Tweaking the LED

[AdamS]

so are you saying im overdriving my UV's or under driving the RB LEDS on the driver with the 3 UV's?

What current is the driver running at, that will give you the answer.

 

[Salty Cracker]

Crap, they are rated 700ma

Well that complicaes things.  However, since I have 9 drivers in there now, and a dozen various heatsinks, I should be able to fashion up a couple of UV and blue/RB strips for now.  Eventually I might do a second 5' strip of just UV's running alongside the 'actinic' strip.  This is the beauty of DIY.  If I was just ordering the fixture, I couldn't make all these on the fly changes

 

[Neopimp]

just buy a larger driver

I run 3 to light up 96 leds

 

[Duke]

[quote author=Duke link=topic=3647.msg31607#msg31607 date=1354067103]
so are you saying im overdriving my UV's or under driving the RB LEDS on the driver with the 3 UV's?

What current is the driver running at, that will give you the answer.
[/quote]

never really went as far as putting a meter on them, they aren't an adjustable driver so I figured whats the point, ill assume since total im on the low end of the recommended leds for this driver i probably am overdriving the crap outta the UV's but it hasn't been a problem yet,

 

[Salty Cracker]

Actually, this was good info.  I have been running my Royal blue actinic strip with 2 of these drivers:
http://www.rapidled.com/mean-well-lpc-35-700-constant-current-driver/    which is underdriving those LEDs.    So I can use them for the UV bulbs, and get a couple of these http://www.rapidled.com/mean-well-lpc-60-1050-constant-current-driver/ for the royal blues and get a bit more light out of them.  Everything else is running on dimmable drivers. 

This is why I post these things, what you can learn is amazing

 

[AdamS]

Duke, if you are overdriving them it means you are overheatin them and shortening the life. If you just have a few, i wouldnt be too worried about them. Maybe just have a few replacements on hand.

 

[Victoss]

Maybe you have a lower running driver like salty posted, I don't think the UVs could survive being run higher then 700 for very long but never tested this as I don't want to waste LEDs so maybe they are being over driven? If you are then like Adam said, their life will be considerably shorter in the long run.

That should work for you salty, just make sure your are running the 3-14 they say for each driver. Also I don't think it was ever posted so what brand/type of royal blue are you running any ways? Just want to make sure you don't have something like the Philips Rebel ES Royal Blue the RapidLED also sells or something else, because it can only be run at 1000mA.

 

[Salty Cracker]

Maybe you have a lower running driver like salty posted, I don't think the UVs could survive being run higher then 700 for very long but never tested this as I don't want to waste LEDs so maybe they are being over driven? If you are then like Adam said, their life will be considerably shorter in the long run.

That should work for you salty, just make sure your are running the 3-14 they say for each driver. Also I don't think it was ever posted so what brand/type of royal blue are you running any ways? Just want to make sure you don't have something like the Philips Rebel ES Royal Blue the RapidLED also sells or something else, because it can only be run at 1000mA.

I run the cree royal blues, I've had great luck with the CREEs so far, don't really want to try anything else until I read there is something definitely superior.  That driver I listed should run the CREEs, no?

 

[Victoss]

Yep your good with any cree royal blue rapid has, just checking . I use mainly crees too but I have a few Phillips for some of the weird colours and what ever their violet UVs are.

On a side note, I ordered 2 of RapidLEDs <a href="http://www.rapidled.com/12-led-par38-bulb-mixed-color-with-uv/">12 LED PAR38 Bulb (Mixed Color with UV)</a> for a frag tank, so really exited about getting them soon. I like the idea of PAR38 bulbs this time around since they will be easy to mount anywhere and sell if the need comes compared to a DIY fixture. (But I would still go for a diy fixture on a display tank)

 

[AdamS]

Any update?

 

[Salty Cracker]

Of COURSE it didn't show up by Friday.  Ah well, I'll have time during the week when it does show up. 

 

[TORX]

Of COURSE it didn't show up by Friday.  Ah well, I'll have time during the week when it does show up. 

BE sure to check the tracking...deliveries love to be left on your front porch this time of year and trolls love to go shopping on peoples porches this time of year. Especially UPS...will attempt delivery 3 times before leaving a card for pick up my arse. They do not even knock, just drop and run. Maybe they are trying to be ninjas

 

[jones02]

[quote author=Salty Cracker link=topic=3647.msg31918#msg31918 date=1354379450]
Of COURSE it didn't show up by Friday.  Ah well, I'll have time during the week when it does show up. 

BE sure to check the tracking...deliveries love to be left on your front porch this time of year and trolls love to go shopping on peoples porches this time of year. Especially UPS...will attempt delivery 3 times before leaving a card for pick up my arse. They do not even knock, just drop and run. Maybe they are trying to be ninjas

[/quote]

Just had my brs order come in annd I put a signature required when they shipped and I was in my living room and they came put the card on the door and didn't even knock? And my neighbour said they didn't even bring a package in with them? And it was 8:40 at night the tracking said no one was here to pick it up.

 

[Salty Cracker]

[quote author=Torx link=topic=3647.msg31934#msg31934 date=1354382413]
[quote author=Salty Cracker link=topic=3647.msg31918#msg31918 date=1354379450]
Of COURSE it didn't show up by Friday.  Ah well, I'll have time during the week when it does show up. 

BE sure to check the tracking...deliveries love to be left on your front porch this time of year and trolls love to go shopping on peoples porches this time of year. Especially UPS...will attempt delivery 3 times before leaving a card for pick up my arse. They do not even knock, just drop and run. Maybe they are trying to be ninjas

[/quote]

Just had my brs order come in annd I put a signature required when they shipped and I was in my living room and they came put the card on the door and didn't even knock? And my neighbour said they didn't even bring a package in with them? And it was 8:40 at night the tracking said no one was here to pick it up.
[/quote]

canada post has been doing this quite a bit...I got the guy about a month ago dropping off the card, saying "not home, go pick it up yourself" and said "WHAT THA FUCK".  He said "you're on my list of deliveries, but the item is not on the truck, so I have to leave a card."  I guess it's easier to drop everything off at the post office for me, but why drive all the way over with nothing, then say it wasn't their fault, but that I wasn't home. 

 

[AdamS]

Im glad my house/neighbourhood is not the only one this happens at. They should have an option to just pick up at depot, no delivery attempt, would save everyone time and money.

 

[jones02]

What white leds do you have? Cool whites? And are they the XP-G or the new XM-L?

 

[Salty Cracker]

I only have the xm-g,  I don't plan to get the more expensive ones unless the colour is better.  If I can get things growing well in a ~15000K look tank, I'm going to go that route. 

Never say never, but for now I'm going much more blue, and using less white.

 

[Salty Cracker]

Sweet, it showed up today, it's a freakin nice heatsink.  I think I decided to do 14 Royal blues on one driver, then a mix of white and RB on the second channel.  Little by little I'm going to swap out the RB's I have on a 5' heatsink for all UV.  I have 3 more tiny heatsinks I will use for supplemental white, red, etc. 

**edit.  Wow, this thing is drilled for 36 LED's.  Change of plans, I will set the UV's on a 3rd driver right on this sink.  That way I can get rid of the smaller sinks in my canopy.  I definitely will be ordering 2 more of these to finish the setup.  36 on each of these, and then 24 whatever else on the 1"x5' sink.  Awesome. 

 

[Salty Cracker]

Sweet, it showed up today, it's a freakin nice heatsink.  I think I decided to do 14 Royal blues on one driver, then a mix of white and RB on the second channel.  Little by little I'm going to swap out the RB's I have on a 5' heatsink for all UV.  I have 3 more tiny heatsinks I will use for supplemental white, red, etc. 

**edit.  Wow, this thing is drilled for 36 LED's.  Change of plans, I will set the UV's on a 3rd driver right on this sink.  That way I can get rid of the smaller sinks in my canopy.  I definitely will be ordering 2 more of these to finish the setup.  36 on each of these, and then 24 whatever else on the 1\"x5' sink.  Awesome.

Heh, soldering 36 LEDs takes a while.  Maybe I should have made the plunge to the solderless ones...   Still, this is a killer design on the heatsink.  slots for the splash guard, and ridges on top for a hanging kit. 

 

[jones02]

Are you going to be using splash guards?