led UFO hacks?

Hi. I have been wondering about the ratings of led grow lights and why they are all only run at half power. Is this just to extend life or for heat dissipation? How would efficiency change running the diodes at FULL rated power? I understand this may need upgraded power systems and cooling. I am thinking to get a 600w (300) and get it running at true 600 using 4 large peltier refrigeration chips and liquid cooling to an external radiator (to preheat feed solution) . I know it will invalidate guarantee but don't care. I am a qualified electronics engineer BTW.

Has anyone opened up a UFO to see the guts? Would love to see some teardown pics

drspastic said:

Hi. I have been wondering about the ratings of led grow lights and why they are all only run at half power. Is this just to extend life or for heat dissipation? How would efficiency change running the diodes at FULL rated power? I understand this may need upgraded power systems and cooling. I am thinking to get a 600w (300) and get it running at true 600 using 4 large peltier refrigeration chips and liquid cooling to an external radiator (to preheat feed solution) . I know it will invalidate guarantee but don't care. I am a qualified electronics engineer BTW.

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The lower the current the leds are drawing, the more efficient they operate, so cranking them up even more would make them even worse than they already are!

The best way to hack that thing is with a hatchet.

Obviously, with lower efficiency at higher current , cooling requirements don't scale linearly, although it's close to linear at the range of currents you're looking at.

The Pelter chips eat a lot of power too. Might be better of starting with bin 1a chips and compression cooling. I have a nice peltier block to use up though. Any good price sellers of red and blue leds? Only bin 1a on eBay are whites.

drspastic said:

Hi. I have been wondering about the ratings of led grow lights and why they are all only run at half power. Is this just to extend life or for heat dissipation? How would efficiency change running the diodes at FULL rated power? I understand this may need upgraded power systems and cooling. I am thinking to get a 600w (300) and get it running at true 600 using 4 large peltier refrigeration chips and liquid cooling to an external radiator (to preheat feed solution) . I know it will invalidate guarantee but don't care. I am a qualified electronics engineer BTW.

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Do it! That is if you have the extra cash and time. Anyone growing should have both (unless they spent it all on lawyer fees). Experimenting/taking things apart, and rebuilding them better is in my nature, and it looks like it's in your's too lol. The worst thing that will happen is you lose whatever money you put into it. However, I think the knowledge you will gain from rebuilding an LED, will far surpass any money you put into it. Knowledge is power my friend.

You may decide to mount your own LEDs along the hood of your HPS, or you may invent something new that could help us all. Regardless, I don't see any harm in trying.

I actually get it. Over drive them bitches like T5s. Surely their is a reason they are under driven. Perhaps for life? I dunno. In class once, we were doing some electronics experiments on bread boards. Dude hooked his cheap probably less than a watt LED straight up to a 9 volt battery without any resistance. Blew that sucker right up. The plastic hit the ceiling and bounced around for a second.

I know what your thinking. But, it was not my buddy @LetsGetCritical

drspastic said:

The Pelter chips eat a lot of power too. Might be better of starting with bin 1a chips and compression cooling. I have a nice peltier block to use up though. Any good price sellers of red and blue leds? Only bin 1a on eBay are whites.

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I would look into the led section to see other people's recent DIY builds with cxa/cxb and vero, which are all warm white cobs.

The ways to make a higher efficiency led lamp is to underdrive, but use more total leds to arrive at the same total output power, lower case temperature (bigger heat sink), and getting the highest flux bins. (vero doesn't have flux bins)

The guts of the UFO......AC/DC Constant current converter/driver....metal pcb...diodes...12 DC Fan power supply....not much really...anything inside can be found in the cheap section of an Ebay LED search.....

Junk. Not worth driving any harder....they are already driven hard enough.

I guess warm white still wastes power in unuseful spectrum

imho there is no such thing as "wasted" spectrum...

Drivers are cheap. Just need some good chips

Abiqua said:

The guts of the UFO......AC/DC Constant current converter/driver....metal pcb...diodes...12 DC Fan power supply....not much really...anything inside can be found in the cheap section of an Ebay LED search.....

Junk. Not worth driving any harder....they are already driven hard enough.

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Well that's an opinion and that's fine. But, they call them 3 watt LEDs? Are they really? Or are they perhaps 6 watt LEDs and they label them as 3 Watt LEDs because they last longer at that wattage.

Case in point.PCs can be overdriven. They scale back the real actual speed in which the Processor runs to protect it from heat and early failure. Add a liquid cooling heat sink and powerful processor fan and voila you can drive it harder.

Anyone got a watt meter and a variable resistor? Order up a epi whatever LED and test to see at what wattage the LED blows. Then reduce that wattage maybe 25% and run it for a while to see if it's performance degrades. Or just search to see if anyone else has. I'm sure the engineers have done this. Wonder if it's published? I dunno.

Must have been done. Shall search google. Semiconductor works better as cold as it can go without cracking due to contraction.

GrowUrOwnDank said:

Well that's an opinion and that's fine. But, they call them 3 watt LEDs? Are they really? Or are they perhaps 6 watt LEDs and they label them as 3 Watt LEDs because they last longer at that wattage.

Case in point.PCs can be overdriven. They scale back the real actual speed in which the Processor runs to protect it from heat and early failure. Add a liquid cooling heat sink and powerful processor fan and voila you can drive it harder.

Anyone got a watt meter and a variable resistor? Order up a epi whatever LED and test to see at what wattage the LED blows. Then reduce that wattage maybe 25% and run it for a while to see if it's performance degrades. Or just search to see if anyone else has. I'm sure the engineers have done this. Wonder if it's published? I dunno.

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That is not an opinion....an opinion is that they are pieces of shit when compared to LED's companies that actually produced specifications on their diodes...point blank....

and there is no such thing as "3w diodes" that is a marketing term....Current and Voltage are way more important than obscure number like wattage which reveals neither.......is the current high or low, is the voltage high or low....that makes wattage arbitrary...

Abiqua said:

That is not an opinion....an opinion is that they are pieces of shit when compared to LED's companies that actually produced specifications on their diodes...point blank....

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Nope. It's just another wannabes worthless fucking opinion. Yes I know, I rocked the Deans list every semester and carry a 4.0.

FUCK OFF!

Abiqua said:

and there is no such thing as "3w diodes" that is a marketing term....Current and Voltage are way more important than obscure number like wattage which reveals neither.......is the current high or low, is the voltage high or low....that makes wattage arbitrary...

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Shut up with the silly jibber jabber. You aren't convincing anyone that you are the author of any kind of scholarly article.

@GrowUrOwnDank

I am sorry you feel that way...I still see you don't understand fundamental AC/DC concepts, diode construction and Constant Current....read on any of those topics to divulge your answer...if you are interested....

If you want to call names fine...I have been working with LED's for almost 2 years and started out as ignorant as you...

Again, is it opinion that they are driven hard and specs aren't produced? Hardly opinion....IF it was Cree, Nichia, Bridgelux, Osram, etc etc etc.... we would already have your answer...

Red flag when you don't.....