DiY LEDs - How to Power Them

Abiqua

Abiqua

Well-Known Member
@SupraSPL

Again, many thanks for your help. Shouldn't have bitched about the drivers, they showed up, shortly after :joint:
First horti light is 90% done. Without bugging you, this would not have happened, very grateful. Now on to the AB project!

6x V10 3500k: 3 strings of two in series, drivers wired in parallel. Case borrowed from 400w inverter, heatsink recycled from 1000w MH w/piggyback ballast.
P1130212.JPG P1130207.JPG P1130206.JPG P1130216.JPG P1130184.JPG
 
epicfail

epicfail

Well-Known Member
guod said:
the second version is a sort of fail safe strategie for the most failure on leds, an open circuit.
based on Kirchhoff's circuit laws...
Click to expand...
Thanks goud, I knew you would know all about it.

So I talked to the guy about what needed to be done and gave him a few options. Ultimately he decided to go with using the working drivers from one light and the working board from the other to make a single functioning unit, the leftover parts I get to keep for payment. He was happy with the use he got out of them and pleased to get a working unit again, It seems they were unusable in storage collecting dust. I could use heatsink/case/fans it to make a nice Vero29 lamp or refurb this one for around $200 and sell it, who knows but its not a bad deal for either of us.

He mentioned having over 50 units in their commercial setup consisting of mostly AT-600's with some SG602's and Mars II 1200's, Imagine having a setup like that. I have only ever seen small grows IRL none any bigger than what greengenes has which to me is big, so this is almost unfathomable.
 
AquariusPanta

AquariusPanta

Well-Known Member
Abiqua said:
@SupraSPL

Again, many thanks for your help. Shouldn't have bitched about the drivers, they showed up, shortly after :joint:
First horti light is 90% done. Without bugging you, this would not have happened, very grateful. Now on to the AB project!

6x V10 3500k: 3 strings of two in series, drivers wired in parallel. Case borrowed from 400w inverter, heatsink recycled from 1000w MH w/piggyback ballast.
View attachment 3303628 View attachment 3303631 View attachment 3303635 View attachment 3303633 View attachment 3303636
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Is it better to have the fan pulling air in through the side sleeves of the HeatSink, as I believe you have configured in one of your photos, or to pull air from above the fixture and out through the side sleeves?

Those V10's looks sweet with their yellow jackets!
 
P

PurpleBuz

Well-Known Member
P
AquariusPanta said:
Is it better to have the fan pulling air in through the side sleeves of the HeatSink, as I believe you have configured in one of your photos, or to pull air from above the fixture and out through the side sleeves?

Those V10's looks sweet with their yellow jackets!
Click to expand...
Pushing air into the heatsink is better, leverages the force of the fan, think of a water stream hitting pavement with pressure, or water being sucked off of the pavement. I believe the photo just above shows the fan pulling air away from the heatsink.
 
Abiqua

Abiqua

Well-Known Member
AquariusPanta said:
Is it better to have the fan pulling air in through the side sleeves of the HeatSink, as I believe you have configured in one of your photos, or to pull air from above the fixture and out through the side sleeves?

Those V10's looks sweet with their yellow jackets!
Click to expand...

@AquariusPanta
I do believe it is better to pull air in thru the top and down onto the heatsink and then vented out. .....[Interesting Side-Bar] Apparently heatsink fins were specifically designed for vertical placement, but obviously are used horizontally in many cases.]

I guess using convection to enhance conduction [fan blowing on metal heating sink] is the more efficient means.

I am blowing onto the heatsink, which then vents down and out. I am NOT sucking air up. Hope that clarifies....

Case is wonky right now....but also have a 40mm fan to draw air into the case when finished.

It has been discussed, but it has been aways back, maybe someone can chime in here. Might even be in this thread. Certainly maybe something to bring up to @SupraSPL in their heatsink thread. Which direction of active cooling is most effective/efficient and why.

My "driver board" where the fan is mounted is actually the lid to square compartment just over the heatsink...my fan Arctic F12 120mm, doesn't quite stretch over all the fins of the sink [5.5x" wide ]. So I built a little compartment that does cover the outside fins
and then vents outs of the fins, similar to SDS, who is the inspiration for most of my methods.
As rag-tag as they may be, functional 1st......

The yellowjackets are funny, lol....definitely Kapton inexperience showing. Wanted to mount this way versus tapping holes. Very easy with wago's and Molex connectors. Everything can be pulled apart in minutes..:peace:
 
AquariusPanta

AquariusPanta

Well-Known Member
Abiqua said:

I am blowing onto the heatsink, which then vents down and out. I am NOT sucking air up. Hope that clarifies....
Click to expand...


How weird. I bought a few 140mm fans from Newegg (Rose Will) and they blow in the opposite direction that your fan is directed. To clarify, when powered, air flow is circulated through the opening with the holding frame (four supports) of the fan motor. I haven't powered it yet but there are arrows pointing in what seems to be the operating direction.

I'm going off the same principles as you though Abi :). Solid analogy PurpleBuzz.
 
Dloomis514

Dloomis514

Well-Known Member
Just my two cents, when you want a fan to cool you, do you stand in front of it or behind it? I prefer the front, where the cooler wind is blowing on my skin.

Evaporative cooling is way different than convective but that's the general idea. Evaporative requires a phase change from liquid to Gas followed by mass flow, conductive requires mass flow.

PurpleBuz said:
P


Pushing air into the heatsink is better, leverages the force of the fan, think of a water stream hitting pavement with pressure, or water being sucked off of the pavement. I believe the photo just above shows the fan pulling air away from the heatsink.
Click to expand...
 
Abiqua

Abiqua

Well-Known Member
I am blowing air onto the heatsinks.
AquariusPanta said:


How weird. I bought a few 140mm fans from Newegg (Rose Will) and they blow in the opposite direction that your fan is directed. To clarify, when powered, air flow is circulated through the opening with the holding frame (four supports) of the fan motor. I haven't powered it yet but there are arrows pointing in what seems to be the operating direction.

I'm going off the same principles as you though Abi :). Solid analogy PurpleBuzz.
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I will check to make sure, but yes the F12, looks the opposite of most fans i.e the support crossbars are usually where exhaust is located on most fans but not all..... When you flip the my Arctic fan over, the F12 logo is prominently displayed in the center, essentially facing "forward" or as the exhaust. Tres Suisse fabrique.

Yes, fans arrows are usually molded in, showing direction of spin and exhaust direction. I have had a few fans over the years not have this, but it is getting less and less and usually of the uber cheap variety too.....
 
Abiqua

Abiqua

Well-Known Member
AquariusPanta said:


How weird. I bought a few 140mm fans from Newegg (Rose Will) and they blow in the opposite direction that your fan is directed. To clarify, when powered, air flow is circulated through the opening with the holding frame (four supports) of the fan motor. I haven't powered it yet but there are arrows pointing in what seems to be the operating direction.

I'm going off the same principles as you though Abi :). Solid analogy PurpleBuzz.
Click to expand...

@AquariusPanta

By the way, my fan WAS mounted backwards and finally I double checked. I was being stubborn because I had checked it once already.....duh! But not too stubborn to admit my mistakes publicly!

Thanks for calling that to my attention. I went to look for the amperage specs on the Artic's site and realized my error on the 1st diagram they posted showing air flow......facepalm....

anyhoo.....before that, the heatsink was nearly cold to the touch with the fan mounted in the wrong direction. So it should be ice-t cold from now on...... Still also have 11 volt's on each driver to possibly mount a few 630/660 stars.

So that also begs more questions especially coupled with the data from the heatsink thread that Supra has been posting over the last few days.
 
alesh

alesh

Well-Known Member
SupraSPL said:
Just recently we had a 9V OEM fan power adapter fail on a CXA3070 build with 5.88" heatsinks and 140mm fans, so all four fans quit. That is a bummer because it is hard to get any better quality than OEM. The adapter was not being over driven. It would have been a real bummer if they were mounted on CPU coolers, possibly destroying the CXAs. I am not saying that I think we should rule out CPU coolers or active cooling, but that is an interesting data point to keep in mind.
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[quote from another thread]

Good info. I know you've tested many PSU's, which ones do you rate positively? And how much are they?
The cheapest better-than-OEM-quality I could find was MW APV-12-12 from LED series.

Or if we were to go the cheapest way, ditch CV supplies and hook up up to 4 fans to $1.25 CC drivers you tested. It would be perfect match for A11 heat sink fans and even more efficient than small 12V supplies.

Perhaps even brand-quality CC supplies might be better choice both economic- and efficiency-wise. Fans can easily be run in parallel which means that a even a higher current CC supplies are usable to drive fans.

Anyone sees any cons?
 
zangtumtum

zangtumtum

Well-Known Member
I would like an opinion on the possibility of using this power supply
MAGTECH M38 series,
my dilemma is which model ideal for CXA3070, CXA3590 38.5v, Bridgelux Vero29
M38-U36, 20-36 VDC, 1110 Amp, 38W max power
M38-U42, 27-42 VDC, 950 Amp, 38W max power

for example, if I see the CXA3070 vf reference graph:
@1110 Amp = 36.42 vf = 40.06
@950 Amp = 35.9 vf = 34.102 watt

which would be best to try ?
surely the 42 runs, but maybe 36 could push the cxa3070 up to about 1050 Amp that it's in tollerance without flickering...
Magtech-M38-.jpg
 

Attachments

nogod_

nogod_

Well-Known Member
I believe the 36v is after the cob has warmed up and stabilized. It will pull more when its cold and (possibly) cause the driver to go into limp mode.

What is the price of the magtechs? If theyre cheap buy one and give it a whirl.

Im trying the same experiment and pushing the voltage limits with an hlg-185h-c700. Will post results. Hopefuly not $70 wasted. :roll:

zangtumtum said:
I would like an opinion on the possibility of using this power supply
MAGTECH M38 series,
my dilemma is which model ideal for CXA3070, CXA3590 38.5v, Bridgelux Vero29
M38-U36, 20-36 VDC, 1110 Amp, 38W max power
M38-U42, 27-42 VDC, 950 Amp, 38W max power

for example, if I see the CXA3070 vf reference graph:
@1110 Amp = 36.42 vf = 40.06
@950 Amp = 35.9 vf = 34.102 watt

which would be best to try ?
surely the 42 runs, but maybe 36 could push the cxa3070 up to about 1050 Amp that it's in tollerance without flickering...
View attachment 3308708
Click to expand...
 
midsummer

midsummer

Well-Known Member
Why is it that with the Meawell Hlg driver series people go for the model with the external dimming than for the a model with the adjustable internal potentiometer. Is it the quality of the dimming? TIA
 
SomeGuy

SomeGuy

Well-Known Member
because then you can dim one or more drivers output through a pot and not have to mess directly with the driver.
 
SupraSPL

SupraSPL

Well-Known Member
I have seen quite a wide variety of Vf from CXA3070s from different batches. Some are much higher than the graph and some much lower. So unfortunately what works for one lamp may not wopk for another (when we are cutting it close with Vf range of the driver). Also there is some variation from driver to driver, especially with the generic ones.
 
SupraSPL

SupraSPL

Well-Known Member
All good and defintiely relevant to the thread. The B version with remote dimming also has the advantage of being able to dim to a lower range and to be able to dim multiple drivers from a single pot. Or you could automate it using PWM dimming signal (it will still use constant current dimming on the actual LED string).
 
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