DIY Hydra 26 Mount

benapilot · Feb 22, 2016

I really couldn't find a solution I liked for hanging my Hydra 26 fixtures over my 75 gallon aquarium. Shipping to Alaska is ridiculously expensive.... so I designed my own and printed the brackets on a friend's MakerBot 3D printer. These are hanging on aluminum channels from Lowes.

Here's the thingiverse link for the brackets:
http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1359922

red reef · Feb 22, 2016

very nice!!
will the material degrade after time?

benapilot · Feb 22, 2016

I'm hoping not... It's not in direct contact with the water.

New2dareef · Feb 22, 2016

Ever thought of making up a few and seeing how quick they might sell
I'll take a ten

red reef · Feb 22, 2016

New2dareef said:
Ever thought of making up a few and seeing how quick they might sell
I'll take a ten

I was thinking the same thing

TheHarold · Feb 22, 2016

That would be sweet for the Radion as well

New2dareef · Feb 22, 2016

Looks like a market already

benapilot · Feb 22, 2016

Hmmm... intriguing!

How much would you be willing to pay for something like this? I'm thinking $8 a pair??

I'll have to take a trip to my LFS and get some measurements on the Radions.

New2dareef · Feb 23, 2016

I think that would be more than fair.
You could take it a step further and offer rails, mounting brackets for the rails. Stops for the rails. Canopy setups and hanging setups. Your a millionaire just waiting to be discovered.
But back to the brackets, I'll take a dozen. Not kidding

benapilot · Feb 23, 2016

What color? I have yellow, orange, green, purple, red (not sure if I have enough for all 12), black, sparkly black, and sparkly blue. Each set takes about two hours to print, so give me a couple days...

Here are a couple more pictures of the brackets:

Untitled by benapilot, on Flickr

Untitled by benapilot, on Flickr

I'm not sure about mass producing these things... I haven't done any structural or environmental testing on these.... there's a lot of liability involved in hanging expensive LED fixtures over open water!

steiger33 · Feb 23, 2016

Those are sweet. I would love them for my 26's and 52's

Frop · Jan 3, 2017

benapilot said:
I'm thinking $8 a pair??

Very low price considering it's a custom part. Did any ever sell? Also wondering what the pullout force would be on the 3D piece.

benapilot · Jan 4, 2017

I sold six sets... enough to realize the MakerBot is not sufficient for mass production: takes about an hour per bracket and I had to babysit the machine to make sure the filament didn't bind ruining the job.