TheFishMan65
New member
IIRC, no the 185 is what you want. The 240 does not have good dimming, but double check the data sheet.
DIY LEDs - The write-up
- Thread starter JohnL
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Ahhh I see. How many LEDs can you run at 1.5 amps on one of the HLG185?
Here is Thea link where you can find the data sheet I just want another few sets of eyes to look at it please!
http://wattsupply.com/s.nl/it.A/id.2982/.f
Here is Thea link where you can find the data sheet I just want another few sets of eyes to look at it please!
http://wattsupply.com/s.nl/it.A/id.2982/.f
TheFishMan65
New member
What voltage do you want to run at? Assuming 48 volts you have 3.9 amps to play with.
Well i have decided to start making my DIY LED units. They will be 600x400mm in size with the enclosure made of 2mm thick aluminium. There will be three units each with an initial 48 Cree LEDS using the Rapid LED DIY kits available online. The heatsinks will be 600 x 76mm with 12 LED's on each heatsink. the desgn will allow for a fifth heatsink and 12 LED's to be installed if i find i need more light. I have made up some drawings to show what i am planning. These will cost around $500 - 550 each to build creating a unit of approximately 144 watts. Although you buy similar wattage chinese built units now for that price i am hoping that going the DIY route i can create something out of higher quality products that will also be customisable and upgradable and easily repaired (eg if a driver blows etc). Any thoughts on the comparison between DIY and off the shelf would be appreciated.
Although the payback will be around 3 years plus (as i already have MH lighting so i dont need to actually buy it) i am hoping the lower power costs in particulr with chilling will make a big difference.
I plan to make these as professional as possible and will also be installing a temperature controller for the fans that will monitor the heatsink temp and start up the fans as required.
I will be using:
24 Cool White Cree XP-G R5 LEDs
24 Royal Blue Cree XP-E LEDs
48 Cree XP- Lenses (~60 degree lenses)
4 Mean Well ELN-60-48D dimmable drivers (hope to utilise the 1-10v dimming unit with the Aquatronica at a later stage to control these lights)
Each lighting unit will have 4 drivers with 2 drivers controlling the blues and 2 drivers controlling the whites. I may add some other colours later if required but i hope thiss will give me the colour and output i need to keep SPS.
I have shown the protecive glass slightly offset to show the layout a bit better It was too hard to see when it was fully in position.
Although the payback will be around 3 years plus (as i already have MH lighting so i dont need to actually buy it) i am hoping the lower power costs in particulr with chilling will make a big difference.
I plan to make these as professional as possible and will also be installing a temperature controller for the fans that will monitor the heatsink temp and start up the fans as required.
I will be using:
24 Cool White Cree XP-G R5 LEDs
24 Royal Blue Cree XP-E LEDs
48 Cree XP- Lenses (~60 degree lenses)
4 Mean Well ELN-60-48D dimmable drivers (hope to utilise the 1-10v dimming unit with the Aquatronica at a later stage to control these lights)
Each lighting unit will have 4 drivers with 2 drivers controlling the blues and 2 drivers controlling the whites. I may add some other colours later if required but i hope thiss will give me the colour and output i need to keep SPS.
I have shown the protecive glass slightly offset to show the layout a bit better It was too hard to see when it was fully in position.
TheFishMan65
New member
kirsto71, Am I reading right that you will have 12 ELNs? That is not recommended as you may have problems. Take a look at the HLGs.
Well i have decided to start making my DIY LED units. They will be 600x400mm in size with the enclosure made of 2mm thick aluminium. There will be three units each with an initial 48 Cree LEDS using the Rapid LED DIY kits available online. The heatsinks will be 600 x 76mm with 12 LED's on each heatsink. the desgn will allow for a fifth heatsink and 12 LED's to be installed if i find i need more light. I have made up some drawings to show what i am planning. These will cost around $500 - 550 each to build creating a unit of approximately 144 watts. Although you buy similar wattage chinese built units now for that price i am hoping that going the DIY route i can create something out of higher quality products that will also be customisable and upgradable and easily repaired (eg if a driver blows etc). Any thoughts on the comparison between DIY and off the shelf would be appreciated.
Although the payback will be around 3 years plus (as i already have MH lighting so i dont need to actually buy it) i am hoping the lower power costs in particulr with chilling will make a big difference.
I plan to make these as professional as possible and will also be installing a temperature controller for the fans that will monitor the heatsink temp and start up the fans as required.
I will be using:
24 Cool White Cree XP-G R5 LEDs
24 Royal Blue Cree XP-E LEDs
48 Cree XP- Lenses (~60 degree lenses)
4 Mean Well ELN-60-48D dimmable drivers (hope to utilise the 1-10v dimming unit with the Aquatronica at a later stage to control these lights)
Each lighting unit will have 4 drivers with 2 drivers controlling the blues and 2 drivers controlling the whites. I may add some other colours later if required but i hope thiss will give me the colour and output i need to keep SPS.
I have shown the protecive glass slightly offset to show the layout a bit better It was too hard to see when it was fully in position.
Design looks nice, as Fishman mentioned there is a chance you could run into issues with that many ELN drivers. I also wanted to suggest that you look into other vendors for the LEDs, last time I looked rapid led was still about $6 a LED, XP-E royal blues can be had for closer to $3 each which is a big difference on a build of this size. Also I would consider adjusting your ratios of white to blue.
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So does that mean 4 strings of 12 LEDs at 1 amp per led? Really not saving money here at all from the sounds of it but I don't know how many you can run per driver.
Gold Stripe
New member
As long as you stay at 12 leds per driver, why would it matter how many drivers you have?
brassmonkyballs
BMB
If you go back only 3 or 4 pages you will find this from Kcress:
Answers to some higher-up-the-page questions:
Quote:
Originally Posted by TheFishMan65
kcress, I am curious so could you explain more? Is the harmonics due to a lack of PFC? Also curious 6 per circuit or per fuse box?
Thanks
I'll quote myself here:
Quote:
To answer your PFC question. The Meanwell 60-48D has just diodes on the front-end that charge a capacitor. Capacitors store energy with voltage. What happens is the capacitors charge up to some level and operation begins. Every power line cycle which varies from 170V to -170V can only add power back to the capacitor, (that is continuously drained by running the LEDs), when the absolute value of the voltage exceeds whatever the drained down voltage of the capacitor is at that moment.
This means the power can only be gotten from the outlet in tiny sporadic gulps. Those gulps are large sudden current spikes because all the energy needed by the system has to come in those tiny gulps.
Those gulps can be 10A even though the name plate states 1A or 0.5A. That's because the name plate shows the average current. When you stack up a pile of these things you may have 300A pulses being drawn from your outlet even though the average current is only 10A.
The heating in your breakers and wiring and outlets is only a function of I-squared R. Which means the heating is very sensitive to the current I. Your wiring is set up for "average" current not these repetitive pulses.
In most cases you won't have a problem - you'll get away with it. Your wiring will be running hotter than predicted by the average current values listed on the Meanwells. If you have no weaknesses (today) like a bad connection in your house wiring you probably won't have an issue.
As for the startup problem with the inrush the inrush listed only occurs when you power-on the MW and the power line voltage which cycles, as stated above, is at the maximum values. Any other time it's less. This means you are rolling the dice every time you energize the MWs. You may turn them ON and the first time the breaker trips. Or the 300th time the breaker blows as it all depends on where in the power line cycle the switch gets thrown.
If you always leave the MWs ON but just dim them then your breaker tripping opportunities are obviously reduced.
The aforementioned problems that diode-front-end power supplies cause is so onerous to the power companies and to places where a lot of switching supplies are used, like offices with a bunch of personal computers, that the laws are changing on the subject of switching supply front ends.
Enter the Power Factor Controlled (PFC) front ends. Instead of diodes hooked to capacitors the diodes are replaced with a controlled network of transistors and inductors. The control directs the current drawn from the power source to be drawn smoothly over the entire power line cycle not just in gulps - no gulping allowed. This avoids ALL the current pulsing and wire heating. This same network can provide the bonus of eliminating the inrush too. As the initial energy drawn on start-up can be actively limited.(Note that these PFC Meanwells don't limit inrush much.)
The HLG line is Meanwell's PFC or "active front end" current drivers. They would be the choice for those wanting a "bunch" of drivers.
007Bond; It means you switch to something bigger. You have a 5 tons of rock to move? You have to switch up from that Volkswagon. The HLGs as Fishman suggests is the way to go. Or the DIY drivers in the other thread.
brassmonkyballs
BMB
The 240 is a strange bird but the others appear to only be dimmed down to 10%. I haven't hooked up my 185 yet as I'm not on that build but I am running the HLG 120 in 42V and its pretty awesome with really smooth dimming compared to the ELNs. All the wiring is more like 16 gage vs 22 on the ELNs, and they are sealed waterproof. Doesn't even get warm with 4 strings of 10 LEDs running at 700ma though I do not run them full tilt in practice.
However, they will not dim to completely off. At zero volts they remain on at what I'm assuming to be 10%. The specs show 1V is 10% and at 0V its the same. I haven't tried open circuit but it supposed to 102-108% so not sure what the intent of the design is. But like I said the dimming is very smooth covering the entire range of the POT with no dead spots whatsoever.
I am very impressed with the driver.
ps....There is a 320 version that runs 7.65A at 42V with the same dimming specs as the 185 and others...the 240 is the only strange one out there.
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kcress
New member
Umm. As far as I know the 320 has never been sold. The spec sheet sez "Preliminary".
Also if it is sold it will be limited just as the 240 is, about 50%.
Thanks for the feedback. I am unsure where i would have issues (i am only new to this). Each light will only have 4 drivers and its own 240 volt supply. Therefore each unit will be self sufficient and seperate from the next.
What is the issue with this many drivers. I was hoping to take advantage of the control aspects.
Thanks again for the feedback.
brassmonkyballs
BMB
not sure where you see that ... not what this spec sheet says http://www.meanwell.com/search/hlg-320h/default.htm ... I don't see preliminary or limiting on it anywhere...fully dimmable.
It may not have ever been sold but if it can be had a call to wattsupply would answer the question. They don't list it but get direct from meanwell.
kcress
New member
Are you serious? Might I suggest you actually read some of this thread.... Just three posts prior brassmonkyballs went to the bother to hunt down the answer to your exact same question and spoon fed it here. Now you ask it again... :hmm3:
Let me also point out the the very best, longest, and clearest, answers to all these same questions are in the earlier posts.
None of us can spend the large amount of time it takes to pen these answers, and check, them and correct them, dozens of times, over, and over.
What that means is if you ask the same question for the thirty-fifth time the answer you get is probably going to be the most terse possible since it was already asked and answered in-depth previously.
If you want the best answers, use the search feature.
Without a doubt RC's search is the finest ever provided on a website. If you search you will find the answer you want in more depth and RIGHT NOW instead of waiting for someone to come and answer it again.
In search check the DIY FORUM to limit search to this forum.
Select "anytime" to reach back to the original material.
Type in two or three key words.
Click the SHOW POSTS not the threads (unless you want the whole thread).
Hit search and you will get several posts of exactly what you seek.
Give RC's search a serious try - there is no finer search function on any forum.
Then, if you need a clarification, by all means ask. We love working a clarification. It means you've bothered to do a few minutes ground work - you're on board, the train is moving. Something new, something to solve. We'll be entertained. You'll get an in depth answer.
Thank you for the feedback. I had actually responded without seeing the response from brassmonkyballs and i apologise. I usually use the search function and agree it has served me well in the past. I do still want some more clarification because i dont 100% understand the issue and will have a look foirst to see if i can find it.
Of course a little civility is also reasonable. You obviously responded assuming i am new to this process and know nothing of how to utilise the resource. I made a mistake and missed some information i will endeavour not doing that again.
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