DIY LED lighting

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22nd December 2008

Before allocating money to all the items needed for this project I decided to test out a single series first. No point me buying all the items needed and then finding that it didn't work or that my abilities were not good enough for the task.

I did some basic searching and found ebay pretty good for the parts needed.

For this single series I would need 3 LEDs, a 12V adaptor (700ma or above) a current controller for 3W LEDs and some wire. For heat dissipation I would need some heatsinks. For wire I used blue/brown wire from standard power cables.

I bought all of these apart from the wire from ebay. The LEDs came as sets of 5 so I had 2 spare for this 'learning' setup. The heatsinks are for PC memory chips which came in packs of 8.

This test would be for a '9W' setup, however the current controller consumes 1.5V leaving 10.5V of the 'available' current from the adaptor available to the LEDs. Each of these LEDs takes 3.7V for max brightness and therefore are underpowered. I am told they are actually running at 2.45W which means each series totals 7.35W.






With the series wired up and complete I plugged it in. These are really bright and you shouldn't look directly at them. If you do you will experience a similar experience to welders that have a welder's flash. The brightness burns the retina and you have pain in your eyes for a few days.

After I had tested that the series worked I crudely fastened the series onto the front flap of the tank's hood to see how bright they were. The results were impressive. A single series is just 0.22WPG yet it is brighter than using an 18W fluorescent even though there is only 7.35W through the LEDs!!! Also they give the 'shimmering' effect which is very pleasing to the eye. Colouration from the 5500K is perfect in my opinion. It doesn't 'enhance' the colours of the fish or the plants. Everything looks as it would under natural daylight so no 'false' colouration. If you want fish colours enhanced then there are different K ratings of these LEDs so pick and choose as you would with fluorescent lighting.

With the test complete and succesful I moved onto designing the complete luminaire and ordering all the parts needed to complete the project.









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