Skkye 8W LED to 20w Full Spectrum LED mod under $50/ea

SMACKERS4

SMACKERS4

Member
So, I happened to pick up a NUVO 16, I HAD a 20.5" 120w Razor LED over it, but i hated the way it looked over the top and it took away from the minimalist look i was going for since this will be in my bedroom, not to mention it was overkill. i wanted something more of a stock look and scooped up some 2 8w Skkye LED's to complement the stunningly sleek modern look of these tanks.

Now my issues are
#1 The "14K" look is much too white for my tastes, looks more like 10k to me.
#2 Each light is 8 watts consisting of 6x 1w Cool White LED's and 4x .5w Blue Moonlight LED's that are only strong enough to do softies and MAYBE a couple med light corals and i want to put an anemone or 2 in this tank.
#3 I will not be modifying the Moonlights as i like that feature and want to keep it as is.

I wanted to change the color by switching the Cool White LED's to a mix of Blue, Royal Blue, UV, and Neutral White (for the full spectrum). There were a couple of options as far as LED's go but i went with REEF BREEDERS 3w LED's due to the fact that they will directly replace the 1w LED's with out any modification. I ordered a bit more than i need of each color i wanted inorder to have extras and be able to play with the color if i wanted. Heres where you can get them.
http://reefbreeders.com/leds/

In order to utilize the full 3w watts i wanted from these replacement LED's i have to upgrade the drivers for the 6x Cool White LED's only. Again, there are a few options out there, one of the features i was looking for was the ability to dim the channel to my liking. This seemed like the simplest way to replace the existing driver/power adapter with a dimmable driver and power adapter all built into one driver. you can get this here.
http://www.rapidled.com/0-10v-dimmable-nano-driver-with-potentiometer/

Having just ordered the parts, once they arrive i will take pictures, and log my progress of this mod.

By my calculations (including the moonlights) There will be 20 watts per fixture after replacing the 6x 1w LEDs with 6x 3w LED's along with 4x .5w Moonlight LED's
 
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SkullV

SkullV

New member
Glad I could help ya figure this out! Can't wait to see these up and running. I would expect that as the price of individual chips without stars continues to drop the number of retrofit LED fixtures will go up.
 
SMACKERS4

SMACKERS4

Member
SkullV said:
Glad I could help ya figure this out! Can't wait to see these up and running. I would expect that as the price of individual chips without stars continues to drop the number of retrofit LED fixtures will go up.
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DOH! i cant believe i forgot to Give you and Joe props for inspiration and tech help! i HAD it in the post but after editing and rephrasing a few lines, forgot to put it back in! my bad!

THANKS TO JOELYDON AND SKULLV FOR ALL THE HELP AND INSPIRATION TO PUT THIS MOD TOGETHER!
 
SMACKERS4

SMACKERS4

Member
So, i received the last of the parts yesterday and decided to put this stuff together. this will be pic heavy and ill explain it the best i can, very simple mod though. a slight set back but nothing too serious.
So for starters i disassembled the light to remove the existing 1w LED's from the board.



Then i proceeded to remove the stock LED's, this became ALOT easier once i realized the underside was soldered as well as the +/- tabs. i used a solder "sucker" to remove molten solder from the tabs then i bent them up and out of the way. What had to be done in order to heat up the solder under the LED it removal of the white top/lenses in order to reveal a metal "button" that would allow me to apply heat to remove it from the LED board




AFter the old LED's were removed and i figured out my layout, it was time to install them onto the board. i wasnt sure how to resolder the underside back on the board so i just used thermal paste to help with the heat transfer. The toothpicks were holding the board centered while the paste set a little bit.


NOw i had to remove the old power supply to install the new 30-700mA dimmable driver. This was the easiest to do out of everything. i pried apart the ols power adapter, and unsoldered the b/r wire connections to use on the new power supply, then i removed the endcap from the new power supply at attached the wires with the set screws. you can see that i salvaged the rubber stopper on the end of the old adapter and made use of it on the new one.





only thing left to do was put the light back together and power it on. All in all the mod was successful. It doesnt look as bright as i had hoped and will be looking into how i can make this mod a bit more efficient to provide more power to the LED's, would anyone be willing to test these with a PAR meter to check how much lighting they are actually providing?

THANKS for looking!
 
tinman

tinman

Well-known member
SMACKERS4 said:
no fan, didnt com with one stock. IF they seem to run hot im sure i can install one and tap into power from somewhere, im sure its easier said than done though.
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i ran the same thing with 6 3Watt crees and it gets hot..

the stock ones are 1 Watt leds so they wont get that hot. id advise you to add a fan before it burns some leds :)
 
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