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Picked up 3 of these from Ebay: link
Then removed the optics (you'll see why below)
Then zip-tied the LED plate to the aluminum heat-sink using the available holes:
Bought three of these from Home Depot:
Removed the clamps and reflector:
Then plugged them into an extension cord and timer.
Now, here's why I removed the optics that came on the bulb:
As you can see, with the optics on the light is a narrow beam on the left compared to a nice spread without optics on the right.
I set the lights right on the glass lids:
15W each, running 3x on the 450gal tank means a total of 45W compared to 4x 36" Ecoxotic Stunner strips totals to 72W. They both output about the same amount of light, but the Stunner strips disperse the light all over the tank, where as these spotlights have a few dark spots. Shimmer is great, better than Stunner strips at least for me. A little more yellowish than the Stunners but it's not that bad. I have the Stunners on a remote so when I need to light up everything, I still have that option, especially while taking pics of the tankmates.
All in all, they work pretty much as I wanted and I'm pleased with the outcome given the price. 2x of these will light up a standard 125/135/150 tanks and 3x will light up 180/210/215/240 tanks. If I were to only run these on my 450, I'd use 6x but I like that I still have my Stunners to completely flood everything with light.
Total cost was around $100 for this project, and was very easy since everything was plug and play.
Then removed the optics (you'll see why below)
Then zip-tied the LED plate to the aluminum heat-sink using the available holes:
Bought three of these from Home Depot:
Removed the clamps and reflector:
Then plugged them into an extension cord and timer.
Now, here's why I removed the optics that came on the bulb:
As you can see, with the optics on the light is a narrow beam on the left compared to a nice spread without optics on the right.
I set the lights right on the glass lids:
15W each, running 3x on the 450gal tank means a total of 45W compared to 4x 36" Ecoxotic Stunner strips totals to 72W. They both output about the same amount of light, but the Stunner strips disperse the light all over the tank, where as these spotlights have a few dark spots. Shimmer is great, better than Stunner strips at least for me. A little more yellowish than the Stunners but it's not that bad. I have the Stunners on a remote so when I need to light up everything, I still have that option, especially while taking pics of the tankmates.
All in all, they work pretty much as I wanted and I'm pleased with the outcome given the price. 2x of these will light up a standard 125/135/150 tanks and 3x will light up 180/210/215/240 tanks. If I were to only run these on my 450, I'd use 6x but I like that I still have my Stunners to completely flood everything with light.
Total cost was around $100 for this project, and was very easy since everything was plug and play.
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