Looking for advice for lighting for a 29BC with LEDs.

[menace78]

So I was cruising ebay and came across these LEDs,

10W Square High Power White 15000K LED 10-12V 850Lm 1A | eBay

Wondering if anyone has tried using them? or if anyone knows something I don't about using them?
For the price, they seem to be pretty awesome, and I could get all the required equipment to set them up from the same seller.

Any advice/pro's/con's would be appreciated.

Thanks,
Casey

 

[Guerry]

I'd have to say buyer beware, If your looking for cheep LEDS look here Bridgelux chip high power led - Wholesale products with online transaction

 

[Tecnomage]

I know rapidled has a biocube kit with heatsink and everything needed to retrofit one. The Cree LEDs give off a ton of light. When I was looking around at forums the Cree lights were very highly recommended.

 

[Rothany]

I had these in mines Ecoxotic Panorama 12W LED Module w/ Transformer

I had sps,lps,zoos,clams

 

[menace78]

at $7 per equivalent (10w) cree's would be alot more $ and take alot more space. I'm looking for something very compact and inexpensive.
I checked out the rapiled kit, but at $200, I could buy it all and build it myself for less as well.
I like the DIY side and buying a diy kit that I just bol;t in wouldn't satisfy my urge to experiment. lol
The ecoxotic ones would be easy as well but would cost way more than the rapiled kit for the same intensity.

For some background. I already gutted the hood and have retrofired 4x 36w PC's and upgraded and channeled the fans to keep the hood cool.
I plan on housing an anemone and a few clowns in this tank and since it's such a small tank, I would rather not have to supplement feeding for the anemone very much, currently it's housed under a 400w MH.

If you guys think cree is the only way to go, I might fork over the $ for them, but I was hoping to find a cheaper way to get it done, even with lower quality arrays, I might have to replace them more often, but the $ difference and space saving of 10w arrays are my biggest pro's.

My only real unknown is the 10w LED's are rated at 15000k, but I have no way to know how accurate that is, and was hoping someone might have an idea how these things actual lit a tank.

I might have to just take the gamble and get them checked out after I spend the $ and hope I didn't make a bad decision. lol

Any other thoughts or concerns would be appreciated.

Casey

 

[tat2z_21]

Well I have several 10w LEDs and 20w LEDs. I like the color of mine and the power without lenses is great I could not imagine them with lenses. Now I have no actual numbers for these but I am sure that if you had 5 or 6 of them in the 29 there would be enough lighting. Not sure on the efficiency of the lights you have but I am positive that it is less wattage then the 144w's of PCs and more efficient light output

 

[epic1]

I am testing a par 56 on my 24g nano and it seems to be working pretty well.

 

[menace78]

Well I have several 10w LEDs and 20w LEDs. I like the color of mine and the power without lenses is great I could not imagine them with lenses. Now I have no actual numbers for these but I am sure that if you had 5 or 6 of them in the 29 there would be enough lighting. Not sure on the efficiency of the lights you have but I am positive that it is less wattage then the 144w's of PCs and more efficient light output

This is my thinking as well.
I'm still throwing around the possibility of using the 3w emitters as well,
I'm trying to figure how many watts of 15000k I should be looking at over the 29BC not including actinics.
I figured an eaven split point for cost figuring at 90w of led (although not sure I will need that much) It will be ~ $117 (non dimmable) and ~$180 (dimmable) for 90w in 10w led's, and ~$102 (non dimmable) or ~$144 (dimmable) for the same 90w in 3w emitters.

Any ideas on what kind of wattage I should be shooting for?
This will be my 1st run at LED's over a tank, and I know that wattage between LED's and MH/PC/T5 is not comparable.

also, Anyone ever looked into using these on a heatsink? 2PCS Thermoelectric Cooler Peltier- Tec1-12706, 60W, 40x40x3.8mm, 12-15V | eBay[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Casey[/FONT]

 

[Tecnomage]

From what I've read it's less about the wattage and more about the lumens per watt in the proper spectrum.

Which LED
The whole reason most of got into this light scheme was for efficiency. Having said that there have been a lot of question like will this LED work. The thing to look for is efficiency and spectrum. If the spectrum is what you want (matches the bulbs in there now) then you are fine. Most people have picked the CREE XR-E and XP-G LEDs because of their efficiency of over 100 lumens per watt. If the LED you are looking at is not over 100 lumens per watt you probably don’t want it.

I know it's a lot of reading, but you might want to check out:

DIY LEDs - The write-up - Page 251 - Reef Central Online Community

 

[menace78]

From what I've read it's less about the wattage and more about the lumens per watt in the proper spectrum.

Which LED
The whole reason most of got into this light scheme was for efficiency. Having said that there have been a lot of question like will this LED work. The thing to look for is efficiency and spectrum. If the spectrum is what you want (matches the bulbs in there now) then you are fine. Most people have picked the CREE XR-E and XP-G LEDs because of their efficiency of over 100 lumens per watt. If the LED you are looking at is not over 100 lumens per watt you probably don’t want it.

I know it's a lot of reading, but you might want to check out:

DIY LEDs - The write-up - Page 251 - Reef Central Online Community

Still reading threw at my leisure, I'm going to try this setup even without knowing the lumens per watt.
I'm not trying to make a perfect LED fixture, just a cheap one that will use less electricity then the PC's and generate alot less heat.
If all goes well, I'll probably opt to change over my 125g to LED. Then I'll get into the high end LED's.
I'm going to use cree's for the actinics in this build since it's proving harder to find any specs on nm ranges of the cheaper emitters.

I was just hoping someone had used these and might have an idea on what there real life result was. I guess I'll be the Guineapig

Does anyone have any ideas on the use of the thermoelectric peltier's?
I'm thinking adding 2 of those to the build to try and cut down on heat.

Casey

 

[Tecnomage]

Still reading threw at my leisure, I'm going to try this setup even without knowing the lumens per watt.
I'm not trying to make a perfect LED fixture, just a cheap one that will use less electricity then the PC's and generate alot less heat.
If all goes well, I'll probably opt to change over my 125g to LED. Then I'll get into the high end LED's.
I'm going to use cree's for the actinics in this build since it's proving harder to find any specs on nm ranges of the cheaper emitters.

I was just hoping someone had used these and might have an idea on what there real life result was. I guess I'll be the Guineapig

Does anyone have any ideas on the use of the thermoelectric peltier's?
I'm thinking adding 2 of those to the build to try and cut down on heat.

Casey

Cool! Take a lot of pics and share, I'd love to see how it all comes together. Just glancing on ebay those looked like max 850 lumens so they'd be around 85 lumens per watt if my fuzzy brain is right. Though they listed max and not a real spec sheet where you could validate that.

I don't know how much heat those LEDs put out but a lot of people are using aluminum U channel for the lower watt ones, I'm betting a real heatsink and fan would be more than enough, but that's just a guess.

I can't wait to see how it looks when you're done.

-Jim