So i been thinking and looking around at leds and i have seen alot of led fixtures by aquafic life and a few others .my question is it going to be cheaper to buy a unit like aquatic life 54 watt or make a fixture that has everything u want.dmer 90 degree optics and.all the right colors need im put from all u.led.guru’s
Joe, I’m not sure what size tank you’re planning on using the LED for. DIYing it can and may save you some money if you’re a DIY kinda person. For my 72" build, I have 3 set of LED for total of 144 chips. Which cost me little bit over $400 over time. If I was to go with fixtures I would probably have to buy at least 6 fixture to cover the 72"x24" at a cost of average $300-$350 each for total of $1800-$2100.
If I was to go with fixtures, I believe I would go with the company that our club was or is planning on purchasing for our GT drawing that come with CREE MultiColor 120w full spectrum fixture at $310 each.
http://www.ajmreefled.com/#!products/cngp
Or if you want to do the DIY way the company link below that I found to be reasonable IMO. They will help you with whatever your needs are. Once you order, just put in the instruction block what spectrum you would like your lights at and they will mail you the proper LED chips for your order.
Hope this help.
I would still go for a DIY as things are still changing in the LED aquarium lighting world all the time, if you get a drilled heatsink it’s very easy to change out led’s a few here or there to tweak it to just right for you.
At this point in time I do not like any of the pre packaged kits. my personal recipe for my rebuild of my 2 x 24 led build is
20 Bridgelux 10k @ 700mA
06 Cree XLamp XP-E, 63lm @ 860mA Blue 465-485nm
14 Cree XLamp XT-E,1520mW @ 1300mA, Royal Blue 450-465nm
06 Bridgelux 420nm @ 700mA
02 Osram Oslon SSL Hyper Red with some kind of diffuser.