Thursday, April 05, 2012
12V led lighting
I have been setting up LED lighting for a while now,
and the technology has been changing fast,
so even my cutting edge (and pricey at the time) cree Q5 LEDs are now outdated...
but I got lots of them so I still make things with them
here is my latest lamp and it lights my living room it is built on a 14 by 17 inch plate of alluminum .032 inches thick
it is 3 cree q5 LEDs mounted with thermal heatsink compound and bolted in place with nylon screws and nuts,
they are wired in series with a resistor,
I did not have a resistor the correct size so I just made one,
it is on the back of the aluminum plate,
and is made with 10 foot (if I remembered that correct maybe it was 15 foot) of 34Ga wire wrapped on a copper pipe and sprayed with stove paint, it still gets hot enough to burn me if I touch it,
I meant to fix that at some point, but have not bothered and it does not seem to cause any issues
it pulls 0.86A at 13.8V so the resistor is about the correct resistance
and it is connected to a deep cycle battery that is set up with a regulated charger that will not over charge my battery , so I figure I will have about 6 months of regular use after the power failure
and that will give me time to set up the solar charging system
the LEDs are way to bright to look at direct so I had to diffuse the light,
I looked everywhere for a proper diffuser,
and eventually settled on ping pong balls cut in half and taped in front of the LED
for another design I made this one
this one uses the base of a failed CFL bulb (I could not figure out what to do with them anyway)
and it is a Q5 led
and uses 2 sticky heat sinks
and a driver board, I have made 12V DC and 120V AC versions
and a 1/2 ping pong ball as a diffuser
any questions ? leave comments
and the technology has been changing fast,
so even my cutting edge (and pricey at the time) cree Q5 LEDs are now outdated...
but I got lots of them so I still make things with them
here is my latest lamp and it lights my living room it is built on a 14 by 17 inch plate of alluminum .032 inches thick
it is 3 cree q5 LEDs mounted with thermal heatsink compound and bolted in place with nylon screws and nuts,
they are wired in series with a resistor,
I did not have a resistor the correct size so I just made one,
it is on the back of the aluminum plate,
and is made with 10 foot (if I remembered that correct maybe it was 15 foot) of 34Ga wire wrapped on a copper pipe and sprayed with stove paint, it still gets hot enough to burn me if I touch it,
I meant to fix that at some point, but have not bothered and it does not seem to cause any issues
it pulls 0.86A at 13.8V so the resistor is about the correct resistance
and it is connected to a deep cycle battery that is set up with a regulated charger that will not over charge my battery , so I figure I will have about 6 months of regular use after the power failure
and that will give me time to set up the solar charging system
the LEDs are way to bright to look at direct so I had to diffuse the light,
I looked everywhere for a proper diffuser,
and eventually settled on ping pong balls cut in half and taped in front of the LED
for another design I made this one
this one uses the base of a failed CFL bulb (I could not figure out what to do with them anyway)
and it is a Q5 led
and uses 2 sticky heat sinks
and a driver board, I have made 12V DC and 120V AC versions
and a 1/2 ping pong ball as a diffuser
any questions ? leave comments
