Powering LED strip lights or alternative?

Sorry to ask what is probably a stupid question, but is this an appropriate power supply for about 7m of these LED strips?

Is sticking them to aluminium, close together, going to be sufficient to dissipate the heat? Heat and electricity costs are my main concern, with original purchase cost not far behind.

Is there something else you would recommend for what will be in an enclosed space.

If I go the strip light route, which I've seen from a couple of threads here does work, what is the best way to adjust their output? The PWM dimmers I see on amazon and ebay don't look like the can cope with 7m of the stuff.

I can't answer your question, but I can offer a suggestion for a better lighting system. Strip lights, even with a heatsink aren't much more efficient than fluorescent bulbs.

bicit said:

I think a DIY lamp would be ideal for this setup. After you're experiment you could try your hand at building something like this. The heatsinks are pre-drilled for M2.5 screws. So you could build this light in about 10min with basic tools. It would be completely passive and roughly 45% efficient.

Vero 10
Pico EZ-mate
A driver
The heatsink
Thermal paste

Just one more option to consider.

Click to expand...

Those are all invisible links btw. Good luck to you sir.

bicit said:

Strip lights, even with a heatsink aren't much more efficient than fluorescent bulbs.

Click to expand...

People regularly post that the SMD5630 is in the 110-120 lm/w. Are you saying that's not true?

That's higher than T5HO which is 92 lm/w when new (which isn't bad). T5HO is onmi (there is a loss incurred reflecting the lumens radiating upwards). Diodes radiate its lumens in the desired direction. That should give SMD a considerable edge as well?

az2000 said:

People regularly post that the SMD5630 is in the 110-120 lm/w. Are you saying that's not true?

That's higher than T5HO which is 92 lm/w when new (which isn't bad). T5HO is onmi (there is a loss incurred reflecting the lumens radiating upwards). Diodes radiate its lumens in the desired direction. That should give SMD a considerable edge as well?

Click to expand...

I won't dispute it outright. It really depends on the manufacture of the strip and final assembly like any led light. Are they actually 5630's? How hard are they driven? Bin's? Resistor quality?

To many variables to say which would be best. To me working with cobs seems like a much easier route.
YMMV.

Sorry about the invisible links - I've edited them to make them visible. I figured if invisible was this forum's style I should stick with it.
I'd rather go with LEDs than fluorescent bulbs, partly for environmental/disposal reasons and partly for space saving reasons.
I intend to combine the cool and warm white variants of the strip I linked to - hopefully I can think of a way that I can easily adjust the ratio as I go along.

@plimsoul
My project will be using one or two older style AT computer power supplies I have kicking around. The voltage is not variable on these.
eby has some cheap power supplies that are adjustable/20A(240w?)/free shipping... around 25$. Someone (caretak3r ?) mentioned using a dimmer out there to control power.

My setup is almost 3:1 warm to cool. 10m of warm will have one power supply and 5m warm + 6M cool on the second.

Forgot who, but someone out there mentioned that when they reduced voltage to 11v and it ran much cooler, but the light output dropped quite a bit. I wouldn't bother with the added complexity with dimming if you have the ability to raise and lower.

@bicit, I agree with most of what you have commented about these smd chips and strips. But at these prices today, I consider this hardware disposable. Believe me, I have almost pulled the trigger on a dozen Vero18's. Can't justify the $$$ yet if I'm still pulling over .75g/w on 230w of cfl.


GB

Hey plimsoul!

This driver is good for 10m of SMD5630 Stripes(1roll coolwhite+1roll warmwhite).
Cut it into 50cm pieces and add them on a alu sheet with 5mm space between the stripes. Than solder allways 2 50cm pieces to one 1m long piece to get 10pcs 1m long stripes!
At last add the 10pcs of 1m stripes in parallel to the driver.
If you use a longer stripes, then you'll got too high losses within the strip and the rear LED's are getting darker and darker. Note! The shorter the strip, the higher the light emission!
I'm using stripes for vegging and for some motherplants and I can confirm they work better as any CFL I have used.
I have used a 125w CFL for a long time for my mothers and have changed it a half year ago into smd5630LED.
At a distance from 10cm the CFL gives you Ø 10-15.000lx and much less on the edges, with 10m stripes I have 25.000lx at a distance from 20cm on every place under the sheet. Thats say, I have a much better light distribution and double growth rates with only 107W on the wall. Trust me they works well and its a very convenient solution. $ 25 for 10m strip, 30 $ for the driver and $ 5 for the aluminum-sheet, cables, etc. = 60 $ for a 100-120w light.

@go banana and @Randomblame

Wow, thanks for the really information dense posts .
I still think the ability to drop the voltage would be great, but I'm not sure how comfortable I am getting a power supply from ebay - not that I've been able to find one on ebay that is both able to provide enough power and has the ability to switch voltage. The majority of PWM dimmers I've found also don't seem to be able to deal with such a high load.

How hot do the strips get at 12V?

@Randomblame - you said "This driver is good for...", are you referring to what I linked to, or a different driver and the link has vanished?

This video kinda helps to understand a bit about powering these strips and some details of the wiring as Randomblame explained to you.


GB

Hi again!
I mean the 120w driver in your first post. To get lower temps choose one of the small dimmers from ebay! You get get it for 3$ I think. How I've said I have 107w on a 1mm thick alu-sheet with 35-55cm and the max. temps on the backside was allways underneath 45°C. And the temps in grow chamber are only at 20-24°C with 18°C outside.

go banana said:

This video kinda helps to understand a bit about powering these strips and some details of the wiring as Randomblame explained to you.

GB

Click to expand...

Thanks go.banana!
It's a good sample for how to solder them without voltage loss!

Thank you both! That video is great. Apparently I need to buy some crazily thick wire, though...

thanks for the video post! that method of wiring/soldering is SO much easier than what I've been doing.

Is it possible to put pwm dimmers in parallel so that I can control output of warm white and cool white separately but on the same power supply?
e.g.

plimsoul said:

Is it possible to put pwm dimmers in parallel so that I can control output of warm white and cool white separately but on the same power supply?
e.g.

Code:

DC12V 10A -> PWM -> ==  Cool White  ==
          -> PWM -> == Warm White ==

Click to expand...

pretty sure I've done this before - I can't think of any reason why it wouldn't work.

Cool, thanks. My shopping list for this project is getting pretty expensive (need some new tools), but it seems like things should work . No doubt I'll end up with more questions, but even if I don't I'll post a pic of the finished result

Ok Brothers, I am dying to use smd 5730's to make a micro grow or at least use them as side lighting in my 16 x 16 inch mini LED cab. What do you think? I need some advice on which led strips to buy. It's driving me cray so I have to try this.

Please post links to what I should buy. Or tell me I'm crazy and tell me to spend my time in a better manner

Hi plimsoul,

Don't know if you've already sorting it out, but thought I'd chime in..

"Switching power supplies" allow for voltage adjusting. They're only a tad more expensive than 12v dc adapters (wall plug type), but some require a minimum wattage to be attached, so they're a little less simple plug&play than wall adapters. They are a box with no wires.. you attach a 120v or 240v AC wall plug cord, and attach the DC cords.
Wall adapters seem more common for 100watts or less, ... switching power supplies can handle much more wattage.

The rule is to oversize any power supply by 20-30% over what is attached.