What do you think to my DIY lamp?
- Thread starter fishlibrary
- Start date
Louey & dupaboy1992, thanks for your reply.
Both photo of previous post were capture with auto setting from my mobile phone, sorry that no detail information can be provide.
My tank size is 60cm(L) X 28cm(W) X 36cm(H), light up by my DIY LED lamp two month ago. Total 900 X 5mm LED wired on 4 PCB covering 80% of my tank, each PCB consist of 100 X 50000mcd white, 100 X 13000mcd blue & 25 UV LED. Most of the corals love this light, but I think to raise the color temp to more blue. Now, I waiting for more powerful 5mm blue LED to improve the color temp so as to color-up my SPS.
One more photo from my Canon A40.
Exif Data
File size: 337425 bytes
File date: 2006:11:17 19:03:28
Camera make: Canon
Camera model: Canon PowerShot A40
Date/Time: 2006:11:08 20:37:27
Resolution: 800 x 600
Flash used: No
Focal length: 5.4mm (35mm equivalent: 37mm)
CCD width: 5.23mm
Exposure time: 0.077 s (1/13)
Aperture: f/2.8
Whitebalance: Auto
Metering Mode: matrix
Please give me more comment!
Thanks!
Both photo of previous post were capture with auto setting from my mobile phone, sorry that no detail information can be provide.
My tank size is 60cm(L) X 28cm(W) X 36cm(H), light up by my DIY LED lamp two month ago. Total 900 X 5mm LED wired on 4 PCB covering 80% of my tank, each PCB consist of 100 X 50000mcd white, 100 X 13000mcd blue & 25 UV LED. Most of the corals love this light, but I think to raise the color temp to more blue. Now, I waiting for more powerful 5mm blue LED to improve the color temp so as to color-up my SPS.
One more photo from my Canon A40.
Exif Data
File size: 337425 bytes
File date: 2006:11:17 19:03:28
Camera make: Canon
Camera model: Canon PowerShot A40
Date/Time: 2006:11:08 20:37:27
Resolution: 800 x 600
Flash used: No
Focal length: 5.4mm (35mm equivalent: 37mm)
CCD width: 5.23mm
Exposure time: 0.077 s (1/13)
Aperture: f/2.8
Whitebalance: Auto
Metering Mode: matrix
Please give me more comment!
Thanks!
I played around with using LED lamps some time ago and came to a couple conclusions, mind you this was years ago when 10000mcd white lamps were affordable (50000mcd now? yikes), and I only used 100 over a 24" x 18" section of tank.
1) When the lamps themselves were on, they did look very bright and nice.
2) When taking a picture with a camera they looked extremely bright as well, of course the "auto-settings" will keep the shutter open for an extended period to make everything look the same brightness, so I wouldn't use what your camera shows as proof that it works
3) When I turned on 4-55w PC bulbs (this was over a 72" x 18" footprint of a tank), you could hardly tell the LEDs were even on, which made me wonder if they really had any significant effect.
4) How your corals grow will be the ultimate test, much more so than any camera or your eye can show.
5) It's way to early for me to try to calculate how much light output is really coming from those lamps
I'm not knocking your project in anyway, I think it's great, however I'm not convinced on LEDs quite yet. Luckily you did this all on a PCB, when I did my 100 I actually soldered them all together by hand!
1) When the lamps themselves were on, they did look very bright and nice.
2) When taking a picture with a camera they looked extremely bright as well, of course the "auto-settings" will keep the shutter open for an extended period to make everything look the same brightness, so I wouldn't use what your camera shows as proof that it works
3) When I turned on 4-55w PC bulbs (this was over a 72" x 18" footprint of a tank), you could hardly tell the LEDs were even on, which made me wonder if they really had any significant effect.
4) How your corals grow will be the ultimate test, much more so than any camera or your eye can show.
5) It's way to early for me to try to calculate how much light output is really coming from those lamps
I'm not knocking your project in anyway, I think it's great, however I'm not convinced on LEDs quite yet. Luckily you did this all on a PCB, when I did my 100 I actually soldered them all together by hand!
sfsuphysics, Thanks for your support!
I think I am the forerunner of using 50,000mcd 5mm white LED on aquarium lighting. :lol:
I find your fail is mis-planning of intensity, you wrongly spread only 100 LED to cover 24"X18" area. 8O From my case, I uses 900 LEDs cover only 11"X16" area, do you think un-believable??!!
I have try 40,000mcd 5mm white LED before with better result since the color temp show more blue(combination with blue LED) that keep & improve all SPS color.
Unfortunately, those 40,000mcd 5mm white LED burned after 4 week test period and the reason of burn was due to misbelief of factory specification. Factory typical specification of the 40,000mcd 5mm white LED is 3.4VF at 25mA with Temp. 25 degree C, but I only drive it with 3.2VF at 20mA. After 4 week testing period, white LED show less brightness than before. During the test period, a little bit heat emitted from PCB or should be say from the LED itself, that means a lot of heat coming out from the LED PN junction without enough cooling. Or you may say I am driving the LED with in-correct temp., but I refuse the term over-drive. :evil: Finally, I loss 400 X 40,000mcd 5mm white LED.
I think I am the forerunner of using 50,000mcd 5mm white LED on aquarium lighting. :lol:
I find your fail is mis-planning of intensity, you wrongly spread only 100 LED to cover 24"X18" area. 8O From my case, I uses 900 LEDs cover only 11"X16" area, do you think un-believable??!!
I have try 40,000mcd 5mm white LED before with better result since the color temp show more blue(combination with blue LED) that keep & improve all SPS color.
Unfortunately, those 40,000mcd 5mm white LED burned after 4 week test period and the reason of burn was due to misbelief of factory specification. Factory typical specification of the 40,000mcd 5mm white LED is 3.4VF at 25mA with Temp. 25 degree C, but I only drive it with 3.2VF at 20mA. After 4 week testing period, white LED show less brightness than before. During the test period, a little bit heat emitted from PCB or should be say from the LED itself, that means a lot of heat coming out from the LED PN junction without enough cooling. Or you may say I am driving the LED with in-correct temp., but I refuse the term over-drive. :evil: Finally, I loss 400 X 40,000mcd 5mm white LED.
Ah!
Yeah, currently high intensity LED has this heat issue, and it is the major problem to overcome. The fact that it does not give off much IR radiation make it a very difficult problem compare to incandescent bulb that has no heat problem :lol:
If they can make LED with a build-in heat sink or make the housing more thermoconductive, it may help a little. This is the price you pay to be at the forefront of the technology.
Yeah, currently high intensity LED has this heat issue, and it is the major problem to overcome. The fact that it does not give off much IR radiation make it a very difficult problem compare to incandescent bulb that has no heat problem :lol:
If they can make LED with a build-in heat sink or make the housing more thermoconductive, it may help a little. This is the price you pay to be at the forefront of the technology.
No I didn't fail at the planning, I actually sunk all of the LEDs into a holder, and soldered the wires together which made one hell of a mess, there is no way I could do 900 in the space you mention. You using a PCB instead just to plug them in can easily do better than I, although I'm guessing they are quite crammed together.
To give you an idea of intensity, I'm assuming your 50cd leds, are 10degree spread? If so 50/42 x 400 gives you about 475 lumens for the white parts, a typical 150 watt metal halide gives over 10000 lumens, so unless I did the math wrong.. which is possible
Doesn't look as much light as you think. Mind you lumens are a human eye viewing aspect, so bluer means less lumens, but still its something to think about.Oooooo...........So disappointed!
50,000mcd with 20 degrees beam angle white LED only have 4.773Lumen, 400 white LED X 4.773Lumen = 1909.2Lumen. That is far far away from a 150HQI.
PAR also unknown, it is so expensive if buying a PAR meter for measure once. Spectrometer also un-reachable for me!!!!!!! :?
50,000mcd with 20 degrees beam angle white LED only have 4.773Lumen, 400 white LED X 4.773Lumen = 1909.2Lumen. That is far far away from a 150HQI.
PAR also unknown, it is so expensive if buying a PAR meter for measure once. Spectrometer also un-reachable for me!!!!!!! :?
I have also been playing around with LEDs just for fun. Nothing on the 900 LED scale though. That scale is too expensive for goofing around with. I did make some smaller 15, 40, and 100 LED setups. The 40 is nice as a backup when the power fails or its a hot day inside. The soft corals have grown towards the area that get hit with the blue leds which may be anecdotal, but I find interesting. The blue leds are in a simple horizontal line that hits a narrow band in the front part of the tank. I leave them on 24x7 and they've been running somewhere in the neighborhood of a year now. Since they are not real bright I have no way to tell if they've lost intensity.
I'm not ripping out my MH light. In fact when I did some non-scientific tests I could get my 100 LED array to be higher intensity (visibly) than my 400 watt XM bulb. Of course that was 100 LEDS that covered about a 10x10 inch space whereas the single 400 watt XM bulb is for the whole tank. These are all just 10,000 mcd LEDs though. If they can get the LEDs to become more efficient than MH then I think they have some potential. Its an overly simplistic statement, but unless the LEDs can convert a larger percentage of the electricy to light instead of heat as compared to MH, then they just aren't as good.
I do think though that for nano's this is becoming a viable way to go. If nothing else, you can direct a large amount of the heat to the back of the PCB with a peltier chip and they exhaust it from the tank without affecting the water temp like a small MH bulb does.
Just my $.02
I'm not ripping out my MH light. In fact when I did some non-scientific tests I could get my 100 LED array to be higher intensity (visibly) than my 400 watt XM bulb. Of course that was 100 LEDS that covered about a 10x10 inch space whereas the single 400 watt XM bulb is for the whole tank. These are all just 10,000 mcd LEDs though. If they can get the LEDs to become more efficient than MH then I think they have some potential. Its an overly simplistic statement, but unless the LEDs can convert a larger percentage of the electricy to light instead of heat as compared to MH, then they just aren't as good.
I do think though that for nano's this is becoming a viable way to go. If nothing else, you can direct a large amount of the heat to the back of the PCB with a peltier chip and they exhaust it from the tank without affecting the water temp like a small MH bulb does.
Just my $.02
utahsaltreefer,
Thank you for your support!
Would you mind to share how do you drive the LED array?
You are right, 900 LED is really and also expensive to me. It cost me at around US$200 only on LED itself, previous burned 40,000mcd LED not included.
Experience capture from this burning of 40,000mcd LED, now I under-drive all the LED below factory minimum specification. On this under-drive condition, no heat coming out from LED again! And all the LED maintain the brightness as same as the new one after two month operation.
Thank you for your support!
Would you mind to share how do you drive the LED array?
You are right, 900 LED is really and also expensive to me. It cost me at around US$200 only on LED itself, previous burned 40,000mcd LED not included.
Experience capture from this burning of 40,000mcd LED, now I under-drive all the LED below factory minimum specification.
On this under-drive condition, no heat coming out from LED again! And all the LED maintain the brightness as same as the new one after two month operation.
Planning how to drive the LED array, how many voltage & forward current.
Prepare the tools & materials.
Tools : Cutter, wire wrapper.
Materials : 50,000mcd white LED, 13,000mcd blue LED & UV LED, pre-drilled PCB board, copper wire, power supply(not include inside the photo)
Prepare the tools & materials.
Tools : Cutter, wire wrapper.
Materials : 50,000mcd white LED, 13,000mcd blue LED & UV LED, pre-drilled PCB board, copper wire, power supply(not include inside the photo)
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