Series vs Parallel?

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BlackmoreRulz

Active Member
Another noob here, with a stupid question......this series vs parallel thing has done my already feeble mind in.

I borrowed this image from HERE

strips.png

If I were to run two sets of three strips in parallel I would add leads as indicated by the orange and green bold lines and eliminate the blue wire with the brown X through it? Is that correct? What exactly is the benefit or disadvantage of doing it this way over just running in series like the original image?
 
1

1212ham

Well-Known Member
BlackmoreRulz said:
Another noob here, with a stupid question......this series vs parallel thing has done my already feeble mind in.

I borrowed this image from HERE

View attachment 4560459

If I were to run two sets of three strips in parallel I would add leads as indicated by the orange and green bold lines and eliminate the blue wire with the brown X through it? Is that correct? What exactly is the benefit or disadvantage of doing it this way over just running in series like the original image?
Click to expand...
It's just a matter of matching driver voltage and current to the strips. If those were 20 volt strips, the series wiring would need a 120V driver but your series-parallel modification would need 60v from the driver, and twice the current. In series, the strips voltage add together and current stays the same. In parallel, add the current of the strips together and voltage stays the same.
 
B

BlackmoreRulz

Active Member
1212ham said:
It's just a matter of matching driver voltage and current to the strips. If those were 20 volt strips, the series wiring would need a 120V driver but your series-parallel modification would need 60v from the driver, and twice the current. In series, the strips voltage add together and current stays the same. In parallel, add the current of the strips together and voltage stays the same.
Click to expand...
Thanks, that makes sense somewhat. A little different than what I had reconciled in my head but that helps clear it up.

Hope I didn't screw up with the driver I bought (ELG-240-48B ), I was thinking it would run 6 or 7 strips safely in a 2' x 3' frame.
 
iPerculate

iPerculate

Well-Known Member
That driver will give you around 48V output. Hopefully you live somewhere with 240V access for the ELG series driver. If the strips that you plan to run are 48V, then you did OK on driver choice.

In that case, you will have to run parallel connection which is not like the picture you posted above. Also, fuses are recommended but not required for parallel builds.

Do you know what make and model strips?
 
1

1212ham

Well-Known Member
BlackmoreRulz said:
Thanks, that makes sense somewhat. A little different than what I had reconciled in my head but that helps clear it up.

Hope I didn't screw up with the driver I bought (ELG-240-48B ), I was thinking it would run 6 or 7 strips safely in a 2' x 3' frame.
Click to expand...
That driver will work, but the ELG series only put out 75% power when operating on 120 volts AC.
 
B

BlackmoreRulz

Active Member
OK, I have the first fixture built, took me awhile just being able to work on it a couple of hours on the weekends...went ahead and bought a HLG-240h-48b. Seven strips on 1.5"x1/4" flat aluminum in a 1"x1" angle frame attached with thermal tape.

20200522_164819[1].jpg

20200522_165040[1].jpg

20200523_105709[1].jpg

I let it run for about an hour and a half with the pot turned up almost all of the way and the heatsinks were barely warm, I would say that the hot water out of my tap has a higher temp than the heatsinks were.

I have 4 strips left that I am going to make a couple of smaller fixtures with and power them with the ELG 240, about a foot wide with two strips each for vegging and veggies, that way I can either put them side by side or end to end. I assume they too should be wired in parallel?

I am an old fart that has wanted to grow weed since 1975 or so but was always too scared of the law but now I am able to do it legally(that still amazes me). I bought one of the Lenofocus QB knockoffs back in December off of Amazon without doing much research, planted two seeds on New Years Day. I nurtured those two plants for months, made 10 or 12 clones from both plants and then this happened:
20200414_173023[1].jpg

When I flowered them both freaking plants turned out to be males. I could tell that the Lenofocus was going to be woefully inadequate, and impossible to veg plants and also have something to flower with so I started doing research and wound up where I am now.

Being on a limited budget these strips seemed like the answer, for under $300 I will have made two lights that will run about 400 watts by my uninformed calculations.

P.S. If I wanted to add some red spectrum to the above fixture anyone have any recommendations on how I would do that? I saw these strips on Ebay: https://www.ebay.com/itm/3-Red-Booster-Sun-Board-48-LED-Strip-660nm-730nm-IR-Quantum-Grow-Light-Emerson/254226203486?hash=item3b3110035e:g:LMsAAOSwdgtdSf7j

Is there a part number for these strips that I can search for to maybe get these a little cheaper or something like them?
 
Barristan Whitebeard

Barristan Whitebeard

Well-Known Member
BlackmoreRulz said:
OK, I have the first fixture built, took me awhile just being able to work on it a couple of hours on the weekends...went ahead and bought a HLG-240h-48b. Seven strips on 1.5"x1/4" flat aluminum in a 1"x1" angle frame attached with thermal tape.

View attachment 4574768

View attachment 4574769

View attachment 4574770

I let it run for about an hour and a half with the pot turned up almost all of the way and the heatsinks were barely warm, I would say that the hot water out of my tap has a higher temp than the heatsinks were.

I have 4 strips left that I am going to make a couple of smaller fixtures with and power them with the ELG 240, about a foot wide with two strips each for vegging and veggies, that way I can either put them side by side or end to end. I assume they too should be wired in parallel?

I am an old fart that has wanted to grow weed since 1975 or so but was always too scared of the law but now I am able to do it legally(that still amazes me). I bought one of the Lenofocus QB knockoffs back in December off of Amazon without doing much research, planted two seeds on New Years Day. I nurtured those two plants for months, made 10 or 12 clones from both plants and then this happened:
View attachment 4574989

When I flowered them both freaking plants turned out to be males. I could tell that the Lenofocus was going to be woefully inadequate, and impossible to veg plants and also have something to flower with so I started doing research and wound up where I am now.

Being on a limited budget these strips seemed like the answer, for under $300 I will have made two lights that will run about 400 watts by my uninformed calculations.

P.S. If I wanted to add some red spectrum to the above fixture anyone have any recommendations on how I would do that? I saw these strips on Ebay: https://www.ebay.com/itm/3-Red-Booster-Sun-Board-48-LED-Strip-660nm-730nm-IR-Quantum-Grow-Light-Emerson/254226203486?hash=item3b3110035e:g:LMsAAOSwdgtdSf7j

Is there a part number for these strips that I can search for to maybe get these a little cheaper or something like them?
Click to expand...
There is no part number for those strips that I know of. Just seems to be a few sellers on eBay, the same ones who sell those 16 inch Sunboards. Maybe they get them from one of the suppliers on Alibaba, I'm not sure. Those boards say Samsung, but I'm pretty sure they're not made with Samsung LH351H diodes. As far as I know they've never listed what diodes are used in those supplemental strips.
 
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