# LED - High power DIY - 60cm



## tmiravent (11 Jul 2017)

Hi,
i love doing light for my tanks, here is my last DIY.
Hope you like it!





The fixture from above, you can see it's all aluminium, 4 pieces of double U shape with chihiros leg's (you can buy for around 9/10€).




The light emiters, 4 x10W LED, and a acrylic protection for security.




Detail were the lamp's join the cable, a multi filament RJ45 cable.




They way to fix the LED strips, also with double termal tape to aluminium sheet.
You can see that i'm using T8 LED lamps, took the glass out! [can be dangerous doing this, very careful]




The detail where the cable goes out to power supply and chihiros leg's, can see two previous wrong holes!




Inside protection from preventing the leg's to scratch the led's, wire or acrylic protection.




The power box! Wit visit window to change settings if needed.




Inside the box! You can see i'm just using 2 power adapters for 4 LED strips.
I mesure it it was just too much power, very high PAR.




The power adaptor inside cabinet, with a hanging hook! I can easily connect and disconnect the fixture for maintenance.

Hope you like!
[always very very careful working with electricity, if you don't have knowledge just get away from it]


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## tmiravent (11 Jul 2017)

Par data for 30cm (outside water with non reflections, black and dark place):

1 driver - 55 PAR
2 driver - 100 PAR (the one that i'm using now)
4 driver - 185 PAR

With one driver the light is enough for a normal tank, there is almost no heat.
With two drivers it heat's very few, the one that i'm using now as second power LED for background rotalas!
With 4 drivers the fixture heats a lot, the light is just to much for the tank. For using the 40W i would double the aluminium surface for better heat transfer.

Here is the picture of the my oldest son tank (Vicente, 9 years).




Side by side with Chihiros RGB, i really love the mixture of RGB and 2x6500ºk and 2x4000ºK.
Chihiros RGB is in the 3 low level.



cheers,


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## Neeraj Batra (7 Oct 2017)

Did you screw the led strips to the aluminium heat sink, how did you prevent damage to the PCB circuit?


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## Costa (8 Oct 2017)

Can you please be a little more specific re the lights? Are they IP65, how many lumens, how did you measure the par? PAR of 185 at 30cm out of led strips is impressive.

Could you provide a rundown of the items you purchased to make this work?

Great job, thanks for sharing!


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## Zeus. (8 Oct 2017)

Which LED chips did your use ?


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## Costa (8 Oct 2017)

Zeus. said:


> Which LED chips did your use ?


Looks like he used a strip but would be nice if he elaborated a little


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## ricky tango (9 Oct 2017)

powering them through a network cable ?


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## ian_m (10 Oct 2017)

Be careful RJ45 network connectors are only rated at 1A or less. Prone to melting at much higher currents. Power over Ethernet (POE) is limited to 0.5A for this very reason, current limitations of Ethernet connectors. The cable is generally much higher rated in order of 2-4A.

Also do not use insulation tape near mains & near moisture....spawn of devil.... Prone to either arcing and sparking and drying out and falling off in years to come.


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## tmiravent (14 Oct 2017)

Neeraj Batra said:


> Did you screw the led strips to the aluminium heat sink, how did you prevent damage to the PCB circuit?


_Can't screw too much, have to be gentle.
_


Costa said:


> Can you please be a little more specific re the lights? Are they IP65, how many lumens, how did you measure the par? PAR of 185 at 30cm out of led strips is impressive.Could you provide a rundown of the items you purchased to make this work? Great job, thanks for sharing!


_The led's that i used here are T8 tub led's. I had to break the glass to strip and hack the bulb *[Attention! this is very dangerous, must use eye protection, and strong gloves. The glass is thin and sharp, expect small glass parts]*
Is not IP65.
The spec's say is about 10W - 1000lumen - 6400ºK
This model: http://www.led-pol.com/pl/product/oro-t8-60-glass-bz,1788
About PAR, check the topic (the power of light): https://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads...ihiros-led-par-data-the-power-of-light.43178/
The material list: 2x T8 6400ºK + 2x T8 4000ºK + aluminium strips + screws and bolt's + chihiros adpater for serieA _



Zeus. said:


> Which LED chips did your use ?





Costa said:


> Looks like he used a strip but would be nice if he elaborated a little


_T8 60cm LE POL, the strip is made on aluminium base.
Don't advice to use these T8 tubes directly on aquarium. They use AC 230V, and have holes for heat dissipation.
Using them inside a aquarium flourescent fixture can be a solution for this, remember the heat must get out of the bulbs._




ricky tango said:


> powering them through a network cable ?





ian_m said:


> Be careful RJ45 network connectors are only rated at 1A or less. Prone to melting at much higher currents. Power over Ethernet (POE) is limited to 0.5A for this very reason, current limitations of Ethernet connectors. The cable is generally much higher rated in order of 2-4A. Also do not use insulation tape near mains & near moisture....spawn of devil.... Prone to either arcing and sparking and drying out and falling off in years to come.



ricky tango and ian_m, very well observed! Safety in first place, caution is needed.
_Yes, i split the transformer from led's.
RJ45 is not the best solution, so i tried to put a multi-wire cable instead of a regular RJ45 single cable (more flexible and breaks less).
These led's use high voltage and very low Amp.
The purpose of this topic is sharing information and ideias. Suggestions are welcome.
I view this lights as 'working models', and a way to test theory and learn a bit more.
I take off this light when doing maintenance.
Bad insulation, arching or short circuit can happen, that's true. [trying this takes some risks, buying a comercial aquarium light is safer]
Working with 12v is usually safer, i repeat the same is first post:
*[always very very careful working with electricity, if you don't have knowledge just get away from it]*_
Cheers


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## zozo (14 Oct 2017)

tmiravent said:


> multi-wire cable



Make them yourself  All kinds of wire sleeves are available, if you take the braided version



these are also flexible in diameter and come in decorative coloring even in metal aluminium color. Than you can use simple twin siamese cable per strip, sleeve them.. Than use a little piece of glued (IP68) shrink sleeve to secure the ends. It's not for the IP68 code, but this shrink sleeve contains a strong glue getting soft and adhesive when heated and secures the end of the braided sleeve. 

You can also use different color shrink tube at each end of a cable set as color lable so after you sleeved it each end has it corresponding color.  Helps figuring out which belongs where..

In end result you can have something looking simular like this.


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## tmiravent (14 Oct 2017)

zozo said:


> Make them yourself  All kinds of wire sleeves are available, if you take the braided version
> these are also flexible in diameter and come in decorative coloring even in metal aluminium color. Than you can use simple twin siamese cable per strip, sleeve them.. Than use a little piece of glued (IP68) shrink sleeve to secure the ends. It's not for the IP68 code, but this shrink sleeve contains a strong glue getting soft and adhesive when heated and secures the end of the braided sleeve.
> You can also use different color shrink tube at each end of a cable set as color lable so after you sleeved it each end has it corresponding color.  Helps figuring out which belongs where..
> In end result you can have something looking simular like this.



Very nice ideia zozo, thanks!
Next time i'll try that flexible sleeve. The shrink sleeve i use in all connections.

Any idea for the plug's?
It's very useful to have an easy plug to connect and disconnect the light form transformer (that's why i used the RJ45, very easy to plug for maintenance).
Cheers


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## zozo (14 Oct 2017)

tmiravent said:


> Any idea for the plug's?



There are so many cable connector versions around from jack plug to screw versions, i wouldn't know where to start..  If i make something i first look at what i have and go from there with whats available. For example i use the TC420, this has a row of screw connectors, for this i pinch and solder a fork cable shoe on to the wire. I realy dislike screwing only the cables to it, that's always a hassle.

If you have something like a assambly box you could use strips of predrilled DIY PCB's and solder on PCB cable connectors and go from there.. It all depends on what i have already present and if i can't change that i have to figur out from there what options i have. Lately i'm still in the process of building something with these led drivers  and it is made for a 7 pin Micro JST 2,54 connector. Problem solved found my wired connector type i can use.


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## Cactusface (14 Oct 2017)

Hi trim...,
           That is a super project and well done. My LED lighting is much simpler, well it's only a 20L shrimp tank, and good lighting for plants is perhaps not that important!!  I just used 6x 1Watt bead leds, and driven from a standard 9v main adpator. I did buy a proper controller, but found I didn't need it for this project but will use it on my old Juwel 60L tank, where the original light balest failed, an replacement proved to get too hot, it was replaced with a string of led modules, these you can get on eBay....

Regards

Mel.


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