Gujustud Posted June 1, 2004 Share Posted June 1, 2004 Thanks to this post, I ended up getting my own Aquavase for my room. After helping my sisters fiance set his up last night, I just had to get my own. My 38g is downstairs, and since I spend a lot of time in my room/computer, I figure I might as well start my own nano/pico whatever. all pictures located here Well, this is what we started with: Now if you read my other post (link above) my sisters fiance (Paul) didn't get a light with his setup (got everything but light for $10), so I ended up giving him my light, as I wanted to do some LED testing. I decided to use the same LED's as in my moonlighting thread. So I made my own bracket to hold the fixtures: I made it on the CNC. I milled a slot down the center to hide the wiring. I ended up using 3 of the fixtures, 2 white 8LED and 1 blue 8LED. Once I finish the wiring, I may wire it so I can turn off just the white, and leave the blue on at night. The bracket isin't finished yet, as I didn't know what height I wanted it above the surface. I may just end up making it adjustable. I threw in some rock just to give you a idea of the lighting (so don't flame my aquascaping ) Here's the first test. I just sat the fixture on the top, its about 1" from the surface of the water. You'll notice that its quite blue in the middle from the blue LED. And here is the LED fixture kept about 2" above the surface. You'll notice the blue is a little more washed out along with the white LED's, which looks a little better IMO. Here's one more picture with the fixture above 2": So far, i'm "somewhat" happy with the LED's. It doesn't seem as bright as the 7w as I thought it would be. Still its pretty good. I "may" make another fixture with 2 more WHITE led fixtures on it. We'll see what happens. I think with some sand in there, it may brighten things up a little more. Stay tuned... comments, ideas are welcome ... Link to comment
invert Posted June 1, 2004 Share Posted June 1, 2004 greate to see new pico's. nice tank and good luck with your cool diy lighting. Link to comment
ninhsavestheday Posted June 1, 2004 Share Posted June 1, 2004 wow led! can you use any LED.. or do you have to get a special kind? Link to comment
jtsam Posted June 8, 2004 Share Posted June 8, 2004 wow, thats smooth, i want to see more. do corals grow well under led lighting? Link to comment
Gujustud Posted June 8, 2004 Author Share Posted June 8, 2004 ::invert:: Thanks! Its my first try at it, so we'll see how it goes. ::ninhsavestheday:: Not honestly 100% sure. Its all a test at this time. ::supernip:: Thanks! Its not exactly as I hoped it to be, but we'll see what I can do with it. ::jtsam:: Thanks! I'll post some more pics, once I do my proper aquascaping and such. Not sure about coral growth, that is honestly my main question in all of this, and the best way is to test it out. Link to comment
DRZL-sauras Posted June 29, 2004 Share Posted June 29, 2004 interesting....gave me the bug.....off to petco....keep up with the weird lighting...wouldnt mind biting your styl-o....updated pics?? Link to comment
Gujustud Posted June 29, 2004 Author Share Posted June 29, 2004 Originally posted by DRZL-sauras interesting....gave me the bug.....off to petco....keep up with the weird lighting...wouldnt mind biting your styl-o....updated pics?? Good time to response. I haven't been happy with the LED lighting. By far not bright enough. I even noticed some of the LED's within the fixture have failed. So I ended up getting some 13w 50/50 bulbs from another member on this site. Needed something to power them, and buying a retrokit from ahsupply was pretty expensive when I consider getting it shipped to Canada. So on my search for something to power the 13w lights, I found what I thought was a good deal at princessauto. It was a 13w Worklight for $15cdn. I tried out the 50/50 bulbs, and tried them out tonight, work great. Now I just need to retro fit it somehow to make it look good for my setup. Probably make something out of acrylic. Will post pics when I get around to that. Link to comment
DRZL-sauras Posted June 29, 2004 Share Posted June 29, 2004 grrr-eat looking forward....just whatever u do...dont do the wooden box hat look on this guy...keeep it clean and light... what i was thinkin was just use the light the came with it, and buy a second one and put one act one 10K or 2 50/50...it wud still havee theat clean look IMO...good luck on whatever u do thou Link to comment
jtsam Posted June 29, 2004 Share Posted June 29, 2004 hmm..yeah... i'm about to get one of those due to that i will be going to italy next summer. i'll probly end up selling my nano and everyting in it except a few choice corals to start a pico with (i'll probly be able to get my girlfriend to watch over tiny). so yeah, lighting is one thing that i've been wondering about for these. oh yeah, also for those who have had aquavases what colors do you think look best when it's all set up an everything (yaknow the bottom and top rim comes in differnent colors)? Gujustud if you figure out a nice design for the 13w retrofit with your acrylic skills would you consider selling or trading me one as well? Link to comment
jtsam Posted July 1, 2004 Share Posted July 1, 2004 another good place for bulbs and ballasts is ahsupply.com Link to comment
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