wfrancis76 Posted February 28, 2005 Author Share Posted February 28, 2005 Originally posted by clipse12 wFrancis, care to elaborate on the wiring for your fan and LED setup? I am considering the 96w you got but am concerned w/ keeping the temp <80F. Wiring info for the fan would be greatly appreciated. Thanks. Sure. The wiring for the fan is extreamely easy. I used a CPU fan that I took off a computer that they were throwing away at work. You can buy also, I don't think it would cost that much. There are 3 wires on a CPU fan. One positive, one negative and one that monitors the RPMs of the fan. You just need the positive and negative. The negative is black and the positive is one of the other two. Find a 12 volt AC to DC converter around your house. I'm sure you have an old cordless phone or something like that. or you can buy one at Radioshack. Make sure the fan is 12 volt, most are. Just read the label on the fan. Cut the end off the converter and strip the wires. The negative wire on any plug has ridges that run the length of the wire. Conned the negative from the plug to the black wire from the fan. And the positive to one of the other three wires. If the fan starts spinning you've got it right, if it doesn't try the other wire. Make sure its blowing air in the right direction, if it's not you've got the wires backwards. All computer fans have two arrows on the side, one shows the direction of air flow and the other shows direction the fan should spin. Once you've got the connections figured out cut the third wire off the fan, since you don't need it. Use wire nuts or soder the connections together. And thats it. Just takes a few minutes. I'd recomend buying some wire strippers from your local hardware store or radioshack. Since I've had a few questions about the LED's i'm going to draw up a wiring diagram and post it on this tread. I'll include a diagram for the fan. Link to comment
wfrancis76 Posted February 28, 2005 Author Share Posted February 28, 2005 HERE'S INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE LED'S This is my current set up except with 6 LED’s. It’s the same no matter how many you have. If you have a different power supply or LED you need to calculate the amount of RESISTANCE needed. V = I x R V is Volts, I is current, R is reistance Here is how I calculated it for my set up. Since 4.5 Volts is a little too much for the LED’s I bought I had to add some resistance to drop the voltage. My LED’s need from 3.7 to 4.5 volts. To be safe I wanted around 4 volts. I = .02 Amps or 30 mAmps 4.5 – 4.0 = 0.5 Volts : That’s how much voltage drop I want. R = V/I = 0.5/.02 = 25 ohms. The store had 22 ohm resistors which was close enough. EXAMPLE: If I had a 12 Volt power supply instead of a 4.5 Volt, Lets calculate the resistance needed. 12 – 4.0 = 8 Volts ß that’s how much voltage drop we want. I = 0.02 Amps ß that’s how much current our LED draws, may be more or less for different LED’s R = V/I = 8/.02 = 400 ohms. So we would need a 400 ohm resistor or something close. Just as long as we keep the voltage between 3.7 to 4.5 Volts. Again, different LED’s have different voltage ranges, so adjust accordingly Good Luck! Link to comment
EPICTANKHERE Posted February 28, 2005 Share Posted February 28, 2005 Thanks for the tech info! sounds like a fun project. Thanks foe th pm too! GO ECLIPSERS! Link to comment
wfrancis76 Posted February 28, 2005 Author Share Posted February 28, 2005 No problem. Your tank looks great. Had any problems with it? Link to comment
EPICTANKHERE Posted March 1, 2005 Share Posted March 1, 2005 oh yeah! Had this thing as FW for years. Rushed into this hobby before learning about it! LFS told me a load of bull$#!!. Sold me a 9 watt antic for 50 bucks to use with the stocklighting, some sand, and rock and 5 damsels! Used my roomates nitrate loaded water from his 120gallon FOWLR that also has gained all of his knowledge from the same LFS. 4 of the 5 damsels died in a day. The tank cycled in a week, never got my nitrates lower than 160 thoughs. Then i learned a little from this site. ripped out the bio wheel, and ordered a powerquad, which was shipped to me broken then took the seller over 2 months to replace! NEVER SHOP FROM SEACORALS.com! Got the light, then had a green algea explosion! To make matters worse, i turned the powerheads off to try to get the last surviving damsel out, which i couldn't, then forgot to turn the pumps back on before i left for the weekend! Red slime outbreak!!! Tank crashed completly. Called the guys at Garf.org they sent me some of there grunge and a janitor pack (THEY ARE AWSOME!). Bought some Chaeto off Tigerboy (his tank truly kicks ass and he lives down the street from me). And within less then a week everything balanced out to perfection (well almost). my firefish, some shrooms, a waving hand cloves, and a cleaner shrimp survived all of this. I only have to clean the glass off every couple of days now! As far as the tank is concerned, i love the shape more than anything out there. As i said before i am doing the ac500 fuge this week when it gets here. Its been about 4 months and i think i finally got a handle on everything in the tank, now am ready to stock it with some serious coral! Link to comment
EPICTANKHERE Posted March 1, 2005 Share Posted March 1, 2005 And then i find out my new clown just died.....dammit. Link to comment
imafishboy Posted March 1, 2005 Share Posted March 1, 2005 lol wfrancis, i've been researching about LED's for about a week or so. i couldn't find any good info to DIY one. but they cost alot more than something i could make. but anyway, i learned something about led's today! lol where did you learns this stuff? i'm still a lil shady on some of details...i want to make a 2 light led moonlight for my tank, can you help me? i'm thinkin bout getting stuff from here http://www.thelebos.com/ or from radio shack...lol ya think you could just tell me wht to get? ...draw up a diagram? and i'm confused how to connect the power supply since it would be something like an the DC plug. do i cut it and strip the wire? anything will be greatly appreciated. Link to comment
wfrancis76 Posted March 1, 2005 Author Share Posted March 1, 2005 imafishboy, I checked out that website, very cool. I would buy the 5 LED DIY "no soder" kit. it's only 17.95. That's much cheaper than just buying 5 LED's at radio shack. and the LED"s they are selling are much better, almost twice as bright. And, it comes with a detailed manual on how to do it. All I would add is that when it comes to mounting LED's in a Powerquad, the best method is to buy radioshack led holders. http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?cata...%5Fid=276%2D080 you just drill the holes and stick them in. hope this helps loren Link to comment
wfrancis76 Posted March 1, 2005 Author Share Posted March 1, 2005 Originally posted by EPICTANKHERE And then i find out my new clown just died.....dammit. That pretty clown in the pic died? That sucks. Did you ever get your nitrates down. I just put a bunch of macro algea behind some of my live rock. I just got 3 turbo's and 3 hermit crabs yesterday. The turbo snails are huge! it didn't know they were that big. I've also got a cleaner shrimp and a yellow tail damsel. All seem very happy and my nitrates are at 5 ppm and nitrites at 0. I'm really anxious to get some an anome and a clown. Link to comment
EPICTANKHERE Posted March 1, 2005 Share Posted March 1, 2005 Yeah as soon as i put some chaeto algea behind my rocks the nitrate problem disapeered. checked it yesterday and it was at 5. everything else was perfect water quality wise. I think he was a bad fish. He never ate or anything. I am finding it really hard to find a reliable LFS in LA. I had a turbo snail and he grew like crazy! started knocking stuff over. I tell you the janitor packs from garf.org are worth it they give you very small nerite and cirith snails that are great algea eaters and the hermits were all less then the size of a dime. Link to comment
wfrancis76 Posted March 1, 2005 Author Share Posted March 1, 2005 after most my algae is gone i think i'll take one of the turbo's back. I was going to get an emerald crab and a Nassaus (sp) snail today. i need some more detrius (sp) eaters. i've got two red legged hermits and one blue legged. they are very small. i'm probably going to get some shells for when they grow. i'm really pumped about getting some coral in there! do you have a cleaner shrimp? Mine is my favorite animal so far. he's very curious. likes to jump on my hand when it's in the tank. Link to comment
EPICTANKHERE Posted March 1, 2005 Share Posted March 1, 2005 yeah love my cleaner shrimp! good for cleaning out your finger nails LOL. Link to comment
EPICTANKHERE Posted March 3, 2005 Share Posted March 3, 2005 So i got my aquaclear500 today and the thing basically is as long as the back of the tank. Prob will have to get rid of one of my powerheads but from what i hear the filter (that i am converting into a fuge) will provide enough flow to make up the difference. But this ruins my chance of mounting a cpu fan where you put yours. i've had the feeder top of to get rid of the heat but it has gotten as high as 84 degrees. aggghhhh! when summer happens i am sure one cpu fan wont even be enough. I want to mount two of them inside the hood maybe on the top pionting down next to the fedder top on both sides. what do you think about this location? Do you think they will fit there? And how do i wire 2 fans? i'd prefer to only have to use one plug and you seem to be an electronics guru. Link to comment
wfrancis76 Posted March 3, 2005 Author Share Posted March 3, 2005 I would mount them on top of the hood. It would probably look pretty cool. You would one one blowing air in one side and one pulling air out the other side. Cutting the holes is the hardest part. I would use a half inch or quarter inch boring bit with a drill and do a circular pattern of small holes instead of one big hole. Wiring two fans is the same as one. Strip the wires on a 12 volt plug run both negatives to the negative from the plug (the one with the ridges) and both positives to the positive. computer fans draw very little amps so you can put a whole bunch off of one plug. do you have any pics of someone with a ac fuge on an eclipse 12? Link to comment
EPICTANKHERE Posted March 3, 2005 Share Posted March 3, 2005 awsome buying fans tomorrow! thanks man. i posted one link on your other thread but i dont think it has eclipse pics. this guy did it with a ac200 but imo that is too small for a fuge, he had a skimmer back there too though. I am going to use the 500 (think its actually called the 110 now) and will post my progress on your new thread if you dont mind me hijacking it. here's the link for the ac200 fuge on an eclipse: http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/showthread...&threadid=35832 Link to comment
wfrancis76 Posted March 3, 2005 Author Share Posted March 3, 2005 BTW to mount the fans buy a simple set of machine screws with nuts from your local harware store. Put the fan where you want it and mark the holes with a small drill bit. Drill the holes and secure the fan with the screw and nuts. with the fan mounted use a pencil to trace the big circle where you want the holes drilled. then take the fan off and drill either a bunch of small holes or a few big holes. run the wires on the inside of the hood and out the back. I'm assuming that you mounted your powerquad on the two existing holes that the stock lighting used. if so you should have an inch or so of space between the reflector and the hood. so your fans should draw the heat right off the reflector. Link to comment
EPICTANKHERE Posted March 3, 2005 Share Posted March 3, 2005 thats exactly how i mounted my quad. great advice! Thats exactly how i will do it. luckily i have a dremil that i am borrowing it is great for mods. god this stuff geeks you out. my fiance wont stop making fun of me. I DONT CARE!!!! thanks again. Link to comment
imafishboy Posted March 5, 2005 Share Posted March 5, 2005 wow, thanks wfrancis for the advice on the leds. i also have a question about the acrylic if ya don't mind... is there a way to heat treat it without "bendage"? hmmm mb putting on something flat and..blowdrying it? lol... thanks in advanced! Link to comment
afiser Posted March 14, 2005 Share Posted March 14, 2005 thanx for the LED info in really helped Link to comment
selch Posted March 16, 2005 Share Posted March 16, 2005 Originally posted by wfrancis76 custom cut acrylic for a splash gaurd. has anyone with a eclipse 12 done this? will it create any propblems? Did you have someone cut the acrylic for you or did you do it yourself? I just bought a piece to do exactly that but have been hesitant to start slicing it on my own. And how'd you get the measurements? Link to comment
wfrancis76 Posted March 16, 2005 Author Share Posted March 16, 2005 i cut it myself. you just need a utility knife with a "scoring" blade ($2 at lowes or home depot). Take the hood of and trace it onto a piece of cardboard. The cut the piece of cardboard to fit onto the inside flange of the tank. make sure you can put the piece of cardboard on and put the hood back on. Once the cardboard fits tape it to the acyrlic. use the scoring blade to trace the shape on the acrylic. first use light cuts to get the shape scratched into the acrylic. the keep running the blade over the shape over and over until you cut threw most or all of the acrylic. then just pop the piece out. take your time and try to cut all the way through with the scoring blade. you can cut half way through and try to snap the rest of the way like glass or tile but you risk screwing the who thing up. use some sandpaper to clean up the edges when your done. good luck. Link to comment
EPICTANKHERE Posted March 21, 2005 Share Posted March 21, 2005 Just checking in... hows the tank going? any new pics. we eclipsers got to stick together! Link to comment
wfrancis76 Posted March 21, 2005 Author Share Posted March 21, 2005 the tank is going great. i had a bad algae bloom that finally went away. i've got some zoo's, a xenia, a green star poylop, and some mushrooms. I've also got a clown, a damsel and my skunk shrimp. along with all kinds of cleaning crew. i'm really enjoying it, although now that everything is balanced out and running good, i'm getting kind of bored. I like doing all the mods. I wish i had some pics. i'll have to borrow my friends camera again. i have one buy i lost the compact flash disk. too lazy to buy a new one. I went a little filter nuts during my algae bloom. i've got a AC 300 and a Fluval 204 canister filter. currently i'm trying to find a nice frog spawn. haven't seen anything i like yet. how's your tank? Link to comment
EPICTANKHERE Posted March 21, 2005 Share Posted March 21, 2005 wow you went off! I think i've seen my tank with the lights on for a total of 2 hours the last 2 weeks. been working like a mad man. Frog spawn is cool i want a green torch badly. I attempted some fraging. My roomate has some peices of large coral in his 120g and I cut some GSP and superglued it to my rock, it worked perfectly, also cut some spegehti coral (soft) and have been trying to get it to attach to a rock with a rubberband but thats not working out so well. Did you convert your AC300? Make sure you keep that filter clean or it will add to your nitrates. Still havn't done my fan mods yet - dammit. Frozen water bottles are ghetto but they work! Link to comment
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