5050 LED Strips

[Bob_S]

 For the past several years I have been using 5050 LED Strips for my 50 and 100 Gallon tanks. I ordered the cool white which shows my cichlids very nicely.

The only problem is that after a while the first 2 or 3 feet of the ribbon the led turns yellow, they only run 10 hours per day.

Two different Setups
1)   I cut several 3' strips and wired in series running back and forth in the canopy. The first strip turned yellow but the other two are fine.
2)   Thinking the wiring causes the problem, when I purchased the last unit(waterproof) I did not cut the strip but ran it back and forth over the aquarium. I still ended up with the same problem.

I was wandering if anyone else has had this problem. The transformer was ordered with the strips.

I am slowly moving away from the 5050 strips. In September I purchased a 48" Marineland LED for my 50 Gallon and over Christmas I got a 48" Aqueon Optibright LED light from Big Al's for my 110 Gallon. The Aqueon has a sunset/sunrise feature which is great.
I really like to look of the tanks with these new lights.

[tanksalot360]

Are these strips mounted to a heat sink? Might it be a heat related issues? A friend of mine reported the same yellowing and has since mounted the strips onto aluminum and now runs fans behind the aluminum sheet for cooling. His new builds don't yellow. He runs these off an old computer power source.

[Bob_S]

No, I had them mounted to particular board.

You are probably right as the wood will not dispurse the heat.

Currently I am down to only one 30" setup.

Thanks for the information. I will have a look for a piece of heat sink as I have lots of light strips  left.