moonlight ideas?

exhumed07

Superstar Fish
Apr 30, 2006
1,774
0
36
Illinois
#1
ok I been wanting to make a moonlight for my 55 and 20 gallon tanks but I don't know alot about LEDS. I know I need to have resistors to avoid blowing the LEDS but not sure if I can run them in parallel or if I need to do one resistor per LED. if anyone has any informatiuon it would be greatly appreciated.
 

exhumed07

Superstar Fish
Apr 30, 2006
1,774
0
36
Illinois
#3
well I was able to order 50 LEDs today with the resistors already attached and also shrink wrapped water tight. They will work on any 6-12 volt dc power supply and I just so happen to have a old set of computer speakers that have a 12 volt power supply. I tested it and it runs a steady 15 volts. not sure how I can reduce the power but I'm going to work on it.

I did take 5 LEDs out of a couple old computers I have laying in a "parts bin". then I took out a resistor from one of the power supplies. hooked them all up and what do u know they all turned on. I left them on for over 3 hours and none of the LEDs burnt up, the capasiter didn't blow up and the wires and conections did not heat up. So I think the setup should work but still going to try and reduce the voltage from the power supply.

The LEDs should be here in a few days so I will be putting it all together and I will take pics of the steps and the finished product. that way if u all like it u can do the same.

As long as it works this whole thing will only cost me about 15 bucks. and I got enough LEDs to do both my tanks and then some. If they are as bright as my test LED I should only need 10 max for my 55 gallon. and I bought 50 lol.
 

epond83

Large Fish
Mar 11, 2007
483
0
0
#4
That is a good site to use for setting up LED's I hope everything works out for you. It is a better set up to have a restor for each led. As mentioned though you need a specific resistor for your set up which is deptrimented for the drop voltage of the led and you supply volatage. Also the brightness of the led will be deturmined by the MCD of it and also the agnle of light coming out of them along with hight from the bottom surface will deturmine how far apart to pu them.

Last summer i built a hood and wired up florecents in to it along with blue LED's
 

exhumed07

Superstar Fish
Apr 30, 2006
1,774
0
36
Illinois
#5
see I can do comon household electrics. and I know my way in out and around the breaker box as well as switches, sockets, and GFI's. but this small stuff is like 2 miles over my head lol. not used to working with such small voltage and amps, as well as tossing in resistors. but thanks for the help. once I get my LEDs I'll plug in all the info about them into that calculator.
 

epond83

Large Fish
Mar 11, 2007
483
0
0
#6
I was pretty at the same point before i did this, as long as you can be delicate with a soldering iron you are goo to go.

Plug in your info to the calculator, figure out out to supply power to the system, i got a simple male female conector form radio shack the plug the led's into the power supply. i used an old cell phone charger it was 5.5 volts 550mA which required me to find a more rare reistor but i found it had to order 100 but they ate cheap. Also at radio shack they had metal holders that screw together on either side of a plate (i used a plexi glass mounting strip) I got the restors last and could have got a better deal ordering everything at the same place.
So yeah mounted everything up soldered the restors to each led, then soldered a wire to each then to a female connector and tha male on the power side. Plug the power supply into a timer and i have sweet moon lights.

One thing i have come across id people putting them too far back and not lighting up everything well since it's not very bright to beging with. I did a row in the front of my hood that point back at a slight angle and a couple in the middle to back area pointing straight down

Here is a picture of mine, i need to take new pictures with my new camera, the brightness is deciveing since these are long exsposures 6 led's up front 4 in the middle on a 40gal i was able to find fairly bright led's, seems like most of the blues that had the right wavelengh were kinda dim. That is another thing to watch there a couple different blues, i wanted really dark blue don't rememeber the exact number but as low as possible... 460nm-ish i think
 

exhumed07

Superstar Fish
Apr 30, 2006
1,774
0
36
Illinois
#7
it looks great. about what I"m wanting to accomplish. I had a blue LED out of an old set of speakers and a random resistor out of a pc power supply. just pointed the one in the water in the middle of the tank towards the back and it looked pretty sweet. If the ones I ordered are just as bright I think I can get away with just 10 total in my 55. then 2-4 in my 20 gallon. there was a realy cool lighting setup I was looking at that was on a timer and it was all LEDs. but the color temp and brightness would change throughout the day to simulate sunrise to sunset and moonlight. but what was cool about the moonlight was some patches would dim and sweep accross the tank like if clouds were going past. only problem was they cost about 500 bucks. sorry but thats a lil more then I want to spend lol.
 

Aug 10, 2009
34
0
0
#8
defiantly cool, make a little write up, obviuosly the resistor's might change due to power supply, but take some pictures of the mounting, and which color of LED you ordered. i've wanted to do this but don't know exactly what color, how many etc.
 

epond83

Large Fish
Mar 11, 2007
483
0
0
#12
Well you are doing this for your own personal taste, so any color you want works. There are two or three blue leds. When i was looking around a wanted a darker blue so i got a low nm blue, there are higher nm ones that will be lighter blue (moving twoards green) and if you go too low you will be moving twoards purple. All a matter of taste. You can look on a light specrum chart that lists nanometers to see what they will look... if you know the nm
 

exhumed07

Superstar Fish
Apr 30, 2006
1,774
0
36
Illinois
#16
well sad to say my LED moonlighting failed. it looked good for a while but there was an unforseen problem. the leads coming out of the LEDs are made of steel and not nickle like I expected. well water and steel don't work as u all know, and with the addition of electricity it accelerated the corrossion proccess.

So now I have a new idea and I hope it works as just one part has cost me nearly $60 but I could possibly make my money back on it if everything works out right. I bought some custom cut 1/8" acrylic pieces to form 3 trays 1/2 inch deep by 21 inches long and 2 inches wide. each tray has 20 holes in the bottom spaced 1 inch apart. that will be where the LEDs will go. once I have them placed and the wires all soldered I'll fill the tray with epoxy or some other type of resin. this will seal off all the wires and connections from the air and moisture. I also plan to grease the trays so I can pop the whole setup out of the tray. if that works then I should be able to start selling these either to my LFS or on ebay. I'll have to figure out price if this works so I can make some extra cash possibly. I'll post pics once I get my LEDs and epoxy and start assembling all of it.