Guide me to the Light....

Rocket Soul

Rocket Soul

Well-Known Member
cobshopgrow said:
lets say your strip is running at 20.5V and your driver is capable of delivering 24V.
you have a "buffer" of 3.5V your cables or anything else in the chain can "burn".
sure , you need pick the right driver capable of enough overhead, while its often not much needed, a volt or so.
should be noted that a volt is percentage wise a lot on a 24V driver, not so much on a 48V driver, even less on 100V and so on.

just wanted to say dont go mad about it, thats just indirect related to how powerfull your drivers are.
You just cant change much other then take thicker/shorter cables, or go higher with the voltage to keep the A low to reduce the drop, IF its too high for your liking/usecase.

the 42V driver and 2 EB3 in series are a good choice in my mind.
for the sammies it sounds like the 48V driver is a better option.
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Using A-type dimming you allways have several volts of possible overhead above the stated voltage. If you kept current real low on the ebs you should technically be able to use a 36A type driver and turn it up to 39-40V. But not ahving tried myself and the small margins make me feel iffy about recing it.
 
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DukeFluke

Well-Known Member
I understand, but what I don't get is, if the voltage of the driver can be dialled down, doesn't that protect from the issue of overload?

I mean if I got a driver a few volts over what I needed and turned it down, what's the problem there?
 
cobshopgrow

cobshopgrow

Well-Known Member
no problem with a driver who is capable of a few volt over.

lets take your 480h-36ab as example.
18 ~ 36V is the range where he is in CC mode.
you connect a led with 18V and it will get 13.3A , 240W used.
or a led with 36V, still getting 13.3A, 479W used.
nothing you need to set or such, detected automatically.

going above 36V and you leave the CC mode, 36-37.8V is the CV region of the driver.
so if you set your driver to 37.8V the driver the current will go down, giving not much more then 12.67A, 479W (practically you will get more power out of the driver this way).

so pushing the driver in the CV region enable you to overdrive the driver a bit, there is maybe a good 10% more comming out of it (14A or whatever),
you get a 530W driver or so in the end.

its pedal to the metal mode, all the engine can give.
 
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DukeFluke

Well-Known Member
Right. Clearly explained. Nice one

So let's say we would never need to overclock the driver. In fact we would only ever need to dim it. Then there will be no real reason to get the A version of the driver?
 
Rocket Soul

Rocket Soul

Well-Known Member
DukeFluke said:
Right. Clearly explained. Nice one

So let's say we would never need to overclock the driver. In fact we would only ever need to dim it. Then there will be no real reason to get the A version of the driver?
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Being able to adjust voltage is also a saftey feature, you can use it to set an upper limit in how much your power strips can draw from the driver.

Iirc : your f-strips are 46V nominal, it means that if something happened and something broke in your parallel circuit in way so that you went from lets say 12 strips to 2 strips; the 2 remaining strips will try to draw more power from the driver until they are pulling either all the remaining power (240w each, and melting/catching fire) or until they reach the max draw of the voltage of the driver. With 48V as set point then it will draw whatever 48V corresponds, lets just say too much. If you have a voltage dimmable driver you can adjust it down to 46V and your 2 remaining strips will not be able to draw more that their nominal current. Your saving your self from the risk of damaging strips and more importantly causing a fire or similar.
 
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DukeFluke

Well-Known Member
Rocket Soul said:
Being able to adjust voltage is also a saftey feature, you can use it to set an upper limit in how much your power strips can draw from the driver.

Iirc : your f-strips are 46V nominal, it means that if something happened and something broke in your parallel circuit in way so that you went from lets say 12 strips to 2 strips; the 2 remaining strips will try to draw more power from the driver until they are pulling either all the remaining power (240w each, and melting/catching fire) or until they reach the max draw of the voltage of the driver. With 48V as set point then it will draw whatever 48V corresponds, lets just say too much. If you have a voltage dimmable driver you can adjust it down to 46V and your 2 remaining strips will not be able to draw more that their nominal current. Your saving your self from the risk of damaging strips and more importantly causing a fire or similar.
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Understood. Thanks

So let's say you're running your strips at half power in the first place, and a couple go out. Would I be right in thinking this gives you some insurance as well? I mean the rest of the strips are still well within their max range aren't they?
 
Rocket Soul

Rocket Soul

Well-Known Member
DukeFluke said:
Understood. Thanks

So let's say you're running your strips at half power in the first place, and a couple go out. Would I be right in thinking this gives you some insurance as well? I mean the rest of the strips are still well within their max range aren't they?
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Once you got your fixture together ill help you out on how to set it up. Its easy.
Key to understand this is that in parallel strips will share the amps every strips will coontinue asking for more amps if they are available, til it reaches the amps where the voltage of the strip has reached the voltage of the powersource. AB is the best way to go anyways.
 
Rocket Soul

Rocket Soul

Well-Known Member
DukeFluke said:
Understood. Thanks

So let's say you're running your strips at half power in the first place, and a couple go out. Would I be right in thinking this gives you some insurance as well? I mean the rest of the strips are still well within their max range aren't they?
Click to expand...
Yes, safety in numbers.
 
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DukeFluke

Well-Known Member
Ok thanks. Obviously there's more I need to know and I'm nearly at the point where I can focus just on individual things. When I've got the main bits of my build I'll carry on taking it all in.

I'm just about to buy my F-series strips and I'm thinking, if I want to add some deep and far red at a later point on a separate driver - which I'm planning to do - should I go for the 3500K, seeing as it's going to be a veg and flower light?

So I'll use just the 3500K for Veg and then turn on the reds in flower.

Gonna try and find my camera today... dust that off and get some pics up
 
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DukeFluke

Well-Known Member
Ok I've had no luck finding my camera and the one on my phone's knackered - need a new phone tbh but that can feckin wait. I'll dig out that cam tomorrow and decorate this thread a bit.

So I need to knock together another couple of lights and I've narrowed my choice down to Bxeb Gen 3 4ft strips, or Samsung F-Series

A lot is depending on the wiring and what @Rocket Soul told me a page or so ago, and heatsinking.

If I go with the more strips of the B'lux, will I need to go double voltage and run 2 series and 10 parallel on a 20 x 4ft strip build?

It's simple enough right? I mean the F-series isn't a whole lot simpler is it to run 8-10 strips parallel?

And if they're powered at around 22w each (450/20) will 2mm alu angle be enough?

Cheers
 
Rocket Soul

Rocket Soul

Well-Known Member
No, the 4 ft strips blux wont do for 2 series. No cv drivers with +80V forward voltage. 2 ft strips you can do that, they end up working like a 4 ft strip. But since you can make them 2 strips wide you can still maintain smaller size. For 4ft blux strips just go for 42V drivers
 
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DukeFluke

Well-Known Member
Yea that was me being an idiot and mixing the 2 and 4 ft strips. Thanks.

Will 2mm aluminium angle/channel be good for those if I run at 22w?
 
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DukeFluke

Well-Known Member
Was talking about the 4 footers.
But I could run the 2's at 22w on 2mm as well? That's interesting.

I've never worked with it before though. How rigid is it? I mean will I need another lateral piece to support the middle of the 4 foot piece? Will it bend otherwise?

Cheers
 
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DukeFluke

Well-Known Member
Open question to everyone.

Can I use 22AWG wire for these builds or is that too big?

What's the best to use for this thing?

Cheers
 
Humple

Humple

Well-Known Member
DukeFluke said:
Open question to everyone.

Can I use 22AWG wire for these builds or is that too big?

What's the best to use for this thing?

Cheers
Click to expand...
That's close to being too small, not too big (wire gauges are funny that way - the higher the number, the smaller the wire).

I know that the connectors on (for example) an HLG Quantum Board can secure down to 22 gauge, but I don't know about the strips, and I personally wouldn't use smaller than 18 anyway. For longer runs, such as between the board and driver (provided you remote mount), I use 14 gauge.
 
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