mechanicritter
Member
I just finished a project some of you might find interesting, I decided to test out some of the new higher power bead LEDs by making a little lamp for one of my pepper plants. It is starting to freeze and this thing still has flowers on it, so I brought it inside. I am assuming december sunlight is not enough, so I made a multivitamin for it out of 2 little Chanzon 5 watt full spectrum LEDs.
These little suckers are about 1/4" and put out 5 watts of 70% reddish and 20% blueish light, and use only 6v and 1.4amps. Here is the spectrum chart they advertise.
I also found a metal mount plate that would hold 5 of them, depending on how much heat they put off.
These are pretty easy to wire up, you just need to determine the + and -, and then wire it up to a buck converter. I found a cheap lm2596 buck converter for it, and set it to about 12v. Then I soldered it up to the two leds in series, the converter, and an input plug for a 12v 2amp supply I had laying around. That should make these LEDs put out about 8 watts, or 100 lumens each.
The two leds produce just enough heat to need some extra cooling, so I used a screw and a washer to pull some of the heat out the top. To see just how hot it gets, I put it in a piece of hardwood. If it turns black or bursts into flame, I will try something less flammable for the permanent cover..
Amazingly these 2 little 1/4" LEDs put out quite a bit of light, and as long as it is more than 3 inches away from the tops no heat is felt near the leaves. Both the big pepper and the little one lean toward the light now. Here is the final project, giving some extra lumens to my indoor peppers.
So far after a week of indoor life, the leaves look better and one pepper turned red! The little habanero appears to like the new light too. With regular indoor lighting on it looks a little pinkish but doesn't make the whole room look weird. And now that they Legalized It, I don't have to worry about getting raided over a few indoor pepper plants.
If you are new to LEDs, these little ones are a great place to start. The 5 watt ones are about a dollar each now, the mount was less than a quarter, and the converter was about 2 bucks. If you have a soldering iron, some wire, and an unused 12v power supply, you can make one too.
This turned out pretty good for a tiny DIY project light for less than 10 bucks!
These little suckers are about 1/4" and put out 5 watts of 70% reddish and 20% blueish light, and use only 6v and 1.4amps. Here is the spectrum chart they advertise.
I also found a metal mount plate that would hold 5 of them, depending on how much heat they put off.
These are pretty easy to wire up, you just need to determine the + and -, and then wire it up to a buck converter. I found a cheap lm2596 buck converter for it, and set it to about 12v. Then I soldered it up to the two leds in series, the converter, and an input plug for a 12v 2amp supply I had laying around. That should make these LEDs put out about 8 watts, or 100 lumens each.
The two leds produce just enough heat to need some extra cooling, so I used a screw and a washer to pull some of the heat out the top. To see just how hot it gets, I put it in a piece of hardwood. If it turns black or bursts into flame, I will try something less flammable for the permanent cover..
Amazingly these 2 little 1/4" LEDs put out quite a bit of light, and as long as it is more than 3 inches away from the tops no heat is felt near the leaves. Both the big pepper and the little one lean toward the light now. Here is the final project, giving some extra lumens to my indoor peppers.
So far after a week of indoor life, the leaves look better and one pepper turned red! The little habanero appears to like the new light too. With regular indoor lighting on it looks a little pinkish but doesn't make the whole room look weird. And now that they Legalized It, I don't have to worry about getting raided over a few indoor pepper plants.
If you are new to LEDs, these little ones are a great place to start. The 5 watt ones are about a dollar each now, the mount was less than a quarter, and the converter was about 2 bucks. If you have a soldering iron, some wire, and an unused 12v power supply, you can make one too.
This turned out pretty good for a tiny DIY project light for less than 10 bucks!
