LED Set-up for a 10g nano! Need Help!

[clownser]

So I have been doing alot of research about lighting for about a week or 2 now. I am going to go with a DIY LED set up for my 10g nano. I am going to go with a 12 or 15 LED system. I don't know if I should use Cool White Cree XP-G R5 3 watt LEDs(5000-8,300K) or the Cool White Cree Q5 XR-E 3 watt LEDs (6,500K). I do want to house corals in my tank. I am going to do a 50/50 system with the other lights being Royal Blue Cree XR-E LEDs. Will this lighting be sufficient? Does the K rating on LEDs matter as much? I have noticed that in most LED builds people are using the cool white XRE lights even though they have a much lower K rating than the XP-G's. Is PAR and Lumen more important when referring to these lights? Also I will be using 2 Dimmable 2 Mean Well ELN-60-48D Drivers. Any input would be helpful! Thanks!!

 

[king_neptune]

Originally Posted by Clownser
http:///forum/post/3254586
I am going to go with a 12 or 15 LED system. I don't know if I should use Cool White Cree XP-G R5 3 watt LEDs(5000-8,300K) or the Cool White Cree Q5 XR-E 3 watt LEDs (6,500K). Will this lighting be sufficient?
Excelent choice. Both of them are great lights. You read any of EvilCC66's LED guides?
You can do corals jsut fine with a 15 bulb display over a 10g nano. Consider a 10/5 (w/b) vs a 50/50 setup. Or at elast a majority of white instead of a fifty fifty.The white is what really does the growing. The blue is for aesthetics. I dont know off the top of my head how this will affect driver/buckpack purchases. I think a typicle pack handles 6 bulbs doesnt it?
Om not an LED guru, but from what I have read the Cree XR-E lights are pretty much the accepted lights to get.

 

[swimmer4uus]

What current are you wanting to run them on? What driver are you using? If you give me a couple days I'll have my first buck topology driver setup based on the NCP3066 chip. So far I've purchased parts that would equal 10 if they come out right. $50 total. What's your configuration going to be like?

 

[clownser]

Just purchased 18 LEDs 9 CW and 9 RB along with 2 Meanwell ELN 60-48D drivers. Not 100% on my setup yet. New to LEDs and its been awhile since I have had an aquarium. I am just hoping I don't electrocute myself and my fish! Any ideas on setup/wiring would be helpful. Also need to get a fan still so recommendations on those would be awesome!

 

[swimmer4uus]

So are you going to run them 9 in series on each driver? So, roughly that's a demand of 28.8 volts when the LEDs are dropping aprox. 3.2 volts each. When you wire these up, you'll be trimming down the Meanwells pretty close to their min output. Not a bad thing, but efficiency is a little down. You could technically run all your LEDs off one Meanwell.
EDIT: Looking at the data sheet for those meanwells, looks like the smallest voltage you can trim those down to is 43.2 Volts. You probably should have bought the 27 series, and trimmed the output to it's maximum.