heat sink.

 

I should receive my kit today or tomorow, can't wait to get it started.

 

I have measured the exhaust air temperature from the hood with my current setup, using PC-R bulbs, it is at whapping 99.5F. I am hoping it will be cooler with the new LED setup. stay tuned.

[bjbass]

It is good to know the LED drivers do not produce a lot of heat, Thank you.

 

With this knowledge, I am going to proceed with my current retro plan A, which is to incorporate your moon light setup, upgrade the stock fans to Silenx, mount the drivers behind the clear splashguard, all with AquastyleOnline's 36 LED kit and heat sink.

 

I should receive my kit today or tomorow, can't wait to get it started.

 

I have measured the exhaust air temperature from the hood with my current setup, using PC-R bulbs, it is at whapping 99.5F. I am hoping it will be cooler with the new LED setup. stay tuned.

 

Yeah, I would think cooler. Pay attention to the drivers though because mine aren't in an enclosed area and you will be running more LEDs than me. However, you will have fans on yours. I think you should be ok, but definitely keep your eyes on it so that it doesn't cause you any problems!

[BBOSS]

Yeah, I would think cooler. Pay attention to the drivers though because mine aren't in an enclosed area and you will be running more LEDs than me. However, you will have fans on yours. I think you should be ok, but definitely keep your eyes on it so that it doesn't cause you any problems!

 

Thank you very much for your advice. I certainly will keep my eyes on the temperature.

 

I have just received my 36 LED kit this afternoon. will start to work on my retro tonight.

[bjbass]

Thank you very much for your advice. I certainly will keep my eyes on the temperature.

 

I have just received my 36 LED kit this afternoon. will start to work on my retro tonight.

 

Awesome! Keep me posted and let me know if you need any help! I can't wait to see the finished product.

[BBOSS]

Awesome! Keep me posted and let me know if you need any help! I can't wait to see the finished product.

 

The heat sink I've got is larger than I had expected and is not pre-drilled , so I have to drill the mounting holes on the heatsink and figure out a way to mount it into the hood. Too bad Nanotunner is no longer in business.

 

I don't think I will have enough room to setup the moonlights on the side of the heatsink, as you have done, but I should have plenty of room to mount them to the rear where the small circuit board is located. I've got whole day to work on it tomorrow. hopefully I will have something to show you soon.

[bjbass]

The heat sink I've got is larger than I had expected and is not pre-drilled , so I have to drill the mounting holes on the heatsink and figure out a way to mount it into the hood. Too bad Nanotunner is no longer in business.

 

I don't think I will have enough room to setup the moonlights on the side of the heatsink, as you have done, but I should have plenty of room to mount them to the rear where the small circuit board is located. I've got whole day to work on it tomorrow. hopefully I will have something to show you soon.

 

Great news!

 

I didn't even know about nanotuners until I read this. I saw their post though and it sounds like they are still going to sell their products, but it may be awhile.

[BBOSS]

I have been working on my build most of today, ran into a few problems while trying to fit the heat sink to the hood. Long story short, I was able to finally mount the heatsink on to the 4 original taping holes with computer motherboard standoffs. I will start up a new thread when I have this thing all finishe, to exdplain how I did it.

 

Once figure out how to mount the heatsink, the rest was smooth sailing. the LEDs are glued to the heatsink with thermal paste, let the thermal paste cured for about 6 hours, then I soIdered the wires and tested the LEDs by connected the LED chains to the drivers, potentiometers, and power cords. These is the first photos showing off my Heatsink with LEDs and drivers mounted. I will try to finish the majority work tomorrow evening and take a few more pictures of my final product.

 

[lilj104]

nicely done

[bjbass]

I have been working on my build most of today, ran into a few problems while trying to fit the heat sink to the hood. Long story short, I was able to finally mount the heatsink on to the 4 original taping holes with computer motherboard standoffs. I will start up a new thread when I have this thing all finishe, to exdplain how I did it.

 

Once figure out how to mount the heatsink, the rest was smooth sailing. the LEDs are glued to the heatsink with thermal paste, let the thermal paste cured for about 6 hours, then I soIdered the wires and tested the LEDs by connected the LED chains to the drivers, potentiometers, and power cords. These is the first photos showing off my Heatsink with LEDs and drivers mounted. I will try to finish the majority work tomorrow evening and take a few more pictures of my final product.

 

 

Looks great. Did you use thermal paste or thermal adhesive? This is one difference that you will need to know. I think the Aquastyles kit ships with thermal adhesive which is what you need. I used arctic silver thermal adhesive that I bought separately. The LEDs will fall off it is only thermal paste.

 

It looks really good though and I can't wait to see the final product!!!

[BBOSS]

nicely done

 

Thank you

 

Looks great. Did you use thermal paste or thermal adhesive? This is one difference that you will need to know. I think the Aquastyles kit ships with thermal adhesive which is what you need. I used arctic silver thermal adhesive that I bought separately. The LEDs will fall off it is only thermal paste.

 

It looks really good though and I can't wait to see the final product!!!

 

Thanks for pointing out the difference between thermal paste and thermal adhesive. The thermal adhesive that came with the Aquastyle kit is called "Heatsink Plaster", and that was what I had used on this project.

 

Well, the heatsink is installed and sit firmly on the hood. Have not received the SilenX fans yet so I used the stock fans for now. All wires are connected and everything seems working well so far.

 

BJ, I wanted to emmulate your moonlight LED setup, but there were simply no room around the heatsink to mount the plastic moonlight stand I've made, at the end, I had to gave it up and instead, cut three small pieces of sheet metal from the stock reflector, banded them to U shape stands, used thermal adhesive to glue the moonlight LEDs on one end, and glue the other end to the edge of the heatsink. It worked fine but certainly not as elegant as yours.

 

I measured the exhaust air temperature after three hours of use at 75% intensity. The temperature never went above 77F, much cooler than the stock PC lights, it does not affect the water temperature at all. My initial assessment is the heat will not be a problem with this setup, even with the original stock fans. I will know better in the next weeks.

 

Sorry to hijack your thread. I have posted my full write up here Yet Another BC29 DIY LED retro - by bboss

Thank you so much BJ.

[plainrt]

tagging along nice build

[bjbass]

I now added a custom moonlight that I built for $5.83 and it is nice.

 

BC14 DIY LED Moonlight

 

 

 

I would highly recommend something similar. Cheap and low power consumption.