Led suggestions

[mikgus]

I am starting a 3G picotank. Bored one night i ordered a bunch of 3W Leds from aliexpress.
With the leds i ordered mountingplates for 3 or 5 leds.

So the questions are...
What combination from the choises below would you recommend for a 1,3,5 U(or a combination of more) ledlight?
How much light would you recommend? I have/will have drivers for driving them at 1 or 3 watt

Leds:

Cool White 30000 K  
Cool White 20000 K
Cool White 10000 K
Full Spectrum pink
Green 520 Nm
Ice Blue 490 Nm
Blue 460 Nm
Royal Blue 445 Nm
UV 395NM

[Picogoby]

2 minutes ago, mikgus said:

I am starting a 3G picotank. Bored one night i ordered a bunch of 3W Leds from aliexpress.
With the leds i ordered mountingplates for 3 or 5 leds.

So the questions are...
What combination from the choises below would you recommend for a 1,3,5 U(or a combination of more) ledlight?
How much light would you recommend? I have/will have drivers for driving them at 1 or 3 watt

Leds:

Cool White 30000 K  
Cool White 20000 K
Cool White 10000 K
Full Spectrum pink
Green 520 Nm
Ice Blue 490 Nm
Blue 460 Nm
Royal Blue 445 Nm
UV 395NM

How many different channels will you have and what are you using as a controller?

[mikgus]

11 minutes ago, Picogoby said:

How many different channels will you have and what are you using as a controller?

I haven't decided yet. From 1 on/off up to 5 PWM controlled channels. It will be a DIY job so the controller vill depend on how complicated the rest of the setup ends up.

 

Missed it in the first post but the goal is to have Zoas and maybe some other beginner friendly softcorals.

 

[Picogoby]

Just now, mikgus said:

I haven't decided yet. From 1 on/off up to 5 PWM controlled channels. It will be a DIY job so the controller vill depend on how complicated the rest of the setup ends up.

 

Missed it in the first post but the goal is to have Zoas and maybe some other beginner friendly softcorals.

 

I have built several led lights for mainly Pico and nano tanks and to get a good spectrum you really need about 3 channels. I usually use the 3 channels as follows:

1) blues royal blue and normal blue (450-470) in a ration of 3:1 royal to blue

2) whites neutral white (6500-7500k), cool white (10000-12000k) and ice white (14000k-20000k)

ratio of 1:2:1

3) colours green (usually turquoise), purple (one that contains some red spectrum), pink and UV. In a ration of 1:1:1:1

 

you can scale up and down using these ratios.

 

i like to have a controller so I can run the channels on the following % ratios:

blue 80%, white 50% and colours 30-40%

I usually make a module with with 12leds on to the ratios above and then add as many modules as needed.

[mikgus]

Thanks!

Thats a good start. Since it's cheap china leds a have no idea about the quality so i will do some tests when they show up. But now i have an idea of where to start

[jservedio]

On 4/20/2020 at 4:47 AM, Picogoby said:

I have built several led lights for mainly Pico and nano tanks and to get a good spectrum you really need about 3 channels. I usually use the 3 channels as follows:

1) blues royal blue and normal blue (450-470) in a ration of 3:1 royal to blue

2) whites neutral white (6500-7500k), cool white (10000-12000k) and ice white (14000k-20000k)

ratio of 1:2:1

3) colours green (usually turquoise), purple (one that contains some red spectrum), pink and UV. In a ration of 1:1:1:1

 

you can scale up and down using these ratios.

 

i like to have a controller so I can run the channels on the following % ratios:

blue 80%, white 50% and colours 30-40%

I usually make a module with with 12leds on to the ratios above and then add as many modules as needed.

I wouldn't put UV on the "color" channel - definitely group them with the blues as it's on the entire opposite end of the spectrum from your color channel. To make it really simple, you can just go 2 channels and in your white channel add some low-kelvin whites (like 2200k, cree makes one of those) to get a wider spectrum with some red.

 

If you wanted red/color separately, your color channel only needs green and red. The cree photo red or osram deep red is what everyone uses.

 

OP, I know you've already got these chips - but don't try and replace red in your spectrum with a "full spectrum pink" mystery chip. Every chip I mentioned is less than $4.

[Picogoby]

1 hour ago, jservedio said:

I wouldn't put UV on the "color" channel - definitely group them with the blues as it's on the entire opposite end of the spectrum from your color channel. To make it really simple, you can just go 2 channels and in your white channel add some low-kelvin whites (like 2200k, cree makes one of those) to get a wider spectrum with some red.

 

If you wanted red/color separately, your color channel only needs green and red. The cree photo red or osram deep red is what everyone uses.

 

OP, I know you've already got these chips - but don't try and replace red in your spectrum with a "full spectrum pink" mystery chip. Every chip I mentioned is less than $4.

Some good points here!

if you study the spectrum on a shallow reef (what we are trying to recreate) you will find that there is very little red(it gets filtered out VERY quickly) so warmer whites is a good way of getting enough red and you do NOT then need red LED’s.

 

I would go for bridgelux LED’s now, CREE have gone of course and their bin tolerance is massive now. CREE is often used by many companies as they where the best, but I know many are now ordering from bridgelux and you will see the “CREE” branding disappearing of many commercial fittings.

on the UV note DO NOT use much true UV (below 395Nm) as this will start to bleach and kill corals quickly.

[Reefkid88]

I have build TONS of pico lights,I would suggest these leds if the tank is a cube:

 

 1 StevesLeds.com 3ups with a 2 Neutral White and 1 Warm White. 4 Luxeon Royal Blues from StevesLeds,1 Luxeon C Mint,and 2 violets from 395nm - 430nm. 

 

 Here is my latest pico light. NanoBox v3.1 array,with added royal blues and a few violets:

 

 

 

Some of my previous lights:

[mikgus]

Thanks again. The pictures works great for inspiration.

The leds i have ordered are still in transport somewhere in the world, thats why i havent kept up with this thread. I was even thinking of buying a light from a local store.

 

But...

 

About 01:00 this night i woke up from the ATO sucking in air. I refilled the container and watching it top up the tank.

Went back to bed but heard it run again, after 3-4 times i started suspect something was wrong (i wasn't really awake yet). Got up again to check if the sensor had been moved or something like that. But the sensor was ok and the water level correct. 

Heard a dripping sound that hadn't registred yet. Turned on all the light in the room and had a real look. The backpanel of the tank had a crack from top to bottom. My first tought was to put a bucket under the desk and deal with it in the morning (still not fully awake).

Figured out that even if i did that i wouldn't be able to go back to sleep. So i found a hose and started to siphon it out to the bucket.

 

while i was doing this one of my most hated sounds started. Electrical arcing! when i started the tank i was going to move the powerstrip at the back under the desk but forgot. So instead of filling up the tank the ATO had been toping up my powerstrip, eurostyle outlets which basically are water collection cups that funnels the water down to the electricity.

So secured the hose and had to crawl under the desk to disconnect it. Did not think about the damp/wet floor it and i was standing on until now when writing this.

 

finished the siphon moved the rocks to the bucket and went back to bed.

Writing this from work so will spend this wekend to try to figure out what happend and if there are any damages more than the tank.

 

 

[HeyArnold]

Sorry to hear about the cracked glass. Do you know how it happened? What will you do now?