Quick LED question, please.

  • We are currently upgrading MFK. thanks! -neo
Menards or Home Depot sells LED work light. They're 12 x12. Cheap and look good. I think around $30

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rbarn said:
A couple of small 12" Ecoxotic stunner strips would work well for you.
http://www.ecoxotic.com/stunner-led-strips.html

They even offer a simple $15 dimmer in the price list.
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The stunner strips give little to no shimmer. They are made for just illuminating the tank. The individual led's are just not powerful enough. If you want shimmer go with the http://www.ecoxotic.com/panorama-pro-module.html
I have 3x 48" stunner strips and 4x panorama pro's to light up my 110g. It took all of that to achieve the shimmer I wanted. Don't be fooled by these low end led's like the one's found in the marineland double bright fixture's. All you will get is a lot of light and very little if any shimmer. In the led lighting department you have to pay to play.
 
not gonna find cheaper lighting than beamswork. they are already bare bones chinese knockoffs. if you could make one cheaper, they would undercut you and sell for less. good luck
 
Ebay but not .com go for .co.uk. I just bought 120cm x 2 for £9 which would be about $15 i guess but they are completely waterproof and submersible. The ones pictured above are not, i got those for the back of the t.v. :)
 
spiff44 said:
IMO, I don't think any sort of special light causes that other than it take sheer intensity to do it. Add enough inferior lights to equal the output of say a metal halide grow light and they would do the same.
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This is not really true. The key to shimmer is that you want the light to be a point source. Diffuse lighting like a fluorescent bulb or those strips composed of densely packed LEDs aren't going to give you much shimmer, and adding more will make things brighter but may end up giving you even less shimmer.

Similarly, I imagine that LED ropelight that you posted probably won't do a great job either.

The best shimmer will come from a small number of bright point sources. Surface agitation will also help, as will raising the light higher above the tank.

I assume you're not growing plants so you don't care about achieving high intensity of PAR. If you don't care much about electricity consumption, look into a small metal halide (can probably be had for pretty cheap since lots of people are switching to LEDs and selling their old halide setups). Another option would be to try a couple of PAR38 bulbs. Cheapest option would probably be to make a DIY fixture with a cluster of some high powered LEDs.

Check out this old vid of my 65g, which is lit with only 6 3W cree LEDs and has plenty of shimmer (you can skip to around 40s in. There's actually more shimmer in person than the video captures). I can make the shimmer more intense by grouping the LEDs closer together and raising the fixture or lowering the water level. The shimmer during water changes is ridiculous.

[video=youtube_share;WYvevNdKLG4]http://youtu.be/WYvevNdKLG4[/video]
 
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