My DIY LED Aquarium Hood

[neonplanet40]

So put my LED unit in over the last two days. Here is a few pics of the process! Im not a neat person by nature - if it works ok I dont care what it looks like.



The cleaned out hood! And the new fans.

Had to put plastic and silicon it into this section to form a watertight seal.

Quite the mess I have going here!

LED Heat sink and lights installed into hood. And YES that is DD Aquarium epoxy Putty holding the fans in place. Works a charm!

Starting the soldering which I suck at.

My desk is a mess and HAHAHAHAHAHAHA Clegg you useless LAZY LYING BUM!!!!

All finished with the ardunio unit.

Works first time woooot!

Whites only.

Blues only.

Close up of the putty and all finished.

Splashguard on.

Fan filters installed! And hood installed. Done wooo! Now to get rid of the cyno bacteria! Not an easy task but its now on my list.

[razer121]

Im slighty confused, is that a custom heatsink aswell?

[Terbinator]

I don't understand what I'm looking at

[neonplanet40]

Yes I just googled for one with the dimensions I needed. Found the ideal one on Ebay actually.

Had to shop internationally to get all the parts such as the USA for the buckpucks and heatpads for the LEDs. LEDs were got in Europe and when this thing is up at full power it would be similar if not more powerfull to a 250w metal halide while using far less power and creating much less heat.

In the build are

Parts:
12 x PCB adhesive pads.
6 x XPG cool white leds
6 x XPE royal blue leds.
1 x 24V PSU
1 x 1000mA buckpuck with potentiometer.
1 x 700mA buckpuck with potentiometer.
1 x 12" x 6" heatsink.
2 x 80mm akasa fans

Then the Arduino which was also built and can control lighting etc etc such as sunrise and sunsets.

[razer121]

nice, i want one! did you really need both fans though? same with the heatsink?

[danroyle]

That looks sweet.

How much did it all cost (need to do something similar with our tropical fish tank)

[mycarsavw]

I don't understand what I'm looking at

This ^ but LEDs, solder, wires and Arduino was enough to make me read it twice and want one.

[neonplanet40]

I could have done it with one fan but as there was holes for two and they make practically no noise I thought what the hell

As for the heatsink, yes it was def needed as the ekds can run quite hot.

In total I would say the cost was about £220-250. However DD (A nano aquarium manufacturer) make an LED hood for the same tank as mine and they charge £450 for it. It is also half the power as my DIY one so DIY is the way to go to save money and get more light

danroyal, you wouldnt need one like this for a tropical tank. In fact you could just get LED strips for £8 each of ebay and do it like that. As there is nothing in a tropical tank which needs this amount of light intensity. Whereas in a marine tank the corals need this light to live.