QUESTION Expected Lifespan Of a Power Supply ?

[MEXICOWANDERER]

Let's say A 300-watt power supply is used. But only a 280 watt constant load was applied to it, in this case of course LED's.

Any guesses as to lifespan? in hours or years? Max ambient temp of 90F.

The answer of course can be transposed to any switching power supply of this type for other loads. RV converters seem to go years and years without glowing in the dark.

Not To Worry Time?

[MrWizard]

Sorry Mexi
If you ever get this far north,I will be glad to take you over there
I bet you could spend days doing multiple visits
After the Northridge earth quake in 94, they were closed for over a month
Over flowing shelves stacked floor to tall ceiling fell over blocking some of the aisles

[MEXICOWANDERER]

@#$%^&^%$#@!

TEASER! YOU TEASER! Agghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh........................

[MrWizard]

I've been going to the original Apex warehouse store on San Fernando Rd
For over 30 years, never heard of Apex jr until now
The stuff you can find at the original can be surprising
Old heavy wire wound potentiometer...brand new
Transformers, Variacs, and Thousands of different switches or connectors, huge multi wire Cannon connectors (Canon is a brand name)

[westend]

Couple of discount house that are known reliable: Apex Jr,

Surplus sales of NE

[MEXICOWANDERER]

Peeza Cake Mr. Wizard...

Now the "10" volt LED project is involving...
(2) silicon and 1 shottky series diodes should get me where I want to be voltage wise. The star fin heat sinks (90X10 mm) will allow convection cooling without a fan. But trying to find individual heat sinks for the 30 watt chips is a real chore.

Don't forget I've got the Ammo box charger thing creeping alon waiting for parts. Exterior 12 pole switches replace the MW trimmer pot. Couldn't resist adding a kWh meter

[MrWizard]

Mex
didn't say anything about series batteries for the store

120v to 36v for step down for the store
and
DC buck 12 to 36 for the "rural" residential fixture design

step down for the store, either from the grid or from the 5000w generator

he has too many Irons in the Fire Pit

and it can be hard to keep track of his projects

[MEXICOWANDERER]

Using 12 volts DC as a power source this little adjustable puppy will drive around 200 watts of -36 volt- LED chips with ease, About the size of 4 decks of playing cards laying flat stacked one atop the other. Yes, 12 volts to 36 volts. Fine tune output with a pot.


.

[NinerBikes]

I am beginning to think it's a conspiracy theory on Mexico Wanderer bringing a 3rd world type country into the 21st century. MW = Mean Well, Mega Watt, Mexico Wanderer. It's all a coincidence, they are all Power Supply sources?

Are you going to need 45 volts to top charge 3 12 volt batteries in series, or 6 6 volt batteries in series?

[MEXICOWANDERER]

30 watt 36 volt chips

This is for a store. I'm going to use a Dc/DC booster for the rig's area lighting.

When the grid goes down out comes a 200 db 5,000 watt generator. By saving more than 400 watts on lighting the deli cooler can stay operating.

I situate the rig's lighting 10 meters away from the patio. Reason? Bugs. Relocated porch light 2 meters to the rear for this reason.

The store issue is not pure altruism. It is THE store or it's a 225 km round trip to the 2nd nearest. I do not want to be forced to consume meat and products that have seen 25C temperatures for extended periods. At the moment the Viking is holding over 250 pounds of mango slices.

Money is an object for this "mandato" (task). Chips, wiring, driver and heat sinks. I'm afraid this one will be a one driver does all arrangement.

Yes this all gets breadboarded out before the chips go up and driver gets mounted. Trust the Chinese for accurate data? Shirley you jest...

If I need to I will omit a chip to stay within wattage limits of the driver.

Some folks can toss four hundred dollars at a driver for this project, I cannot.

The rig gets three chips total and obviously a different voltage supply. This lets me ignite the chips on battery or shore power (through a battery power supply.

The store is a whole other animal. I just cannot tolerate first generation fluorescent lighting. it gives me a headache and makes inventory products look like they have Ring Around the Collar. Buzzing, blackened tube ends. Ballasts too hot to touch, This description could be applied to early ThinLite RV lighting as well.


Below is a link to the LED I had in mind...

http://www.trcelectronics.com/View/Mean-Well/SE-350-36.shtml

[Golden_HVAC]

I think that I would also suggest doubling up on the power supplies, so that each one will only carry about 175 watts. Also fuse the circuits, so that a pinched wire will not take out all the lights. Some 5 amp fuses (assuming 300 watts at 12 volts) would work well for each branch, and then you can have multible circuits, and only 1 will go out at any time.

How did you determine that all of the LED's only consume 280 watts? What if the watt rating on each fixture is off by 5 or 6 watts? You might be overloading the power supply and not know it.

If this is running on DC power, why not try this. Have a battery charger and 12 volt lead acid battery, then install a pair of 250 watt solar panels to make up most of the load. Have the battery charger on a time clock, so that it will not run during daytime hours or about 3 hours after dark. Then the solar panels will charge the battery during the day, as well as light the 300 +/- lights all day long, and into the twilight. After dark, then the battery charger can take over around 7 or 8 pm.

Fred.

[KJINTF]

you win!

and i thought 120 mile one way to the nearest "shopping" Costco / lowes / etc
Was a long distance - no CAPS problems here

Pony Express?
Mule Delivery?

[MEXICOWANDERER]

KJINTF wrote:
Wow that's a bit drastic "I"D BETTER STOP USING ALL CAPS!"
Not sure if any of your electrical equipment would keep running

Take a look see at the DigiKey web site
They do indeed actually ship equipment to Mexico as well as Montana

I'm sure the drawbacks are far outweighed by the life style you enjoy down south
Do UPS and FedEx have a presence near by?

Enjoy the projects wish you good luck without using any CAPS at all

Got to run - off to pickup five or six 42" CCFL/LED LCD HDTV's (for free) that folks are tossing in the trash - all failures due to defective CAPS - 20 to 30 minutes each with a few new caps and we have more TV's to mount/hook up in the outbuildings

1,200 miles round trip to nearest UPS, DHL, FedEx facility

300 mile round trip to nearest post office.

150 mile round trip to nearest ATM, or nearest bank.

[BurbMan]

smkettner wrote:
+1 for splitting the system. Then you know the backup is working too.

Agree, you don't want one unit to be able to close a store like that, especially if its longevity is suspect to start with.

If you got two of the 300W units, then each would only be running at 50% capacity, helping longevity, and in the event one fails the other could handle 100% of the lighting load until a replacement is secured.

If you wanted to get fancy you could wire a pair of transfer switches so that if either PS failed the 140W it was handling would automatically be sent to the other PS.

[KJINTF]

Wow that's a bit drastic "I"D BETTER STOP USING ALL CAPS!"
Not sure if any of your electrical equipment would keep running
Check out that CAP Lock key as well

Take a look see at the DigiKey web site
They do indeed actually ship equipment to Mexico as well as Montana

I'm sure the drawbacks are far outweighed by the life style you enjoy down south
Do UPS and FedEx have a presence near by?

Enjoy the projects wish you good luck without using any CAPS at all

Got to run - off to pickup five or six 42" CCFL/LED LCD HDTV's (for free) that folks are tossing in the trash - all failures due to defective CAPS - 20 to 30 minutes each with a few new caps and we have more TV's to mount/hook up in the outbuildings