# Multicolored LED lighting! Makes a GREAT moonlight!



## automatic-hydromatic (Oct 18, 2010)

I had posted this in a thread asking about moonlights, but I figured I could put this in the DIY section. I assume this would work just as well for salt water setups, but I'm just putting in the fresh water DIY section simply because I installed this on a fresh water tank 

At first this was purely a test, just to see how well it would work, and I must say that I'm fairly impressed how well it came out! For the whole $15 I spent on the lighting, it's great!

What I ordered was a 3 foot long waterproof red/green/blue LED strip that also comes with a control box and a wireless remote. I got it off eBay. These things are ALL OVER eBay, and you can get them in many lengths, even just one solid color as apposed to the red/green/blue combo. Personally, I like the red/green/blue option just because it gives so many options.


I don't have any photos of it taken by me before I installed it, but this is exactly what it looks like:


































The only thing the kit didn't come with was a wall adapter, but that's no huge problem. It just takes a 12v wall adapter, and they can be picked up anyway, even eBay, for super cheap. A lot of thrift stores even have bins of mixed ones that you can sift through and find one. I actually had one laying around, from what I don't know, and it plugged right in and works perfectly 

The strips can be cut to length (every 6 inches I think) at little lines designated on them. I had to cut about the last 12 inches from mine to make it fit correctly.

To mount them, they come with double sided tape on the back, but I found out within a day that stuff wasn't going to hold up very well to any moister, lol. So I went along the edges and dabbed some aquarium silicone to it so they'll stay in place on the hood. It doesn't look pretty when looking at it, but when the hood is closed it's not visible at all.




























































There was a nice little gap at the hinge of this hood that allowed me to rout the connection wire that goes to the control box out and up:

























Then I just stuck the control box to the top of the hood with some double sided tape that I had laying around, and mounted the wireless receiver facing forward the best that I could (also using a small strip of double sided tape) so that it would pick up signal from the remote as best as possible.


























And the lighting effects it produces are TRULY amazing for the cost!




































At night I use the blue, but the system also lets you dim the lighting, so I dim the blue as far as it will go for a nice moonlight effect:

















When you combine red, blue, and green, the three primary colors, you get white, so this setup also makes a crisp white light as well!
















and this is compared to the light output of the CFLs that I use during the day for the plants


















Here's a short video of it in action:





YouTube - Aquarium RGB LED Lighting








For the little time and money invested, I absolutely LOVE this setup, and I'm definitely going to be installing it on a larger tank!

:fish-in-a-bag:


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## rtbob (Jul 18, 2010)

Great Find! Thanks for the info.


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## GeminiPrincess (Oct 1, 2010)

What type of wall hook up do i need?


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