From Floresent to LED light

[gugge]

Decided just for fun to convert my desk-aqarium to LED light! it works better than i thougt!

Mounting the LED:s



Let there be light!



And on the aquarium



One of the best things about it is that it gives the same effect as Metal Halogen lamps! the ripple on the bottom from the movment on the surface



Well, better late than never I´v change the LEDs to att coldvwhite kind instead and made the installation a bit more serious so it looks better and cools better to! here is a blurry picture of the aquarium with the new LEDs

Now the water doensen´t look yellow anymore

[kingfisher]

Very interesting!

What kind of components do you use? How do you mount them? How do you make sure water doesn't ruin the contacts and LEDs?

Need more info if I want to reproduce this in our own aquariums

Thanks!

[gugge]

In this case it was just a test if it turned out good so I took what i had home to it(yes I´m in to electroics so I have stuff in the closet )

The LED:s are Powerleds 1w Warmwhite( i wolud not recomend warmwhite - use white only insetad so the water doesen´t look yellow) that are sold on many places on the internet.
How you connect them is depending on your powersource for the LED:s but there is a good tool for it here: http://led.linear1.org/led.wiz

most people has a powersource that gives out 12v and then connect them i series, the other specs can you get from the place where you bu the LEDs to fill out the form!

The LED:s get hot, so you have to mount them on a heatconducting surface, as you can se i used a reflector to cool them.

The leds dont like water in the long run, in this test i used silcone to protect then from water.. so they can handle the water fine now but this was as i said just a test - I´ll be doing them a lot nicer now that I now it turned out good! When i do them I will make an exstencive article on the build so anyone can put one together

[bonsai]

Hi. The tank looked very impressive as it was, but with that setup it looks BRILL!

[gugge]

Well i just change water in it and all the "crap" flushed out from hidings so it doesent look so nice I know.. it´s my shimpaquarium that i have beside the comuter - so fun to look at them while they are workning there unfortunally all died at a poweroutake a month ago... now the aquarium is connected to an UPS so that won´t happen again... just need new shirmps now

I was amazed that it got so bright sinse the surface is full of duckweed(yes it´s put there on purpose )

I´m going to replace the LED with ordinary white LED so it doesn´t look yellow to

[smithrc]

those are some expensive LEDs (or they were when I was working for a company that was involved in their first distribution)

I'm concidering a small tank at work to de-stress me a bit - no filter and stuff and I think I'm going to go for LED lighting...

whats the heat build up like in them - heat sink cooling was the only problem with the high output ones a couple of years back... for get the heatsink and they went pop in seconds.
I got a load of blue, white and red "Osram Gloden Dragon" LEDs before I left... 2.3W of LED goodness - they too go pop.

[gugge]

They are not so expensive anymore, there are many more fabricators now, but then expensive is relative

The 1w that gives out 45Lumen kosts about 2,50 GBP here, less if you by more..

The more interersting ones thay gives out 100Lumens and are still 1w LED:s are 10 GBP but can be bougt for 6 GBP if you by more!

The heating is´t that bad anoymore, but they still needs cooling, the 1w can/shall run on 350mA at the most, but if you choose to limmit it to 280-300mA the heat will go down a lot but you dont loose so mutch light.


If you have 2,5w LEDs the current will of course be higher but you get the point, and the best but cost a littlebit is a constant current driver for them, I will use theese in the bigger aquariums.

[gugge]

Updated picture of new LEDs!