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I'm planning to do my first custom full spectrum LED project. Ano po ang recommended number of LED for soft coral keeping sa 20gallons tsaka 40gallons. I know basic electronics and i've done simple led projects before not sure though if I could use regular leds or the HO 3w led version. any suggestions on the recommended number of led?

Bro, not sure if anyone has helped you yet but I read somewhere and agree that any LED that doesn't need a heatsink (e.g. regular LEDs) is most likely not powerful enough to penetrate the water in your tank to light your corals.

I've tried Aquazonic LED Reef light that was ~20 watts that's supposedly full spectrum but my corals either turned brown or lost color, even though it actually said in the box that some of the LED diodes in it were already 1.5Watts, though mostly it was 0.5 Watt LEDs. I may also had something to do with it not actually being full spectrum but could be more more about the power I think...I would go with the readily available 3 watts you could get from the sellers in this forum.

I built a LED array for my scrubber and went with 3W diodes as well...

HTH

Thanks bro. I did my research and I guess you're right. I bought hundreds of 3W LED's colors are Royal Blue, Neutral white and UV. I checked Cree and they recommended these 3 for a full spectrum grow for your corals and should avoid bleaching them. I'm not sure though how to drive them. Any ideas on a DIY dimmable driver for a 20 3W LED project.

Haven't tried that but check out the sponsors here in the section of the same name, like go deals and jarcowin...i think i saw some of them sell dimmable drivers though i am not sure. i'm using non-dimmable. If your LED placement is just crammed close together and the lens angle is a bit wide i think you can just wire them in a way that you can turn of alternate diodes with simple waterproofed switches.. it's not that elegant but does the job i think. keep in mind the lower and upper limits of the driver(s) though in all cases.

There are a lot more leds to choose from now. Before blue and white nga lang, then nagka royal blue, then nagkaroon ng green, reds, violets, etc. I would suggest building a cluster form.. yung parang radion type.. yung leds mo off different colors ay dikit dikit sa isang cluster instead of the normal alternate white and blues.. this will eliminate the rainbow effect.. yung tipong may blue lang sa isang part at white sa isang part ka ilaw..

After an intensive research on what LED colors to use and so on and so forth. I have concluded that you'd need Royal blue, Neutral White and Hyper Violet from a certain wave length. Purchased hundreds of the 3 color combination plus some other colors for aesthetics. I'm building my own LED dimmable driver with wifi controllable aethetic lights. It came from different diagrams(circuit boards) that i've put together. I know basic electronics basic enough for me to build myself an LED driver. Will show you guys pictures on how I would progress on this as I build it. The problem is it would take awhile for the LEDs that I purchased to get here. 25-30 more days since it's in bulk. X_X hope all goes well since I spent alot on those cree LEDs

YGPM bro. Thanks.