First post. New Reefer

[wfrancis]

Hey everyone. I'm new to this hobby and I thought I'd join this site since I live in SA. Quick history: Two months ago I was at the Asian Kitchen on Marbach in SA and saw their saltwater tank. I've have fresh tanks for years and have gotten quite bored with them. The fish in the tank were so beautiful i had to have one. Long storty short, now I have a eclipse 12 thant i'm setting up a nano-reef in. My friend Randy, who is a member has been helping me out and i've done a rediculus amount of reading. Anyway i'm going to attach a few pics. I've made some changes since this pics were taken but it'll give you an idea of what i'm trying to do.

Here's the current setup.

Eclipse 12
AC 300 (i'm putting on today)
96 Watt Coralife powerquad
custom moonlights
13 Watt PC (also putting on today, it was the stock lighting, i tore out the balllast and i'm going to mout the light.)
Rio 200 PH
17 # live rock
10 # live sand
1 skunk cleaner shrimp
2 big turbo snails
2 nassasius (sp) snails
3 hemit crabs
1 emarald crab
1 blue fin damsel
burgandy mushrooms (thanks to Randy)

I hadn't put any live shock in the tank when i took the pics.

Loren

[wfrancis]

close up

[wfrancis]

retrofit lights and custom moonlights

[wfrancis]

at night

[6LINE]

Welcome to MAAST!!

The tank looks good. Looks like you are on the right track.

[Tim Marvin]

looks very cool, welcome to MAAST!

[CD]

Welcome to MAAST, Loren!
Cool tank! So show us a pic with the critters in there :)

Wendy

[dan]

cool pics. looks like UFO'S coming with the moon lights.

[Polkster13]

The moon lights look way cool. You said they were custom. Did you make them, and if so; how?

I second the request for a picture of the live stock. All in favor, say aye!

[dow]

AYE. Oh, and Welcome, Loren.

This is a great site, and the people are a lot of help and a lot of fun. Although I hope you realize that your 12 gallon nano is most likely only a "gateway drug" to bigger and bigger and more and more and gottahavethis and gottahavethat and on and on and on ...

Dow (who's going to go lay down now until the voices stop telling him to buy a bigger tank)

[wfrancis]

Thanks everyone. I'll try to get some new pics tonight. your right dow, this is total crack!! i'm completely obsessed! i call my wife from work to have her check on my tank. hmmm... that gives me an idea a web cam on the tank... see, like i said, total crack.

Polkster13. i made the moon lights with some leds from radioshack. let me know if you want instructions. i'll type them up with a diagram.

Loren

[FSU]

WELCOME to MAAST!!! Tank looks very nice! Moonlights as well!

[dow]

Loren, if you don't mind, I'd like a copy of that diagram as well for the moonlights.

Thanks,

dow

[Polkster13]

Yes, please send them to me either via email or PM. Whichever is easier for you.

Thanks.

[DeletedAccount]

Very pretty! Welcome to MAAST!

[wfrancis]

Ok. I had alot of questions in another online form about the LED's So luckily, I still have those post. Everyone ready for ELECTRONICS 101. Here goes.


This is my current set up except with 6 LED’s. It’s the same no matter how many you have.
If you have a different power supply or LED you need to calculate the amount of RESISTANCE needed.
V = I x R
V is Volts, I is current, R is reistance
Here is how I calculated it for my set up. Since 4.5 Volts is a little too much for the LED’s I bought I had to add some resistance to drop the voltage.
My LED’s need from 3.7 to 4.5 volts. To be safe I wanted around 4 volts.
I = .02 Amps or 20 mAmps
4.5 – 4.0 = 0.5 Volts : That’s how much voltage drop I want.
R = V/I = 0.5/.02 = 25 ohms.
The store had 22 ohm resistors which was close enough.

EXAMPLE:
If I had a 12 Volt power supply instead of a 4.5 Volt, Lets calculate the resistance needed.
12 – 4.0 = 8 Volts ß that’s how much voltage drop we want.
I = 0.02 Amps ß that’s how much current our LED draws, may be more or less for different LED’s
R = V/I = 8/.02 = 400 ohms.
So we would need a 400 ohm resistor or something close. Just as long as we keep the voltage between 3.7 to 4.5 Volts. Again, different LED’s have different voltage ranges, so adjust accordingly

As far as mounting the LED's goes. Raidoshack sells some really cool mounts. I just drilled holes in my reflector and popped them in.
http://www.radioshack.com/product.a...%5Fid=276%2D080

Here is a guy online that sells all sorts of DIY moonlight stuff. http://www.thelebos.com/

BTW the best place to buy LED's in SA is A-Tex electronics by the airport. But they are regularly out of stock.

Have fun.

[Polkster13]

Sweet!. I will print this out and try and figure it out.

[wfrancis]

BTW, when I say "power supply" i'm just talking about a AC to DC transformer. Like the kind your cordless phone uses. People usually have a few laying around the house of various voltages. You can use anyone you want as long as it has more or the same volts as the LED needs as long as you attach the appropriate resistance, and enough Amp output to cover what the LED needs (which is very small).

[JimD]

Gotta love Ohms law.

[mkengr45]

Welcome to maast Loren. You will learn lots of things. Keep reading.


Randy

[garagebrian]

AYE. Oh, and Welcome, Loren.

This is a great site, and the people are a lot of help and a lot of fun. Although I hope you realize that your 12 gallon nano is most likely only a "gateway drug" to bigger and bigger and more and more and gottahavethis and gottahavethat and on and on and on ...

Dow (who's going to go lay down now until the voices stop telling him to buy a bigger tank)

Someone better get dow a comfortable pillow and blanket if he is really going to wait until the voices stop for a bigger tank :) Maybe a touchscreen keyboard he can use while laying down so he can keep posting on MAAST?

B.

[brewercm]

Nice looking setup, and welcome to MAAST.

[wfrancis]

2 months old

[wfrancis]

2

[wfrancis]

more pics here
http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=51834&perpage=20&pagenu mber=4

[jim1000]

For any of you instersted in building moonlights with leds, this site will help to figure out the resistors needed for any type of led . www.electronics.vispa.com Sorry do not know how to make it an active link.

Jim

[GaryP]

Welcome to MAAST

[Brett Wilson]

Nice tank, It looks like a neat setup. :)

Thank you very much for the DIY moonlight info... I'm probably going to end up doing that myself now. :)

Seeing your name reminded me of that old movie, Stripes.
"The name's Francis Sawyer, but everybody calls me Psycho. Any of you guys call me Francis, and I'll kill you. "

-Brett