90W LED UFO Ballast Replacement - Help?

Bigpappa1983

Bigpappa1983

New Member
Aloha guys,

recently got a really good deal on some LED lighting, one of the 90W UFOs i got only half lights up, the seller said one of the ballasts needed replacing. After doing some googling I couldnt find anything really useful, so i turn to my peers!

Does anyone have experience replacing these?
Where could i find a replacement? Store front or online only?
What should i be asking for(90W UFO Ballast is not getting me anywhere online)
Videos/instructions on how to replace said ballast once i can obtain one.

Much Mahalo!
 
Help too. I have a similar problem, (half the diodes just stopped working) with a 90watt UFO I purchased late last year. I came here to find out if it can be fixed easily. I don't know if it is ballast or chip related. How hard would it be to replace either or?

Any help would be appreciated
Thanks Milly C. :thumb:
 
well I played operation and I think i was successful. When I opened her up, it appears that it has 3 power supplies. A smaller one for the 3 fans and 2 larger ones each for half the leds. The two for the leds were labeled 1 and 2, so I unplugged one and then powered up the panel, half the leds light up and all three fans. I took the one that worked and plugged it into the other slot, and boom the other half lit up, so all LEDs work. And just to be sure i tested the other power supply and it did not work on either side.

So now i know what needs to be replaced and how to replace it, just unsure where to get said part. I called a led lighting place and the tech had me send him photos and he will get back to me tomorrow. So hopefully its painless and in expensive. I think I may try to do a video on Youtube on how to replace the power supply. If i get around to it ill post it, otherwise I will try to do a photo tutorial to post on the forums.
UFO_Interior.jpg
power_supply.jpg
Power_Supply_Interior_1_.jpg
 
OK this is getting frustrating! I know what part needs to be replaced, but no one can tell me what to ask for when i show them the part. Even called up a manufacturer and asked if they could give any information about replacement power supplies. They pretty much refused to tell me anything....I have been to places like Granger, and a few other specialty stores and none of them can tell me anything.

Things I can assume...the ufo is 90x1watt diodes......each half of the panel is powered by 1 of the supplies and the fans have there own....so I would assume its a 45W power supply...now the only other thing that someone was able to tell me is i need to know what the voltage supplied to each diode is...again I am nothing but a monkey in knowledge here, but i wold assume it supplies 1w per diode of power?

Bah I did not think it would be this difficult to find a part!
 
G'Day again,
Tried fiddling with the power supply modules and they both only lite up the same half of the LED's. Can't see any way to access the led panels though. Any thoughts.

:high-five:
 
Bigpappa1983 said:
So now i know what needs to be replaced and how to replace it, just unsure where to get said part.
Click to expand...

Check the capacitors to see if one or more are blown (they often bulge and/or leak from their tops, but not always). If that's your problem, they're next to nothing at Radio Shack or your local electronics supply house.

Otherwise, you ought to be able to replace the entire PS with one of comparable voltage/amperage.
 
G'day again,

All the power modules in my UFO are working. Just not the LED's. And there are less than 50% lighting up now.
I don't know if it's electronically relevant, but about 2 weeks before the Led's shat themselves they started twinkling dimly, like a chaser light, 10-15 minutes after the timer turned off. Originally I thought I had a dicky timer, but when I was checking the power modules it was plugged directly into a socket, and the LED's that are still working started twinkling even though the power was not even switched on. I'm getting the royal runaround from my vendor about repairs or replacement, and would like to figure this out. Any info about Epistar chips, googled them earlier and I found they range in price from $0.55 - $284.00 which told me bugger all. I noticed the thick wiring in the pics you provided, wiring in mine is easily half, or maybe a third as thick as that.

Thanks muchly for the help so far.

:thumb:
 
The component is called a constant current driver. It takes a/c wall power rectifies it to d/c and then through a series of caps, resistors, diodes, and possibly transformers (depending on what voltage and current it is attempting to achieve) supplies a variable voltage and a constant current to the leds. If you have a multi-meter (about $10-$20 at the local hardware store) you can read the current being supplied. Make sure you set the multi-meter to dc. Then check the voltage or count up the LEDs find out what voltage they run at and purchase a new constant current drive that matches or exceeds the requirements of your leds.

Milly, it is possible that you have a short in your wiring but the flickering sounds more like a faulty driver or a solder bridge. Look at the trace routing for the LEDs and see if you can see a place where it looks like to lines of copper running beside each other have something touching across them. If not it is more than likely a driver issue.

Forgot to add: This is a link to deal extream. Not the greatest quality parts and components but very good and very cheap.DealeXtreme - Cool Gadgets at the Right Price - DX Free Shipping Worldwide
 
im glad we have someone who knows what they are doing in this thread. Apparently one of my good friends builds LEDs for a living, and he told me to take mine to him....and now he wants to play Tim Taylor on it, and I am ok....esp when he showed the tiny led that he built with 6 120 watt diodes in it!!! So alas my hands are no longer in control. But I am still waiting to hear back from a manufacturer about what exact power supply to ask for. He seemed to know exactly what i had just by describing it, just taking his good ole time. Hopefully we can get Milly back up and running. ill post anything i can find out here, but it seems like housebomber and tourtered actually know what they are talking about, i just experiment and hope things don't blow up!
 
The biggest issue is finding out what current they drive their LEDs at. I personally run mine for testing between 550 and 675mA. I'm also using higher quality 3 watt diodes. If the UFO is using 1 watt diodes it will most likely be driving at 250-300mA. Then take the number of diodes on that string and multiply by 3 to 3.3 (not many companies make diodes with a higher forward voltage than that). This is the min number of volts your constant current driver should be able to push. Those 2 pieces of information will allow you to buy an new one at deal extream.
 
Hosebomber said:
The biggest issue is finding out what current they drive their LEDs at. I personally run mine for testing between 550 and 675mA. I'm also using higher quality 3 watt diodes. If the UFO is using 1 watt diodes it will most likely be driving at 250-300mA. Then take the number of diodes on that string and multiply by 3 to 3.3 (not many companies make diodes with a higher forward voltage than that). This is the min number of volts your constant current driver should be able to push. Those 2 pieces of information will allow you to buy an new one at deal extream.
Click to expand...

not 100% sure but if im reading the inside of the power supply i took the photo off right its running at 130v 340mA and the power supply runs 45 of the leds so that would be 135 if multiplying by 3...so a 130v 340mA power supply? Again I know I may be completely off because I am no electrician.
 
Are those 1 watt LEDs in that panel? If so they are driving them very close to the max. This will cause them to burn out a little faster and run a little hotter. By burning out faster I mean 3-5 years vise 6-10 that is possible under better conditions.

Your math is correct tho. They are running them at a higher amperage and lower voltage. So a 130 volt 340mA driver is what you would need. I would suggest 130-145 volts at 300mA if you can find one. It's more likely that you would have to buy several commercial drivers and re-route the circuitry on the board if you can't get the vendor to replace it.
 
G'Day,
Many thanks for your input. I can't access the panel or (PCB) if there is one, there is so much glue and gummy stuff between the metal plate and the LED panel. Don't want to gouge that out in case I do more damage. I bought the UFO after reading about LED's here at 420 mag, thought they were a toy initially, but quickly became impressed with the growth during veg. I used HPS & MH a few years back, but I have limited space now, and the LED's are a perfect alternative. Although the 90 watt_er struggled a bit during flowering it was still quite impressive. So I ordered a new panel, a GS300Q, which arrived Friday, unfortunately, too late for my current grow, but I have clones, and they are loving it. Still want the UFO fixed for my veg room though. I'll have to do a course, and learn how they work from the inside out. Thank you all, Bigpappa, TorturedSoul, for your thoughts & advice, and Hosebomber, I'll include your technical advice in my next email to my supplier, it might help speed up the repair.

Regards, Milly C

:thumb:
 
Hello. What a hazzle- registrer ...



I have a 90 watt 90 diodes ufo. half of my leds werent working and I contacted the seller. H e said that I need to buy one of the two boxes inside the ufo . So I did, I changed the other box but half the leds still did not function.

After realizing the fault was not within this box I opened the ufo from the side where the leds shine. Just scram a tool in the "face" and take the glass out. Then I checked the leds with an electronic checking tool(costs like 10 euros) you know what it is. I found the led that was broke. Then I soldered a cord through the broke led, I have no replacement led, AND ALL THE LEDS ARE WORKING!! Maybe some of you have the same problem. cheers!:thumb:
 
hölynder said:
Hello. What a hazzle- registrer ...



I have a 90 watt 90 diodes ufo. half of my leds werent working and I contacted the seller. H e said that I need to buy one of the two boxes inside the ufo . So I did, I changed the other box but half the leds still did not function.

After realizing the fault was not within this box I opened the ufo from the side where the leds shine. Just scram a tool in the "face" and take the glass out. Then I checked the leds with an electronic checking tool(costs like 10 euros) you know what it is. I found the led that was broke. Then I soldered a cord through the broke led, I have no replacement led, AND ALL THE LEDS ARE WORKING!! Maybe some of you have the same problem. cheers!:thumb:
Click to expand...

Just joined to say thanks for this info. For me, it wasn't the power supply but a dud led globe. The one right in the middle! Highly recommend checking this first. For me it was as simple as soldering a bit of wire around the single led in the middle to complete the circuit. Like a string of bloody christmas lights!

Big thanks to ^^^this guy^^^ for the tip. Legend mate.
 
Bigpappa1983 said:
Aloha guys,

recently got a really good deal on some LED lighting, one of the 90W UFOs i got only half lights up, the seller said one of the ballasts needed replacing. After doing some googling I couldnt find anything really useful, so i turn to my peers!

Does anyone have experience replacing these?
Where could i find a replacement? Store front or online only?
What should i be asking for(90W UFO Ballast is not getting me anywhere online)
Videos/instructions on how to replace said ballast once i can obtain one.

Much Mahalo!
Click to expand...
Hi it's not hard to take them apart should be 3 screws I think there and there are 2 boxes in side 1 controlls half the lights the others controls the other half the ones I have taken apart are simply plugs in there will be number on the box type them in and see were it takes u with those numbers u should be able to find it online things are only as hard as we make them and if u think u can do it u can
 

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