Back from the dead, sordove: voltage question

[ClobberWatts]

I gave up on doing this for a while. I was trying to start my own company and gave up on growing for a while because of multiple reasons including...

So i have 9 boards that are 11 1/4 x 6 7/8's, with 312 samsung 561c's 3000k.

I ran 3 on a meanwell hlg-240h-c2100b
6 on a meanwell hlg-480h-c1750b

Anyways... after two runs..

I have 3 good boards left, 2 are dead, 1 is mostly dead and the other 3 are

1 - 2 rows are dead
1 - 1 row is dim with one chip dead and one row dead
1 - 1 chip dead on two rows brighter than others, and one flickering row with a dead chip

I also have two strips of greengenes photoboost that have their own hlg-80h 54b.

I just want to grow 2 bushes. Thing is... I don't want to put it in a row with one board basically over each bush. I was hoping I could use one of the kinda burned out boards with the other 3. Run 4 off of the hlg-480 with out blowing them up. I'm kinda out of the loop on the whole voltage driver thing. Been two years I think and I still was not very good back then.

I'm saying. The board with 2 rows dead. The dead rows are on parallel with the rows all being 12 chips at 3v each. So isn't the board still running at 36v's even though those two rows are dead?

If so... Would it be ok to put them on the 480h, but just keep the power down?

I do have two hlg-240h-c1400b's that I could take one of if that would be a better option..

 

[013]

multiple light builders on here- @bluter and @Nunyabiz can advise.

 

[bluter]

would literally have to see it in person. i won't advise unless i'm working on it in person.
short answer is simple. if it's a board it's generally fucked, and it would be a fire hazard to run.

strip and cob rigs can be repaired. boards are usually fucked, that is what the attraction was to mfgrs. they'd just tell folk they had to replace it if an emitter blew, until enough board owners got pissed enough, and the mfgrs dropped the tech entirely.

no one really builds a board now.

you can run it with burnt diodes or even a section out, but it is an outright fire hazard.

some diodes / emitters can be scrubbed and replaced on a board if you can source them. but it is typically not a diy repair.

 

[ClobberWatts]

would literally have to see it in person. i won't advise unless i'm working on it in person.
short answer is simple. if it's a board it's generally fucked, and it would be a fire hazard to run.

strip and cob rigs can be repaired. boards are usually fucked, that is what the attraction was to mfgrs. they'd just tell folk they had to replace it if an emitter blew, until enough board owners got pissed enough, and the mfgrs dropped the tech entirely.

no one really builds a board now.

you can run it with burnt diodes or even a section out, but it is an outright fire hazard.

some diodes / emitters can be scrubbed and replaced on a board if you can source them. but it is typically not a diy repair.

Well. It went a whole run with all of those boards in a nine pack with those drivers. All I saw as far as a fire hazard was more diodes burning out.

Yea.. it was a one time by. Total waste of money.

My question still stands on whether or not my voltage is right.

Guess I forgot to mention that the boards are 36v a piece. I'll post photos once I build it. But let me know if my voltage calculations are right.

 

[bluter]

All I saw as far as a fire hazard was more diodes burning out.

usually what happens is one diode gives out, then all the voltage that diode would consume is passed down the line, overloading the next weakest link until it burns out, and so on. it can lead to a runaway where a bunch give out suddenly, then the circuit is overloaded leading to a potential fire situation.

on a board it takes a number of them popping before it gets troublesome. on older cob rigs it only takes one or two going out.

series wired rigs are somewhat more prone, but it can happen in parallel wiring as well.

 

[The Twisted One]

Heat is the killer anyway you look at it. The key to very long lasting diodes is their ability to remove this heat. Also, they can be overdriven, which results in more heat. In addition, if you had a 4 board light, and one drops out and quits working, whatever wattage those boards are driven at, the voltage that would have been powering the dead board gets evenly distributed across the remaining boards. This is when the conditions are ripe to kill the remaining three boards.
I run four Samsung 288 boards per light at right at 137.5 watts per board with very robust heat sinks. If one of those boards crapped the other three are being set up for failure.
I’d suggest buying a plug in watt meter. They aren’t expensive at all and this little tool eliminates all guess work.
For instance, when a new crop goes into flower, I wind my lighting down to around 300 watts per light down from around 550 watts. I use a watt meter to dial each Meanwell driver into the values I’m needing. After about a week like this, I wind them back up to 550 for the remainder of the grow.
Hope this helps!

 

[ClobberWatts]

I totally agree with you... this is why I do not understand why the boards blew. I had three on one driver. 6 on the 480 h dialed down to basically 66% of allowed wattage. I had heat sinks of aluminum boards on top of them recommended by one of the members here. Old school. Brain fart on his name. My point is... heat was not an issue. They just blew randomly. doesn't matter... I'm just asking which driver I should hook up to 3 good boards with one shitty one cuz my math on voltage sucks. I apprecitate the input from everyone but I still have not gotten the answer I want. 36 volts per board. If I have to do three only... which one should I run and tune it down. Again... I can post pictures of it once I fire it up. I just do not know which driver to use to do it. No offense. I don't care about watts. I care about the voltage. I can tune my watts to zero but if the voltage is wrong. that's where things start blowing up.

 

[bluter]

there's more than one way to build a board, some use constant current drivers, some use constant voltage drivers. you'll have to find out what you have and do the math from there. that is one-half of the equation.

in order to complete the equation you will have to add up the amount of diodes on each board and calculate how much it would take to drive them at 50 - 75% max, based on what each diode consumes.

that will give the figure needed to drive the boards safely, and dictates the driver required.


edit: go read through led gardener dot com.

edit again : a quick glance at your first post shows you are running constant current drivers right now.

 

[ClobberWatts]

Gee bluter. Thanks for finally reading the original post. I come here for help and got absolutely no help. I need heath or fanleaf on this crap.

 

[ClobberWatts]

I'll set it up for a four board but only wire it for three on the meanwell hlg-240h-c2100b. Custom frame. I'll post photos in a few days. I threw the other two outside. One blue skywalker. My strain and a pinapple kush.

 

[bluter]

I'll set it up for a four board but only wire it for three on the meanwell hlg-240h-c2100b. Custom frame. I'll post photos in a few days. I threw the other two outside. One blue skywalker. My strain and a pinapple kush.

you can calculate total for one board and treat it like a single source. just need to make sure you have enough to fire three and drive them in the 50 - 75% range. a heavier driver on a dimmer can fire them, but it could very quickly get not safe.

you really want to match the driver. over driving is asking for a runaway and a fire occurrence.

go check out what happened to @Bill284 ... they nearly lost the house and had a couple yrs worth of nightmare over a similar problem after a fire.

 

[The Twisted One]

Speaking specifically of the 9 boards you have, care to chime in on exactly what heat sink you are using on each of those large 9 boards? A photo is worth 1000 words.
There is a method to my madness I assure you. Plus I just love to see a good heat sink that makes me jealous…

 

[ClobberWatts]

I can't believe... I had to respond to this post. It's been so long. I'll post you a pic of my heatsinks, but I gotta explain the story first.

So it was my idea to fire up the room again since I had not done it in a while. But here's the thing... right after I made this post about this question, I went into the room since I had torn it aprart before and could not find the boards. I had a roomate at the time who I was evicting. Now... these boards in a box with the heat sinks on are like what... 20 pounds. And they were just gone. At the same time... I had a friend who had locked boxes in my room... you know, I don't touch cuz their his locked boxes right... So at the time... I'm trying to get this guy out of my house, ends up stealing my tv and some other random crap and I was like... seriously. My laptop is sitting right here, phones, and all other kinds of crap. I'm going WTF? The guy steals my boards? Seriously? I was going to throw them out.

Anyways... so my friend shows up a few weeks ago grabbing his locked boxes and goes... wtf is this huge box in here that is totally heavy. Yep... the boards. He's all... how did these get in here and I'm like dude, I have no idea, I thought the crazy roommate stole them. So long story short... now I can finally put the thing back together.

I think it was graytail who gave me the idea of aluminum heat sheald plating. Once I get it together. I'll post a photo of it. I'm still in seed mode in the veg stage. Think I'll just run 3 on the 240h. I do have a couple of green gene's orginal stripps that I think I'm going to add to the sides just for shits and giggles.

I'll post photos just cuz... come on... over six months now. I'd like given up... just going "whatever".