Mellodrama
Well-Known Member
The purpose of this thread is to complement the great DIY LED threads. I want to focus on just one part of the puzzle. That would be COB holders. I only have hands-on with one holder, the Ideal holder for the Cree CXA30 series, so the info will be a bit biased in that direction.
Molex makes some holders. Some of theirs look pretty cool. But they don't have a product out yet for the Cree CXA30's so I didn't buy any of theirs.
Ideal Industries makes holders. That link takes you to their main page. From there you can follow links to their holders for Cree, Citizens, Nichia, etc.
For instance, here's the page for the Cree CXA series holders. Ideal makes holders for the CXA18, 25, 30, and 35. The CXA30 holder is Ideal part # 50-2234C. I bought several of those from Newark. Shipping was a little bit ridiculous, but that may have been because I failed to choose the cheapest shipping option. Newark sent them out Two-Day Express. Yikes. On the Cree CXA holder page, please check out the "Product Resources" links. There are some .pdf's and a great video. If you do nothing else, watch the video.
Here's a very nice .pdf from Ideal with specific instructions for wire size, wire stripping, torquing down the screws, etc. Buried deep in Gaius' Battlestar thread I wrote about tightening the screws down until the holder deflected a little bit. That was wrong, but it's too late to edit the post now. Ideal's instructions specify 4 to 5 inch pounds. That's a tiny amount of force. If you watch the installation video you'll see how the guy stops turning the screwdriver before applying any muscle.
Since thermal paste will flow once it gets hot, I'd suggest checking the screws after you've assembled a light and run it for a few days. I'd be surprised if they didn't feel loose.
There are at least 3 advantages to using holders.
#1: No soldering to your brand new COB's. I can solder. I've successfully replaced capacitors on computer motherboards. But I'm not thrilled about soldering to anything that I just bought, much less holding the iron fractions of an inch from the fragile LED's on a $40 COB.
#2: You can use regular thermal paste, not thermal adhesive.
#3: Freedom to move them around, swap them out, move to another heatsink, etc.
All you need is the right drill bit & tap, and ideally a drill press. A small tap wrench would be nice but not necessary. I used #6-32 because I had the drill & tap, and a pile of screws from salvaged computers. A note on screws: you'll want small heads. The beefy heads on #6-32 PC hard drive screws are too large. And just like the risk you would take holding a soldering iron close to the LED's, you run a risk getting close to them with a screwdriver. Straight-slot screws would be suicidal in my opinion. Philips would be better. Torx or Allen would be better still.
Ideal also makes an intriguing product for these holders that they call a Reflector Adaptor. On this page you'll see more links to videos, which explain how these work. The Ideal adaptors will accept four different styles of LEDiL lenses. Each of those four styles (Lena, Lenina, Angela, Angelina) come in wide, medium, and spot.
Here's the problem. The LEDiL reflectors are 1) expensive, and 2) hard to find.
Imagine how freakin' AWESOME it would be to strap 8 of those LEDiL reflectors to Gaius' Battlestar
The hairs are standin' up on my neck
Molex makes some holders. Some of theirs look pretty cool. But they don't have a product out yet for the Cree CXA30's so I didn't buy any of theirs.
Ideal Industries makes holders. That link takes you to their main page. From there you can follow links to their holders for Cree, Citizens, Nichia, etc.
For instance, here's the page for the Cree CXA series holders. Ideal makes holders for the CXA18, 25, 30, and 35. The CXA30 holder is Ideal part # 50-2234C. I bought several of those from Newark. Shipping was a little bit ridiculous, but that may have been because I failed to choose the cheapest shipping option. Newark sent them out Two-Day Express. Yikes. On the Cree CXA holder page, please check out the "Product Resources" links. There are some .pdf's and a great video. If you do nothing else, watch the video.
Here's a very nice .pdf from Ideal with specific instructions for wire size, wire stripping, torquing down the screws, etc. Buried deep in Gaius' Battlestar thread I wrote about tightening the screws down until the holder deflected a little bit. That was wrong, but it's too late to edit the post now. Ideal's instructions specify 4 to 5 inch pounds. That's a tiny amount of force. If you watch the installation video you'll see how the guy stops turning the screwdriver before applying any muscle.
Since thermal paste will flow once it gets hot, I'd suggest checking the screws after you've assembled a light and run it for a few days. I'd be surprised if they didn't feel loose.
There are at least 3 advantages to using holders.
#1: No soldering to your brand new COB's. I can solder. I've successfully replaced capacitors on computer motherboards. But I'm not thrilled about soldering to anything that I just bought, much less holding the iron fractions of an inch from the fragile LED's on a $40 COB.
#2: You can use regular thermal paste, not thermal adhesive.
#3: Freedom to move them around, swap them out, move to another heatsink, etc.
All you need is the right drill bit & tap, and ideally a drill press. A small tap wrench would be nice but not necessary. I used #6-32 because I had the drill & tap, and a pile of screws from salvaged computers. A note on screws: you'll want small heads. The beefy heads on #6-32 PC hard drive screws are too large. And just like the risk you would take holding a soldering iron close to the LED's, you run a risk getting close to them with a screwdriver. Straight-slot screws would be suicidal in my opinion. Philips would be better. Torx or Allen would be better still.
Ideal also makes an intriguing product for these holders that they call a Reflector Adaptor. On this page you'll see more links to videos, which explain how these work. The Ideal adaptors will accept four different styles of LEDiL lenses. Each of those four styles (Lena, Lenina, Angela, Angelina) come in wide, medium, and spot.
Here's the problem. The LEDiL reflectors are 1) expensive, and 2) hard to find.
Imagine how freakin' AWESOME it would be to strap 8 of those LEDiL reflectors to Gaius' Battlestar
The hairs are standin' up on my neck
