Hi everyone. I've been lurking for a bit and I am very excited to start a waterfall ATS for my 330 gallon. It is nicely stock with various tangs and 2 angels. I feed heavily - everyone is fat and happy! With that said, I am going with a DIY 10 cube setup. The dimensions will be 15" X 8". Even though I have been reading a bunch I am still unsure about a few things and would appreciate your advice. - First need your opinion on lighting. I am going with DIY LEDs since I have drivers, power supply and heat sink that I got from Steve's LEDs for a previous pico tank that never took place. I have ordered the LEDs and going with 8 X 3 watt 660 red and 1 X 3 watt royal blue on each side in a linear fashion: red | red | red | red | blue | red | red | red | red The heatsink i have is 3" X 15" X 1.8" fins for each side. Think this would work? - Second, can you guys confirm that there will be no difference between a 15"X8" VS. 8"X15" configuration? Thanks in advance for your replies and suggestions.
orientation is kind of a wash, if you keep the flow per linear inch the same, then you have either a) more overall flow over a wider area with less 'contact time' as the water drops, or b) less flow over a narrower area with more 'contact time'. If that makes sense. So what it comes down to is how big of a pump you want. As far as LEDs go, each LED will cover a given unit of area. It depends a bit on distance from screen, but for the most part, an LED will do well covering a 2" x 2" area or maybe 3" x 3". So a single strip will give you good growth but only right along the center of the axis of the light. IMO what you need is 2 strips on each side of the screen, and using my calculation outlined here, and your screen area of 8x15 = 120, 120/8 = 15 LEDs or 120/4 = 30 LEDs per side (all 660nm) - the former being the minimum, the latter being the maximum You can certainly use less, but you just need to be aware that while your screen size may be reflective of your feeding rate, the lighting needs to also be 'rated' the same, or else your screen capacity is de-rated due to the lowered light. You can compensate for this by running the light for a longer photoperiod but that may only get you so far. I would say, try it and see what your results are. The screen has to mature anyways and during that time, just about any light you throw at it is fine, you're not aiming for immediate filtration, but rather just anything to get it growing. You can always reconfigure later. But I would lay out the LED array in a distributed pattern so that the light is as even as possible.
WOW... thank you so much for the detailed response Turbo! Another option would be for me to use the Steve's led supplies that I have for a small frag-tank and instead purchase lighting for the ATS. I ran into this option on Amazon which would allow for a nice install. I would get 2 packages, so it would be 5 10 watt strips per side and they would be mounted about 1" from the screen. The 5 strips would cover the entire span of the screen for even distribution: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00NANKFNQ/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_?ie=UTF8&psc=1 They also have a red/blue option but the ratio leans too heavy on the blue. Thoughts? which approach would YOU take to light a 15" x 8" keeping budget in mind? Thanks again everyone
SMD LEDs like that are decent most times, and you would want to go with closer mounting like you plan and still go by the wattage per square inch of 0.25W-0.5W/sq in on each side, so 120 sq in that would be between 3 and 6 per side - I would think that would do it. Here are some other good lights to consider: http://www.expressions-ltd.com/Algae_Scrubber_LED_Light_p/led-grow-light.htm This one can be used in a dome reflector, or one of those auto workshop lights like shown in the 3rd picture of post #4 here http://www.ebay.com/itm/301373710943 This last one I really like because it has a nice form factor, you just need to put it in a nice reflector. Something similar to a HID spider reflector would work very well also, or a beer can reflector
Thanks again for your detailed response! I think I will go with the strips I linked to. I like the form factor and should allow for a clean installation. I was going to order the all red strips, however the have red/blue strips with 9 blue + 27 red on each strips. The ratio seemed off to me. What do you think, should I do all red or blue/red?
If you're going with 4 or 5 per side, I would probably use 2 red/blue and the others all red. If going 3 per side, one red/blue, two all red.
They only sell them in sets of 5. So i would have to get 5 blue/red and 5 red as I plan to put 5 on each side. Is there any harm in just going with red. Think that I will see a dramatic difference vs having the blue?
I guess if i get a set of each, i could do 3 reds and 2 blue/reds on one side and 3 blue/reds and 2 reds on the other. thoughts?
possibly, if you can only get them in sets of 5 and you are going to d 5 per side, then to 2 red/blues on one side and 3 red/blues on the other. ninja'd
Thank you sir! They have been ordered. I will be buidinng my unit from an old chopped up wet-dry filter. The bubble-tower from it was the perfect solution for the main box