Canreef Aquatics Bulletin Board  

Go Back   Canreef Aquatics Bulletin Board > General > DIY

 
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
Prev Previous Post   Next Post Next
  #1  
Old 04-04-2011, 05:57 PM
Stones's Avatar
Stones Stones is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: Regina, Saskatchewan
Posts: 401
Stones is on a distinguished road
Default Troubeshooting DIY LED

I've read through nearly all of the DIY LED threads on several forums as well as followed all the instructions from RapidLED on wiring a series of CREE XP-G's to a Meanwell ELN-60-48D driver but I just can't seem to get my light to work.

First off, I wired in a potentiometer to a 10V power source and to the Meanwell driver. Using a multimeter, I'm getting 350 mA with the potentiometer on full and the Meanwell driver internal pot set to the minimum with the multimeter connected to the V+ and V- leads from the meanwell. If I turn up the internal pot on the driver, I can bring my current from 350 mA up to 1.3 A so I know I'm getting power to the LED series as the driver and potentiometer are working correctly.

Now after connecting the V+ and V- leads from the Meanwell driver to my series of LED's, none of the LEDs will fire. I assumed I had a bogus LED so I tested them all indiviudlaly with a battery and sure enough, the 1st LED in the series was fried. After removing the LED from the series, I reconnected the V+ and V- leads from the Meanwell driver and the LED series still won't ignite. When I connected my multimeter in series with the LEDs after the final LED, I'm getting no current reading so I'm not getting any power going through my circuit.

I then went and tested all of the LEDs indiviudally again with a battery and they will only fire up when the battery is connected to the + and - posts on an individual LED. If I try to connect 2 or more LEDs together in a series none of them will fire. However, if I connect the battery to the + terminal of the 1st LED and to the + terminal of the 2nd LED in the series, the 1st LED will fire showing that the wiring/soldering between the two LEDs is sound. When I then connect the battery to the + terminal of the 1st LED and the - terminal of the 2nd LED, neither of the LEDs fire up when both of them should.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. I wasted about 4 hours last night troubleshooting this thing and ended up tearing out all of my wiring and redoing it to no avail.

Here is a pic of how I have the LEDs mounted to the heatsink. Ignore the 1st LED with the black marker as that was the dud.


Here I pencilled in how I had the LEDs wired together before removing the wiring last night.


Here is a close up of how i have the LEDs wired. I only resoldered the first 2 LEDs together again for testing purposes and was unable to get both to fire at the same time off of a battery.
__________________
Do or do not....there is no try.
Reply With Quote
 


Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Forum Jump


All times are GMT. The time now is 10:13 AM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.7.3
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.