14.4 volts to lights when charging?

pnichols wrote:
Also .... what is 14.4 volts doing to the water heater's electronic controller?

I don't know, but I had a "light bulb" idea when ordering a DC-DC converter for my 24v system.

To ensure that your converter isn't destroying your Ebay LEDs and fridge boards, get a DC-DC converter which has a variable input, say 10-15 vdc, but outputs a steady 12.5 or so.

Pnichols, fridge boards and other RV electronics are rated to 15V typically.

Hmmm .... even though the title of this thread is "14.4 volts to lights when charging?" .... I'm more concerned about what boost voltages are doing, over the long term, to the propane refrigerator's (expensive) electronic controller? I had to replace one of these refrigerator controllers once and it wound up costing way, way more than all of our Rv's voltage controlled LED lights put together.

Also .... what is 14.4 volts doing to the water heater's electronic controller?

Here is a test done by Dave Sparky on some ebay LEDs.

click

According to it the LEDs in the test were fine to 14.5v but that's that set. Not all ebay LEDs are equal it seems. Even batch to batch thru the same seller can bring different results.

BTW I had forgot about the test I started a month ago until I went down in the basement and wondered who left a light on. The panel is still going strong 24/7 without any failures. This may take a while.

RV daytrader wrote:
14.4 volts in boost mode, is that voltage going to harm led lights??

Likely it will. The downside of Ebay LEDs.

I used to use a .01 microfarad disc capacitor across the power leads as an RF filter for my radios. If I had a cheap LED that was causing noise I'd try it across the pos and neg leads to see if it would stop the noise at the source. worst that could happen would be destroying a LED that I couldn't use anyway.

"I know that I could design a non regulated LED panel that would last, be relatively constant brightness and not get to hot while operating between 10V and 15V DC"

Care to PM me with your secret recipe :) ?

RV daytrader wrote:
when you are charging your batteries and charger is putting out 14.4 volts in boost mode, is that voltage going to harm led lights??

depends.

If the LED lights have regulators AND have a wide operating voltage range typical of regulated LED's then no. Mine have regulators and are spec'd for something like 10V-18V operating range. camp close to 90 days/year, for 3 years and they are working fine.

However, regulated ones (a) cost more and (b) unless they are designed well, can emit RFI and cause noise in TV, radio etc. I found ones that don't cause RFI problems in my use. Only way to know is to buy one and try it. Even from the same mfg, one type may have no noticeable RFI and another bulb type may.

Now contrary to popular belief, LED' lights do get hot. They are on the order of 10-15% efficient, so guess where the the "other" 90% of the power goes... Into HEAT. and the power is related to voltage SQUARED. So going from 12V to 14.5 is a noticeable increase in power. So it takes a good design and heat sinking to have LED's last reliably over wide voltage range.

NOW to my original attempt at LED's with some cheap non regulated LED's the answer is. Highly likely to damage them. I had some that literally had the LED's get hot enough to melt the solder and had LED's raining down onto the table top. And others that after a few weeks use with the converter cycling starting becoming dimmmer and dimmer and dimmer. And all of these had the adhesive on the back of the panel turn black and shrivel up and the panels drop down.

That was 3 years ago, and as a retired EE, I know that I could design a non regulated LED panel that would last, be relatively constant brightness and not get to hot while operating between 10V and 15V DC. So there may be some out that that do this, just probably not the cheapest ones on ebay etc.

however, it would be easier and quicker to design a system using a good regulator.

back to the old "get what you pay for".

I have the problem of using regulated LED BOARDS in my off-road POPUP setup by causing RFI signals to my HDTV, NOAH WX radio, and Ham radio system when being used. One regulated LED board on would totally wipe out my HDTV and NOAH WX receiver when turned on.

I had to go with the non-regulated LED BOARD types to eliminate the problem. I thought this would be a problem for me as well but have had the $4.99 ebay/china boards installed for around 5-years now. I only have one LED BOARD with three leds out in a roll so far. I am using five LED non-regulated ebay/china boards. I bought several extra boards to replace the failed ones when they got too dim to use. At $4.99 each seemed like an easy way out haha...

I think some smart mode converters may use 15VDC or more for their every 21 hours 15-minute desulfate operations. My PD unit highest DC voltage output is only 14.4VDC. Maybe that is what is saving me from what the other post was dealing with.

It is something to worry about...

Roy Ken

We speak of the system as a 12 volt system, However the normal operating voltage is not 12, it's 13.6 (Give or take a bit), 12.6 is the "resting" voltage of a fully charged battery (Again give or take a bit depending on the battery type) and the charging voltage on your car is often 14 volts or more.

I have looked at the base of many 12 volt lamps and found they showed 14 or 14.6 as the operating voltage on the base. They are actually a bit dim at 12 volts.