Mau5Capades: builds & grow journal

Growmau5

Growmau5

Well-Known Member
@BobCajun I understand the question but I just don't know the answer from a technical stand point. I do not understand the physics of how a driver reacts to a linear dimming potentiometer. You would be better off asking Robincnn, supra, gg, or stardustsailor. sorry mate.


@WwW1962 Thanks again for the kind words. You should start a thread for your light, i really like the angled heatsink design and would be excited to follow your progress. Good luck with it and feel free to ask questions if you need help. cheers
 
BobCajun

BobCajun

Well-Known Member
Growmau5 said:
@BobCajun I understand the question but I just don't know the answer from a technical stand point. I do not understand the physics of how a driver reacts to a linear dimming potentiometer. You would be better off asking Robincnn, supra, gg, or stardustsailor. sorry mate.
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Yeah okay. I guess you're not one of those guys who are looking to get maximum efficiency from the cobs, just to get better results than with HID. You pretty much have to be an electrical engineer to understand it all.
 
Greengenes707

Greengenes707

Well-Known Member
BobCajun said:
Yeah okay. I guess you're not one of those guys who are looking to get maximum efficiency from the cobs, just to get better results than with HID. You pretty much have to be an electrical engineer to understand it all.
Click to expand...
Exactly. And I can't put it in engineer terms. But simply put the hlg's and all 3way dimming meanwells I believe... use constant current dimming(actually reducing the current being output)...not PWM(pulse/strobe/flashing per time interval). Even when using pwm as a dimer(like a arduino or controller), it dims the CC based on the pwm voltage.
So when dimming using any of the 3 methods...it is actually dimming the power level and gaining efficiency of using the lower current.
Plus 6 year warranty, high IP levels, best available drive efficiency...lots of good things about the top tier meanwells like the HLG.
 
BobCajun

BobCajun

Well-Known Member
Greengenes707 said:
Exactly. And I can't put it in engineer terms. But simply put the hlg's and all 3way dimming meanwells I believe... use constant current dimming(actually reducing the current being output)...not PWM(pulse/strobe/flashing per time interval). Even when using pwm as a dimer(like a arduino or controller), it dims the CC based on the pwm voltage.
So when dimming using any of the 3 methods...it is actually dimming the power level and gaining efficiency of using the lower current.
Plus 6 year warranty, high IP levels, best available drive efficiency...lots of good things about the top tier meanwells like the HLG.
Click to expand...
You're right. I found it here. It has internal controls for both voltage and current adjustments. The Spectrum King power supplies have the two holes with the rubber stoppers. I guess you adjust them with a screwdriver or something. That's good news, you can make the SK more efficient.
 
WwW1962

WwW1962

Well-Known Member
Growmau5 said:
@BobCajun I understand the question but I just don't know the answer from a technical stand point. I do not understand the physics of how a driver reacts to a linear dimming potentiometer. You would be better off asking Robincnn, supra, gg, or stardustsailor. sorry mate.


@WwW1962 Thanks again for the kind words. You should start a thread for your light, i really like the angled heatsink design and would be excited to follow your progress. Good luck with it and feel free to ask questions if you need help. cheers
Click to expand...
soon as my 48 hour thing is up, i'll be on it :) ty
 
IlovePlants

IlovePlants

Well-Known Member
WwW1962 said:
Thanks man, i have a single cxa3070 going atm, the frost started really early..very impressed with these incredible
chips..heres a peek at my skeleton for the veg cabinet..i put another sink in the middle..waiting on the XML 4000-4300K 10 w lamps

WwW i cant like anything yet..but every post will get one when my time is up lol
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I like the angle on that dangle. Like Growmau5 said start a thread once you have it up and running. I find that mildly angled lights combined with top down lighting provides awesome penetration and plays into the geometry of the cupped leaf. Chips are so damn tasty ;P

Sincerely,
IlovePlants
 
CanadianONE

CanadianONE

Well-Known Member
BobCajun said:
Yeah okay. I guess you're not one of those guys who are looking to get maximum efficiency from the cobs, just to get better results than with HID. You pretty much have to be an electrical engineer to understand it all.
Click to expand...
You can DIM the LED's with analog control (linear potentiometer) either the internal ones supplied or in the case of the 3 in 1 drivers with an external potentiometer. There are pros and cons of doing it this way and I will mention a couple but not all. Pro: easy for anyone to install & cheap. CON: it can actually cause a shift in color due to lower drive currents. Another method of control is Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) as the name points out it adjusts the width of the on/off pulse. So to put it in easily understandable terms a Meanwell 1400mA driver at 50% PWM would be on 50% of the time and off 50% of the time at 1400mA So not there is no possible shift in color but you still get the increased efficiency because your actually powering the LED's 50% of the time. Hope this helps.some.
 
BobCajun

BobCajun

Well-Known Member
CanadianONE said:
You can DIM the LED's with analog control (linear potentiometer) either the internal ones supplied or in the case of the 3 in 1 drivers with an external potentiometer. There are pros and cons of doing it this way and I will mention a couple but not all. Pro: easy for anyone to install & cheap. CON: it can actually cause a shift in color due to lower drive currents. Another method of control is Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) as the name points out it adjusts the width of the on/off pulse. So to put it in easily understandable terms a Meanwell 1400mA driver at 50% PWM would be on 50% of the time and off 50% of the time at 1400mA So not there is no possible shift in color but you still get the increased efficiency because your actually powering the LED's 50% of the time. Hope this helps.some.
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You wouldn't actually be getting improved efficiency with the PWM dimming then. The LEDs just won't be emitting light steadily but when they in the on state they will be the same efficiency as they were when powered steadily. There will be no increase in lumens per watt. I guess you need to adjust the internal "I" adjuster, "I" meaning current. PWM won't alter the current. Less total power will be consumed but that's because the LEDs are off some of the time.
 
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WwW1962

WwW1962

Well-Known Member
im searching for a cob socket that has the lens attachment for the cxa3070, mouser sent me some wrong marked item..got a link by any chance?
thank you so much
WwW
 
EfficientWatt

EfficientWatt

Well-Known Member
Wow, you sure about that ?

I'm unsure now, but was under the impression that ...

- There was virtually no spectrum shift with cobs we're talking about ...

- Although PWM is 'modulated', I didn't think the driver actually turned on/off, it just 'understands' the level it needs to run at ... not sure at all tho.

Can someone clear this out ?

CanadianONE said:
You can DIM the LED's with analog control (linear potentiometer) either the internal ones supplied or in the case of the 3 in 1 drivers with an external potentiometer. There are pros and cons of doing it this way and I will mention a couple but not all. Pro: easy for anyone to install & cheap. CON: it can actually cause a shift in color due to lower drive currents. Another method of control is Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) as the name points out it adjusts the width of the on/off pulse. So to put it in easily understandable terms a Meanwell 1400mA driver at 50% PWM would be on 50% of the time and off 50% of the time at 1400mA So not there is no possible shift in color but you still get the increased efficiency because your actually powering the LED's 50% of the time. Hope this helps.some.
Click to expand...
 
BobCajun

BobCajun

Well-Known Member
CanadianONE said:
Beauty, I plan to build my own PWM controller with arduino or other micro controller at some point for future builds.
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I wonder how plants perceive PWM dimmed LEDs. Maybe the difference in photosynthesis is not linear at different dimming levels. Maybe it still acts like steady light when only dimmed a little because the strobing is so fast.
 
EfficientWatt

EfficientWatt

Well-Known Member
well...
T5 neon light, and magnetic ballast hps have flickering way worse than any correctly configured led setup by miles.
 
CanadianONE

CanadianONE

Well-Known Member
BobCajun said:
You wouldn't actually be getting improved efficiency with the PWM dimming then. The LEDs just won't be emitting light steadily but when they in the on state they will be the same efficiency as they were when powered steadily. There will be no increase in lumens per watt. I guess you need to adjust the internal "I" adjuster, "I" meaning current. PWM won't alter the current. Less total power will be consumed but that's because the LEDs are off some of the time.
Click to expand...
I agree you wouldn't be getting improved efficiency when looking at lumens per watt. But the total overall system efficiency would be increased because you would now be using less watt's from the wall to get the desired output.

EfficientWatt said:
Wow, you sure about that ?

I'm unsure now, but was under the impression that ...

- There was virtually no spectrum shift with cobs we're talking about ...

- Although PWM is 'modulated', I didn't think the driver actually turned on/off, it just 'understands' the level it needs to run at ... not sure at all tho.

Can someone clear this out ?
Click to expand...
PWM is exactly that the DC side of the driver is switching the current ON (high) OFF (LOW) at a very rapid rate to achieve the desired output.
As far as the spectrum shift when dimming with analog circuit, I have nothing to back this claim up I was just passing on something I had read on another page.
 
IlovePlants

IlovePlants

Well-Known Member
Growmau5 said:
Doing a little camera work tonight. I have a tripod on the way, but I couldn't resist. I'm pretty happy with this run so far, and its development for day 43 of flowering.

Click to expand...
Dude you're not supposed to be this awesome. Great work, like a legend in the making. I can't wait to see the final numbers.

Sincerely,
IlovePlants
 
Growmau5

Growmau5

Well-Known Member
Thanks for the great compliment @IlovePlants its only day 43 on 63 day strain. I feel like things are going pretty well from a health perspective, but bud size could be much better. Don't get me wrong , there are some chongers in there (like GG would say) but there are some really puny buds as well, esp the Sin Mint.

We shall see, this is the first time I dropped the House and Garden: Top booster & Top Shooter(aka liquid shooting powder). This combo has been my late stage booster for the past couple years. This time around, im using Rock Resinator. But ill keep you guys posted, like I said in my first episode of this series: no BS, no ego, no numbers fudging, just the straight dope....
 
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