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Lighting for a 90g

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Kylie, Sep 5, 2011.

  1. Kylie

    Kylie Inactive User

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    What lighting over a 90g (48"L x 18"W x 24"T) would you recommend for a reef tank? I want a lot of color pop and decent growth. Color is more important to me than a lot of growth though. I've seen various LED systems in the past and have liked them, so would be interested in what I would need for enough PAR for a 90g. I do have access to 2 x 400 MH's and would really like to use those if they wouldn't be overkill over a 90g. Curious of everyone's opinions.
    Thanks,Kylie
     
  2. mthomp

    mthomp Inactive User

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    400watt MH would def be overkill. I currently use 2 150 mh with 4 t5 bulbs and seem to get pretty good results on my 9o. Although I am wanting to go all LED i am also considering going with a 6 bulb t5 setup
     
  3. Kylie

    Kylie Inactive User

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    Thats what I figured on the 400w's. So, I have 2 x 150watts over my 65g now and its only 3 feet long. Have you noticed with your two over a 4' space that you have any really low light areas? Or does that seem to work out nicely for 'lower' light corals? Are you able to keep high light things down low like blue maxima clams? I've always been nervous to in my 65g
     
  4. mthomp

    mthomp Inactive User

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    I dont really have any issues with light coverage actually. running a mainly sps tank here and have them on all lvls of my tank and nothing seems to be doing poorly.I do feel 250 watts would be better though. I think greenonion has 250 watt along with t5 on his 120 and last time I was over he said he hasnt ran his Halides all summer with no ill effects.
     
  5. Kylie

    Kylie Inactive User

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    Huh... Well now I have a dilemma. Stick with my 2x150's that are over my 65 now and just transfer them, or switch to 250's... Any brands or types you would recommend? The ones I have now are ebay no brand retrofit
     
  6. Kylie

    Kylie Inactive User

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    So, what sort of LED system would be equivalent or better than 250w metal halides? Again, love color, decent growth, and clarity
     
  7. mthomp

    mthomp Inactive User

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    of course the AI ones are wonderful and have a great many features, you would need 2 though along with a controller and a way to hang them so roughly 1500 bucks. I have been doing some research on the reefbright leds also I think 4 would be needed and about 250 each for a 48 inch. you dont get the control you would with AI so its on or off but from my understanding they look amazing. Kylie you are a pretty handy gal though so perhaps a DIY setup would work for you. i think a 48 inch DIY led system wold run about 600 bucks.
     
  8. Kylie

    Kylie Inactive User

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    Yeah, I've been looking at the DIY ones. My big trouble is knowing it will be what I want. Definitely can't spend 1500 on it. Light budget would probably have to be close to 300-400... Anyone who has done the DIY Led's, feel free to pitch in your opinion. Will probably end up doing 250w mh's retrofit but really want to know more about LED before I make a decision.
     
  9. B-Rad

    B-Rad Inactive User

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    Kylie, I'm going to be selling my 250w MH's shortly, I'm going to upgrade to T5 & Led combo.
    They are Ice Cap 250w HQI, with custom made reflectors 12wide x 17long. I have two of them if you are interested, $200
     
  10. Kylie

    Kylie Inactive User

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    I may be. What leds are you changing to though? Trying to learn more about those before I decide.
     
  11. lehrjet

    lehrjet Inactive User

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    Kylie,
    I have done DYI for my biocube29 and getting ready to do a DYI for my 180g I am going to be building in to my wall of my basement in the near future.  LEDs are nice but it depends if you are going to be doing SPS corals or not.  A lot of people say for SPS corals you should use Cree XP- LEDS vs. the Cree XR leds.  I have some SPS corals in my biocube and they are doing well.  The other thing you need to consider is if you want dimmable for siumulating sunrise and sunset.  The differnece in price is usually around 10 dollars more per driver for dimmable for a rough estimate.  Mine on my biocube are dimmable i have 24 leds 2 drivers one for white one for blue and spent a little over 200 for them then wired everything myself and let my apex dim them.  I didn't use lenses because my leds are very close to the water anyway, for your setup you would probably want 60 or 40 degree lenses to get enough light 2 feet down at the bottom.  60's should do it i think.  A lot of kits out there come with the lenses.  I would think the 48 led dimmable kit from rapid LED for $385 would be plenty for your 90gallon tank but I will do a bit more research first and make sure and let you know if that is something you are interested in.  You would have to buy a heat sink for them which shouldn't run much more then 50 bucks.  I only run my biocube at about 75% power and on top of that I have the drivers dialed way back too so really I am only running 75% of about 75% power if that makes sense.  Also need to consider if you want moonlight but those are pretty cheap too.  My 24 leds are supposed to be the equiv to 175 mh but I can't say for sure other then they are really freakin bright /DesktopModules/ActiveForums/themes/_default/emoticons/smile.gif If your interested in LEDs and want to see some if your near Cedar Rapids more then welcome to check out my biocube anytime and see what they look like to help you decide if LED is a direction you want to go.  Thats my .02 if anyone else familiar with LEDS wants to chime in feel free I am still a bit new to LEDs so another opinion is always welcome.
    J
     
  12. Kylie

    Kylie Inactive User

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    Thanks J. I have been looking a lot at the reefled website at those cree XP/XR leds. From what I can see according to their site, it says a 36 set would be equivalent to a 250w MH. For a 4' tank, I was considering doing two of those with the 60 degree optics. So, do you happen to know that if you get the XP are you still capable of doing LPS corals? At the time being, I've given up on sps. Perhaps with this newer setup, which I plan to make much more advanced than I've done in the past, I'd be more successful with sps. I wouldn't want my lighting to prevent keeping sps but I also don't want it to be too intense for lps. I love lps.

    So I have another question then. I'm trying to make sense of everything that would be needed in a CREE DIY set up. So the heat sink is what everything is attached to and acts as a way to draw heat away from the equipment, you use fans to cool the heat sink, then you have your LED's which are connected no more than 12 in series to a driver... is the driver the equivalent of the power supply then? Or does the driver connect to something else?

    And so, say I was going to have one set up that was 36 LEDs, 24 of which were the blue, 12 of the white, would I have 3 drivers of which 2 run 12 blue LED's each and the third driver runs the remaining whites? And would you organize them on the heat sink to have the white as a row between two rows of blue or would you mix them around and just make sure the wiring is going to the proper driver?

    I'm really liking this idea. I think it would be a fun project. I have not done much electrical stuff but I've been watching the directional videos on their site on how to hook up all the wiring and it doesn't seem too hard. It could be another skill on my list of things to learn that I can check off /DesktopModules/ActiveForums/themes/_default//emoticons/smile.gif
     
  13. B-Rad

    B-Rad Inactive User

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    I'm going to retro fit 5 10w LEDs to a single 48" heat sink to give the shimmer effect that I like, and let the T5s do the brunt of the work as far as growth is concerned. I will try to get a short video latter today of a single 10w blue LED.
     
  14. Kylie

    Kylie Inactive User

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    Also, for the dimmable option, do I need to already have a fancy controller like those $500 setups or do they come with a mini controller just for the lights that I can set on some sort of timer? That would be really nice. I plan to have a controller on the new set up but would like to have something simpler in the meantime. If I were to get at least one set of 36 LED soon, I would probably swap them out in my 65g (36"L x 18"W x 24"T) to make sure I like how they work before I buy a second set for the 90g. (I won't be setting up the 90g officially until I move again next summer)
     
  15. Kylie

    Kylie Inactive User

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    That sounds like a neat setup. I would definitely like to see a video if you didn't mind posting one
     
  16. lehrjet

    lehrjet Inactive User

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    Nice meeting you for lunch today kylie, hope I answered many of your questions and feel free to contact me anytime on future ones. 
    J
     
  17. Kylie

    Kylie Inactive User

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    Thanks! You helped a lot. Now just trying to decide if I have the money to buy a setup. Nice meeting you too /DesktopModules/ActiveForums/themes/_default//emoticons/smile.gif
     
  18. Kylie

    Kylie Inactive User

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    I do have a question now that I'm looking again. You mentioned that certain drivers would possibly be able to handle 18 leds in series. Do you know which ones that would be? And could you direct me to the dimmer switch you were talking about?

    And is this the "light" controller you were talking about? http://www.neptunesys.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=50&Itemid=40
    Did this need a different thing connected to it in order to gradually turn on and off my lights? If I couldn't afford this yet, could I still get the LED's and have them running on an outlet timer?
     
  19. Kylie

    Kylie Inactive User

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    More stuff I found. According to that website, you can connect LED's in parallel to avoid destroying your system (i think..). Here is the link: http://reefledlights.com/wiring-diagrams/

    So is this saying, that should I go with the 18 white, 18 blue (if thats indeed what crabbyo has), then I could use 2 drivers. Each driver would have one set of 9 LED's linked in series, which is linked parallel to a second set of 9 LED's? (making 18 LED's total connected to 1 driver). That wouldn't be so hard to do.

    Haha, and another question while I'm sitting here. You mentioned if I got the pre-drilled heat sink, then I would be able to rearrange my LED's once I upgraded to the 90g. Can you rewire LED's? Once they are connected, can you take them apart again and rewire them? Or does that damage the LED?

    Thanks for putting up with me /DesktopModules/ActiveForums/themes/_default//emoticons/smile.gif
     
  20. lehrjet

    lehrjet Inactive User

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    Wow created a monster /DesktopModules/ActiveForums/themes/_default/emoticons/smile.gif  LOL aren't LEDs cool?  Ok on to the questions.....
    [class="Apple-style-span"]#1. You mentioned that certain drivers would possibly be able to handle 18 leds in series. Do you know which ones that would be? And could you direct me to the dimmer switch you were talking about? [/class]
    Here is the link to one of the drivers, http://www.rapidled.com/servlet/the...ant/Detail  There are some more I'll look them up and let you know on those.Here is the little knob dimmer I was telling you about if you want to skimp by till you got a controller. http://www.rapidled.com/servlet/the...ter/DetailHere is another option with a little more programmable options for you in the mid term.  http://www.rapidled.com/servlet/the...ler/Detail
    [class="Apple-style-span"]#2 And is this the "light" controller you were talking about? #2.5 Did this need a different thing connected to it in order to gradually turn on and off my lights?[/class]
    That is part of it.  You would need that as well as this. http://www.neptunesys.com/index.php...&Itemid=40
    [class="Apple-style-span"]#3 If I couldn't afford this yet, could I still get the LED's and have them running on an outlet timer?[/class]
    Yes you can just have the LEDs on an outlet timer, but you have to have the dimmers hooked up to something or the LEDs wont turn on but you could use that 3.50 cent dial dimmer to do that just fine.
    [class="Apple-style-span"]#4 So is this saying, that should I go with the 18 white, 18 blue (if thats indeed what crabbyo has), then I could use 2 drivers. Each driver would have one set of 9 LED's linked in series, which is linked parallel to a second set of 9 LED's? (making 18 LED's total connected to 1 driver). That wouldn't be so hard to do. [/class]
    I have not explored this much myself, I'll do some reading and get back to you in the next couple of days on this one.  /div>
    [class="Apple-style-span"]#5, 6, 7. You mentioned if I got the pre-drilled heat sink, then I would be able to rearrange my LED's once I upgraded to the 90g. Can you rewire LED's? Once they are connected, can you take them apart again and rewire them? Or does that damage the LED? [/class]
    The short answer is Yes with care.  The long answer is like I said at lunch if you plan on moving them and using the predrilled, make sure sure sure you just get thermal transfer paste and not thermal transfer apoxy.  If you get the glue/apoxy they cannot be moved because that stuff hangs on like none other and you will break the led before you break the bond.  You still should use thermal transfer paste between the led and the heat sink even with pre-drilled even if you plan on never moving them.  The wiring can be redone if your very careful and have a good soldering iron.  Long as your careful and don't have too much solder on the LED you won't damage them moving them once or twice, but you would not want to make this a monthly thing, and like you said you only planned on maybe moving them once at most.
    Again I am no expert, so anyone if I am off the mark on anything please chime up I do not want to be giving bad info here or if there is a better way by all means I am willing to listen LEDs are so customize-able there is so many ways to do things I know a few on this board have a bit more knowledge then me might be able to help with a trick or two of their own.
    Have fun and don't be afraid to ask any more questions you still have 3 left in your quota before I cut you off /DesktopModules/ActiveForums/themes/_default/emoticons/smile.gif  Just joking ask ask ask ask away.
    J
     

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