LED wiring question.
11 posts • Page 1 of 2
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jweb1369 - Posts: 547
- Joined: Thu Jul 10, 2008 2:55 am
LED wiring question.
If you have LED flashlights can you wire the bulbs to work from an outlet? If so, how?
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gumbii - Posts: 1695
- Joined: Tue Dec 04, 2007 3:31 am
yes... you need a low voltage converter...
say if the flashlight uses two batteries it's running with 3V of power... so get a 3V converter and bam...
each LED runs on 1.5V... so you could buy led's like at radio shack and make your own setup... just get like a 12V converter and get some resistors and learn how to wire stuff up in series, parallel, and how voltage dropping works...
say if the flashlight uses two batteries it's running with 3V of power... so get a 3V converter and bam...
each LED runs on 1.5V... so you could buy led's like at radio shack and make your own setup... just get like a 12V converter and get some resistors and learn how to wire stuff up in series, parallel, and how voltage dropping works...
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jweb1369 - Posts: 547
- Joined: Thu Jul 10, 2008 2:55 am
The reason I ask is because you can get LED lights for SUPER cheap sometimes. I bought a few LED flashlights for $5.
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gumbii - Posts: 1695
- Joined: Tue Dec 04, 2007 3:31 am
you can get single led's on ebay for cents... at radioshack they have some pretty ewt ones for a dollar each... i want to replace my blue ones with some white ones... so i might replace some blue ones for dim white led's...
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gumbii - Posts: 1695
- Joined: Tue Dec 04, 2007 3:31 am
because people will still buy them... if you buy your own ballast and fixtures and stuff like i do, you save a shite load of cash... the PC ballast were 13 bucks each for single 65W bulbs... so i got four of those... the harness for the inline PC lamps were 12 bucks for four... the reflector was 20 bucks.... and the led setup was 10 bucks all together... i know everything is bolted onto the canopy, and it doesn't look as nice as the ones that come assembled in a cardboard box... but it does the same thing at only a fraction of the cost... besides the cost of the bulbs... it was pretty cheap... i might add some fans later on... i have a couple of them laying around for PC cases...
like how much does a 260W fixture with 8 led's go for at an LFS... a couple of bills... that's crazy...
like how much does a 260W fixture with 8 led's go for at an LFS... a couple of bills... that's crazy...
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jweb1369 - Posts: 547
- Joined: Thu Jul 10, 2008 2:55 am
yea I wish I knew more about wiring... I'm sure I can figure it out, but I don't know where to go to buy the stuff to do it myself. What do I mount it to? I don't have a top compartment on my tank.
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gumbii - Posts: 1695
- Joined: Tue Dec 04, 2007 3:31 am
eek... epic fail/aids...
um... you could epoxy or silicone them to your exsisting light fixture... they don't have to point into the tank...
um... let me figure out how you could use a 12v converter to run a series of LED's... hold on...
um... you could epoxy or silicone them to your exsisting light fixture... they don't have to point into the tank...
um... let me figure out how you could use a 12v converter to run a series of LED's... hold on...
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gumbii - Posts: 1695
- Joined: Tue Dec 04, 2007 3:31 am
okay... i had to bust out with a pen and paper but i got it...
if you get a 12v DC converter... they sell these all over the place... look around for some old ones... you know... like chargers... those are those blocky things that you plug into the wall... anyways... get one that says 12V output... also... find out what lead is negative or positive... it will have a symbol that shows you...
it will have a + sign and a - sign... usually the + sign points to a dot inside the - side which is the outside... but not all of the time...
so you find out what lead is positive... then you get your resistor... get a 50 ohm resister... those are like cents at radioshack... line it up to your positive side of the converter output... now you're ready to wire up the led's...
the reason i would rock a 50ohm resister is because each LED gives a voltage drop of 3.6 volts... as an example for a 12 volt light, you can run a maximum of 3 white LEDs in series at full power (3.6 x 3 = 10.8 volts drop). Subtract this from your supply voltage of 12 volts to get the additional voltage that must be dropped (in this case, 12 - 10.8 = 1.2 volts of additional drop needed)... in this case, 1.2 volts of additional drop / .025 amps (25 ma) = 48 ohms… resistors are rated in watts. So in this case, 1.2 volts x .025 amps = 0.03 watts... a 1/4 watt 50ohm resistor would work fine.
now you're ready to wire the led's... now each led will have a long lead and a short one... one of them is the + side... i just don't remember right now... it says on the pakage... lol... from the positive line coming from the resistor conect that to the positive lead on the led, and the other lead coming out of the led conect that one with a wire to the positive lead on the next led... then so on to the third led... then that wire should go back to the negative side of the converter...
now if you want to run 6 led's... you will split the positive and use two resisters and each one should power three led's... don't overload the resister, or try to use 1-2 led per resister... they will burn out... so if you want 6, you need to split the positive to a resister, from there the led's go in series, then both sets will wire up back to the negative lead on the dc convert...
yes it's that simple...
there are some pretty good schematics online like on google and such...
good luck...
if you get a 12v DC converter... they sell these all over the place... look around for some old ones... you know... like chargers... those are those blocky things that you plug into the wall... anyways... get one that says 12V output... also... find out what lead is negative or positive... it will have a symbol that shows you...
it will have a + sign and a - sign... usually the + sign points to a dot inside the - side which is the outside... but not all of the time...
so you find out what lead is positive... then you get your resistor... get a 50 ohm resister... those are like cents at radioshack... line it up to your positive side of the converter output... now you're ready to wire up the led's...
the reason i would rock a 50ohm resister is because each LED gives a voltage drop of 3.6 volts... as an example for a 12 volt light, you can run a maximum of 3 white LEDs in series at full power (3.6 x 3 = 10.8 volts drop). Subtract this from your supply voltage of 12 volts to get the additional voltage that must be dropped (in this case, 12 - 10.8 = 1.2 volts of additional drop needed)... in this case, 1.2 volts of additional drop / .025 amps (25 ma) = 48 ohms… resistors are rated in watts. So in this case, 1.2 volts x .025 amps = 0.03 watts... a 1/4 watt 50ohm resistor would work fine.
now you're ready to wire the led's... now each led will have a long lead and a short one... one of them is the + side... i just don't remember right now... it says on the pakage... lol... from the positive line coming from the resistor conect that to the positive lead on the led, and the other lead coming out of the led conect that one with a wire to the positive lead on the next led... then so on to the third led... then that wire should go back to the negative side of the converter...
now if you want to run 6 led's... you will split the positive and use two resisters and each one should power three led's... don't overload the resister, or try to use 1-2 led per resister... they will burn out... so if you want 6, you need to split the positive to a resister, from there the led's go in series, then both sets will wire up back to the negative lead on the dc convert...
yes it's that simple...
there are some pretty good schematics online like on google and such...
good luck...
