DIY Radeon clone?

AbjectMaelstroM · Oct 1, 2019

Alin0 said:
Hi, its possible to use these led https://www.ebay.com/itm/5-Channel-...-Aquarium-Light/233279290975?var=532781586470
to upgrade an old radion G2 ?

No.

Alin0 · Oct 1, 2019

why if I may ask?

AbjectMaelstroM · Oct 1, 2019

Alin0 said:
why if I may ask?

Different leds, different led grouping, different amount of channels, different wiring.

I haven't looked at the insides of G2, but if it's anything like G4, there are just too many incompatability.

Alin0 · Oct 1, 2019

AbjectMaelstroM said:
Different leds, different led grouping, different amount of channels, different wiring.

I haven't looked at the insides of G2, but if it's anything like G4, there are just too many incompatability.

the cluster looks like the same of the G3 pro, i think the size too, so theoretically speaking fit in the G2 but the amount of channels and the wiring could be a problem... I was hoping someone had already tried it hehe
thanks

AbjectMaelstroM · Oct 1, 2019

Alin0 said:
the cluster looks like the same of the G3 pro, i think the size too, so theoretically speaking fit in the G2 but the amount of channels and the wiring could be a problem... I was hoping someone had already tried it hehe
thanks

Heh, unfortunately physical fit/similarity is a far cry from being compatible on the electronic side.

On the upside, you already have 95% of the required equipment on hand. Why not grab a puck or two and give it a go, you could be the first.

AbjectMaelstroM · Oct 1, 2019

Technically, you could probably get it to work somewhat but it would be a gigantic pain in the butt.

Alin0 · Oct 1, 2019

the worst side is the 5 channel vs 6 i think... cause the number of led its the same and max output it's not a problem
ill study a bit more !

AbjectMaelstroM · Oct 5, 2019

Anyone using reef pi pushing more than 5 channels of lighting?

brandon clow · Oct 5, 2019

AbjectMaelstroM said:
Anyone using reef pi pushing more than 5 channels of lighting?

I am at 9 currently, hopefully 12 sometime this winter.

AbjectMaelstroM · Oct 5, 2019

brandon clow said:
I am at 9 currently, hopefully 12 sometime this winter.

How is it wired? Are you using a hat or a PCA9685 board?

I tried hooking up an 8 channel puck, however, if I power more than 5 channels I get led flicker.

What are you using for leds, drivers and board and the PCA9685 setup itself?

brandon clow · Oct 5, 2019

AbjectMaelstroM said:
How is it wired? Are you using a hat or a PCA9685 board?

I tried hooking up an 8 channel puck, however, if I power more than 5 channels I get led flicker.

What are you using for leds, drivers and board and the PCA9685 setup itself?

I am using a pca9685 board (I think sunfounder) to my pi without a dedicated psu to it. I am running all crees and semis. That's spread out across 3 fixtures. 3 channels per fixture and 3 ldds per fixture, totaling 9. Two ldd 1000's (16, and 10 leds) and one ldd 750 (12 leds) per board to fixture. They are on Rapids ldd boards with the pca running the pwm and a ground to it. I have been tempted to add a dedicated 5volts to the PCA9685 but I currently dont have any issues so it's been on the back burner. I do have the pwm set 1000 but 800 also seemed to work fine also.

What kind of driver are you using, perhaps its drawing more then what I am and you need a dedicated 5v.

Edit* I should note that my pi 3b and now my replacement 4b have been both supplied with a 2.5 and now 3.5 amp psu. I have never ran anything below that.

AbjectMaelstroM · Oct 5, 2019

brandon clow said:
I am using a pca9685 board (I think sunfounder) to my pi without a dedicated psu to it. I am running all crees and semis. That's spread out across 3 fixtures. 3 channels per fixture and 3 ldds per fixture, totaling 9. Two ldd 1000's (16, and 10 leds) and one ldd 750 (12 leds) per board to fixture. They are on Rapids ldd boards with the pca running the pwm and a ground to it. I have been tempted to add a dedicated 5volts to the PCA9685 but I currently dont have any issues so it's been on the back burner. I do have the pwm set 1000 but 800 also seemed to work fine also.

What kind of driver are you using, perhaps its drawing more then what I am and you need a dedicated 5v.

I'm using a raspi 3, with Mike's Reef Pi Hat with a PCA on it. The hat is powered via a 5v 2.1a wall plug. The pwm channels from the HAT run to Rapids 4up and 4S-up with 700ma LDDH x6 and 350x2 for 8 total.

Each color has its own dedicated channel. The pucks are Xr30 pro clones with 8 channels.

I also tried hooking up 8 K16s to see if pucks were an issue, they did the same thing. Starts flickering when 5 or more chsnnels are powered.

Does your rapid LDD board have somewhere to plug in GND for pwm? Mine only had 1-4 ch PWM.

Any chance you could post pix of your setup? The drivers, PCA board/pie?

brandon clow · Oct 5, 2019

AbjectMaelstroM said:
I'm using a raspi 3, with Mike's Reef Pi Hat with a PCA on it. The hat is powered via a 5v 2.1a wall plug. The pwm channels from the HAT run to Rapids 4up and 4S-up with 700ma LDDH x6 and 350x2 for 8 total.

Each color has its own dedicated channel. The pucks are Xr30 pro clones with 8 channels.

I also tried hooking up 8 K16s to see if pucks were an issue, they did the same thing. Starts flickering when 5 or more chsnnels are powered.

Does your rapid LDD board have somewhere to plug in GND for pwm? Mine only had 1-4 ch PWM.

The first time I wired up my pca9685 I didnt run a pwm ground and it would never go above 60% without turning off or never getting brighter. I take the pwm channels ground pin in the pca9685 and go to the extra ground push contact on your rapid board.

brandon clow · Oct 5, 2019

I am away from my tank but I have some older pics before I put it into my project box (rough testing). I didnt see your pics till now. Does the ML hat have a ground coming from the pca9685?

brandon clow · Oct 5, 2019

The last picture I took of this isn't really worth much as it was a POC (proof of concept). With it being a POC I didnt really care about wiring colors and other finish details.

In a summary don't critique it too much. You can see the ground on pwm 1 combined with 3 wires and running to each rapid board. This worked exactly as desired but I ended up running one pin to each ldd board (0 to board one, 3 to board 2, etc).

AbjectMaelstroM · Oct 5, 2019

brandon clow said:
I am away from my tank but I have some older pics before I put it into my project box (rough testing). I didnt see your pics till now. Does the ML hat have a ground coming from the pca9685?

It does! And well.... Flicker is gone after I hooked up the ground from pca9685 to the driver extra V-.

I have no idea how I missed that. I've been wracking my brain over this all day.

Now.... For some reason even at 0, leds still stay lit, though very faint... Almost as if theres a residual leak. But that's an issue for another day and I can just set a time to kill the outlet.

brandon clow · Oct 5, 2019

If you are using reef pi its bug number 794. If you rolled back to 2.3 you would see no more light emitting from them at 0. Anything later has it, I see it's on the 3.0 official release todo list, so an outlet to kill it is the same thing I am doing till then.

Glad to see it worked!

AbjectMaelstroM · Oct 6, 2019

It's alive!

AbjectMaelstroM · Oct 6, 2019

Think I'm going to kill off the yellow/amber and replace it with mints. Maybe add hyperviolets... 3 per fixture? 4 mints per fixture?

What do you guys think?

brandon clow · Oct 6, 2019

I absolutely love my hyperviolets so yes to 3. I dont run mint but really want to. From what I have heard they are pretty well represented when used.

What kind of look are you getting right now with those arrays at the levels you want to run them at?