Saturday added 2 new corals , cynarin Lacrimalis (wants to medium light, I put the right front corner) and a fine specimen, although small, Catalaphyllia jardinei ... which I hope to be doing better than 2 to "friends" in the death My aquarium now over 1 year ago.

I wanted to try to purchase the LED from China, always with his friend Valerio (more versed than me on this and related electricity ... and on other issues, for that matter! You can read it on his site ValerioSub.it ) as was the case with killifish eggs that we are about to hatch .
As I got to write this technology is making great strides in improving the efficiency constantly, and even now you can buy products at a compelling cost that, with a little 'do-it-yourself, can be combined to make functional lighting systems and especially adaptable to different needs, from mini bowl (maybe already has a 3W LED light enough to see the fish in it), freshwater aquarium of 100 liters, as well as to ' marine aquarium (due to the different shades of color that are the LEDs, including blue to match the classic white of them are already sold by the white-hot to the cold 20,000 ° Kelvin).

They arrived a couple of weeks ago and I started to try these small LEDs. I must say that they really do a lot of light, just as I expected but I could not be sure the source view, the fact that they are "smarcati" (ie not the most popular LED CREE), as well as the price really low (even including the payment of customs duty).

Basically I bought 2 types of LEDs with 2 different shades of color:

- 5 LED 3W declared at 6000-7000 ° Kelvin (pure white) to 180-200 lumens (then about 60 lumens per watt), star of the most commonly used today for the construction of overhead LED tank, and those self-built and those sold by companies acquariologiche (MARCHE), because that for the most efficient LED reaches the best value for lumens / watt. Those sold from the site. Beam angle: 130 °.
Clearly, with the associated power supplies 5 / drivers to 750 mA.

- 1 LED 20W, said to 10,000 ° Kelvin (cool white) and 1600-1800 lumens (then 85 lumens per watt), with its power supply / driver. My idea is to create a mini-cannon-LED like this, just less wattage, by using an old CPU heatsink I had in a drawer. As you can see from the photo. The disadvantage of this powerful LED is that the emission cone is 140 °, as it should be considered because its emission cone is quind nice and wide, but the focus in some way, on a small aquarium we could be sending out from the tank most of the light ... in fact sprecandola, and then will be moved much closer to the surface characteristics of the water.

I write about my observations on the 20-watt LED, a very small concentration of light ... but it also requires a lot of heat dissipation because really, in fact I have attached to a CPU cooler with 2 fans inside (stale ... but at the time one of the best on the market).
These numbers say little, I can not think why I did not PAR or PUR tools for these measures, however, with the pictures I manage to make people understand that something.
So I took the digital SLR (an old Nikon D50) and I made 2 measurements, with a shot of the whole tank and the minimum focal zoom (70 mm), and the focal closer MACRO mode (300 mm , ratio 1:2), and both with 3 different "situations" lighting: neon t5 4 to 39 watts, 2 39 watt T5 tubes always nice and simple and the single 20-watt LED just arrived.

70 mm (F5):

• 4 t5: 1/40
• 2 t5: 1/15
• 20w LED: 1/30

300 mm macro (F 5.6), focused on the sand bath center:

• 4 t5 f 5.6: 1/40
• 2 t5 f 5.6: 1/100
• 20w LED: 1/60

Soon will post the pictures with the LEDs above the aquarium for which they were made, when I only have the photos below, the comparison above the aquarium with Red Cubic Crystal (shrimp) between the small "cannon-led" by 20 W and the standard light, ie, a 11 W PL.

What do you think? Even from the pictures you can see that the small LED light works well and, after resting on the aquarium marine top 55 cm, it is clear that the well penetrates a distance of 40-45 cm with sand bottom. Think of that, all inclusive, this small spot can cost about 25 euros an hour of work.
As for the color of this ... well I would say that, as observed by others in various forums, it seems hotter than the degree kelvin declared. So the 10,000 th in my opinion are at most 9000, perhaps even 8000, at least by comparison with the ATI from 12000 kelvin above the sea, which seems MUCH colder. For my taste, in short, DO NOT put it in a saltwater aquarium LED 10,000 ° Kelvin alone, but mixed with royal blue to cool and cover better the emission spectrum. If then we use many LEDs, say more than 12, then a green and red ... I would not mind leaving without such concentric lens, so that the color spreads the most, and both connected to a potentiometer (dimmer) to adjust the power.

Where to put those 20 watts? I will try over the refugium under the aquarium .

When ready, show you some pictures of the 5 1-watt LED, I'm waiting for the adhesive thermal paste from China ... got stuck at customs somewhere because it is "liquid".

After over 1 year and a half now since its construction , seems to have found a good method of administration for the ' marine aquarium in the living room , the one with the DSB, and the animals respond well, showing full color and in excellent shape. Too bad about the park lights, lame, only 4 of 39-watt T5 fluorescent tubes + LED strips of blue and purple (previously 6 pipes ...), surely will be improved soon with a nice LED fixture.
Just yesterday I made some tests:

• Nitrates: 2 mgl
• Phosphates: absent
• Ca: 370
• Mg: 1280

The nitrites I have not measured specifically in the last 6-8 months I have always found "high", ie between 0.02 and 0.05 mgl, although no animals seem to be affected and despite many efforts to lower them (or maybe just make them disappear ...).

These values ​​are obtained through:

1. monthly water changes of 15%
2. calcium dose: 50 ml of both flasks (balling method) every other day
3. Vodka dose: 0.5 ml on alternate days
4. feeding fish: once a day with mixed granules and flakes of nori seaweed
5. feeding invertebrates: 2 times per week, with a peeled shrimp and other small pieces of shrimp, mussels, clams (both with pump turned off for 2 hours)

I infer from the values ​​reported having to increase the dose of calcium (I use the method BALLING , but I admit to miss a dose ...) and, after increasing the illumination, could also increase the frequency of food given to fish the coral , even a small of phosphates and nitrates to 5 or 10 mgl would not be a problem, and the corals react with greater growth.