decided to go with leds

[thatguy559]

okay now after reading countless threads on the internet on diy led systems that people have built. out of all of them i cant find a simple block diagram showing the leds with the drivers and the dimmer "pots" does anyone know what im takling about

 

[scottmdebord]

If you go to reefecosystems.com the guy has his cell number on there and he was very helpful to me he may be able to email it to you

 

[NC2WA]

fwiw, you might try the DIY Kits from www.rapidled.com

next payday, I am going to get this Kit all blue lights:

http://www.rapidled.com/servlet/the-23/24-Premium-LED-Do-dsh-It-dsh-Yourself/Detail

 

[tat2z_21]

So as far as a dimmer pot you can get any of the pots from radio shack that will handle the voltage that you will be using. As far as the dagram, shouldnt they be wired in series parrallel. That way you have a constant current and voltage between them. The resisters are important as well.

 

[tat2z_21]

http://www.superbrightleds.com/cgi-bin/store/index.cgi?action=DispPage&Page2Disp=/hobby.htm#Dimmer

THis website has some fancy step pots that are digital and might give you a cleaner output then just the traditional pot. These are just wired inline with the lighting. So you need three of them to control all at once and still have the oppurtunity to dim seperately, 2 if you just want to be able to adjust seperately, and one if you want to control all at once.

 

[thatguy559]

https://www.reefledlights.com/products-page/premimum-xr-e-q5-led-kits/48-cree-xr-e-q5-kit/

this is the kit im going with im going to be getting 2 of these kits mounted on 2 24" heat sinks


hey floyd do you think this would work? http://www.superbrightleds.com/pdfs/LDB-8A.pdf

 

[tat2z_21]

Those are nice. Let me know if you need help getting them all hooked up.

 

[thatguy559]

oh trust me im going to need help i cant just wire stuff up i need at least a wire schematic and block diagram then im good to go

 

[thatguy559]

so you think that dimmer is good? for my kit? which 12v power supply should i get?

here is the driver info
http://reefledlights.com/PDF/ELN-60-spec.pdf

 

[bigblue141]

Why the resistors on each leg? you could accomplish the same thing by just putting one right after the battery. I'm a little rusty on theory, but if you're going to run the same load on each leg, it would be easier to control the voltage going to all the legs using less components.

So as far as a dimmer pot you can get any of the pots from radio shack that will handle the voltage that you will be using. As far as the dagram, shouldnt they be wired in series parrallel. That way you have a constant current and voltage between them. The resisters are important as well.

oh trust me im going to need help i cant just wire stuff up i need at least a wire schematic and block diagram then im good to go

Just draw your own. Should be easy enough.

 

[thatguy559]

so where would the dimmer go in this schematic

sorry for the supper huge picture

 

[sullest]

so where would the dimmer go in this schematic

sorry for the supper huge picture

I am thinking that porbably is going to be on the big black ground wire somehow. Usually there are drivers that have PWM on them where you can control their brightness.

 

[thatguy559]

man im just gonna buy premaid units.....lol

 

[ac7av]

Be sure and let us know how they work out. My brother is using only blue led’s for the actinic lighting and even with the 175mh 10k bulb burning you really know it when the led’s are on and they are just elcheepo ones. I might take out my CF bulbs and replace them with led’s my self. The price has sure come down on those things.

 

[76Frags]

If they work as well as everyone is claiming - I can't see why anyone would use halides!? You still get the glitter/strobe effect with LED's too. Per one of the previous questions - i'm curious too about how to wire up the dimmer and how to calculate how many LED's to use per the area of the top of the tank.

 

[ac7av]

I wonder if a regular dimmer like for a normal light would work for the led setup. You know, the type you have for you house lights.

 

[tat2z_21]

basically the same except that the house potentiometer is set up for 115 volts of load so the resistance would be higher. They have 0 to 12 volt potentiometers at RADIOSHACK that would work perfect. But they sell digital step down units online that would work even better.

 

[tat2z_21]

I can almost guarantee that pre fab's power supply has a resister system for each leg of that circuit built in. And with that schematic displayed you would not have the contollability of actinic and whites. They would need to be seperated into legs. With the way that is wired it is going to power all lights and a dimmer would dim all lights if added to the common ground at the end. I am sure that you would like to be able to have the blues on a dimmer and the whites on a dimmer as well.

 

[TJL]

Hey dude, don’t give up yet first off you can only safely run 12 led's on a driver and then you control/limit the power to it (dimable unit) with the dimmer or control module (neptune / da) that way its possible to ramp up/down individual circuits/colors. If you diy I'd run one circuit all white, one all blue and one 50/50 for best control

Todd