LED Pre-Purchase Reality Check?

[pherbert]

I've done a bunch of reading so far and I'm getting ready to order LEDs for my 90 gallon (4' x 18" x 2'deep) mixed reef tomorrow. I'm just looking for a reality check/some validation of the following thought process.


I want to go LED for energy savings and to get out of the bulb replacement treadmill.
I'd really like flexible programability, either web-based (Like the Radion Gen 2.) or by getting a Neptune Apex.
I'm handy enough to build my own with a kit, busy enough to maybe be willing to pay for an assembled light.
I currently have 2x250 14k MH going 8 hours and a T5 fixture that runs the first and last couple hours of the day.


Originally I was leaning towards 2 Radions, now I'm thinking either the RapidLED 90 gallon kit (with Neptune Apex,) or possibly a couple of the Apollo SolarBlast 5000s (with Neptune Apex.)


The Radions or Apollos are $300 more, but I don't have to do any work.


I'm leaning towards the RapidLEDs right now.


Is there anything I'm missing, or another company I should be considering? Let's just say money is no object (of course it is ) I'm probably as much interested in hearing from those of you who have been down one of the above paths already and maybe wish you'd done something differently.


Thanks!

 

[cdrewferd]

You want to either include as many LED colors as you can, or perhaps suppliment with 2 T5's to really get the color and growth.

 

[Craigar]

I love my ai sol blues I've had great success with them in the past 2-3 years

 

[09bumblebee]

I love my ai sol blues I've had great success with them in the past 2-3 tears

Hmm why are you crying over them Craig?

 

[pherbert]

I love my ai sol blues I've had great success with them in the past 2-3 tears

I looked at the AIs and liked them, but the geek heaven of goofing around with the web interface on my phone or laptop won out.

 

[Cake_Boss]

Consider a reef angel for controlling. It has built-in ports to run drivers ( up to 6 I think) and built-in AI port ( one of the ato ports).

If you can build your own, I'd do DIY

Sent from my Xoom using Tapatalk HD

 

[pherbert]

Thanks to all you you who responded. I feel pretty good about going with RapidLED now.

 

[Smiley]

you also have Acan Lighting and Kessil Lighting.

 

[Mr_Ed]

Now that it's after Christmas I can respond to this thread.

First of all, a little background...

It's my daughter that is really the expert in the saltwater forum, but I joined MASC to learn so that I can help out in 'tank management'. I've also been studying to make sure birthday and Christmas gifts are compatible.
So, that said, I decided to get her the RapidLED setup. I did the 4 channel dimmable for a 90g tank. It is basically less than half the cost of a similar AI Vega setup.

I got everything basically working and wrapped under the tree. Looking at the wires and drivers and controllers on Christmas morning was not that impressive but once it was placed on the tank it is very impressive.

This light rocks! We now have it connected to the tank controller and the sunrises and sunsets are programmed.
Next, I want to get in line to borrow the PAR meter and see what we really have.

 

[Cake_Boss]

Re: LED Pre-Purchase Reality Check?

That's a freaking awesome present! Looking to adopt?.....j/k. Can we see some pics/vids of the light in action?

Sent from my Xoom using Tapatalk HD

 

[pherbert]

I'm still goofing around putting mine together. My mom was in from out of town for 10 days so it felt pretty uncool to disappear for a couple of nights to work on them.

I'd like to see pics too! How did you configure the controllers and lights? For instance, I thought I would wire the RB and UV on one string, the CW, R, and G on the other. And how did you decide how to lay them out? I've tried several layouts on paper and on the heatsink already. They did send me yesterday a diagram from one of their customers, but only after I asked for it. I attached it below in case someone is interested. A lot of people raved about the RapidLED service, but I felt that they send you a box of parts with not much guidance. I'm tech savvy and that's probably the nature of the beast for DIY. But to compare, I just received a kit to replace the foam surrounds on some vintage speakers I have for $38, and that guy included about 12 pages of instructions with pictures for every step.

Or maybe I just over think things!

View attachment 10646

 

[Zooid]

I'd be very careful mixing colors on the same string.
XPG cool whites and XTE royal blues can handle a LOT more current than some of the red, greens, and UV's.
I think the max current on XPG's and XTE's are 1.5 Amps and the max current on the reds and UV's are 700mA.
Max current on greens are 1 Amp.

 

[pherbert]

I was warned about limiting current to 700 mA if I did it that way. It seemed to make sense to group that way, and it seems like many people are not able to run the LEDs at 100% anyway, but I appreciate the comment and I may go the more traditional way of putting like current together to the max of the string (14 I believe.)

 

[cdrewferd]

Personally, I would only do 1 color per string and make each string dimmable. This is the only way you're gonna get 100% control over your lights and the color that you want from your corals.

 

[pherbert]

The 14 LED per controller limit is a bit of a problem for separating them out like that. Since it's two 20" heatsinks, I did consider spanning strings between heatsinks with some sort of disconnect, and I might still do that to get control over 14 blues and 14 whites on two of the dimmers.

 

[fc_reefer]

Now that it's after Christmas I can respond to this thread.

First of all, a little background...

It's my daughter that is really the expert in the saltwater forum, but I joined MASC to learn so that I can help out in 'tank management'. I've also been studying to make sure birthday and Christmas gifts are compatible.
So, that said, I decided to get her the RapidLED setup. I did the 4 channel dimmable for a 90g tank. It is basically less than half the cost of a similar AI Vega setup.

I got everything basically working and wrapped under the tree. Looking at the wires and drivers and controllers on Christmas morning was not that impressive but once it was placed on the tank it is very impressive.

This light rocks! We now have it connected to the tank controller and the sunrises and sunsets are programmed.
Next, I want to get in line to borrow the PAR meter and see what we really have.

Did you just go with their default LED color scheme? I am trying to figure out the color combo I want to go with for my 34 gallon.

 

[Mr_Ed]

Sorry for the delayed reply....

I put all the royal blue on one channel and the cool white, 3 UV, 1 red, and 1 green all on the other. This way it's sort-of like having a white and an actinic. When I laid it out, I ran the royal blues down the middle and spread out the others as much as possible. So, with the four controllers I have two Royal Blue channels and two channels for the whites.

Like mentioned before, you HAVE to limit the power on the drivers. I set the blues to 1A, and the mixed (cool white, red, green, UV) to 750mA. When first setting it up, I added the dual potentiometer to dim the lights. Now we have an Apex to drive the lights. At sunrise we ramp the blues first, then the whites. In the evening, we do the opposite. During the day we only drive the LEDs at 80% of what we could. Using a PAR meter will help us decide what we want to do in the long run, but this seems pretty bright.

We have not added the LED lenses yet - I hope this is not a problem. I plan on using the 80 degree lenses instead of the 60 degree.

I was also planning on converting the tank from a glass-top to an canopy covered. Anyway, on Christmas morning we wanted to see what the lights looked like, so we just set them on top of the glass. It seems to be working fine and they are not hot at all - especially at 80% levels. So, the lights are still sitting on the glass top for now.

I also recommend mounting the drives on a board and using terminal strips for the setup. It makes it much easier to work on - and to measure voltages during the ramp up and down. Once everthing is finalized, then I'll add some type of connectors to the cables/lights for added convenience.


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