2x4' lm561c Strip Build w/ additional red

[Ted]

Not yet,

Ive been running it at a lower power, it works. I'll have time this weekend to do it. I was thinking of going against your advice though, in terms of the rewiring.

Here is what I was thinking,

Capture.JPG (19.9 KiB) Viewed 1482 times

I was planning on using butt splices with heat shrink for the connections, I figured it would look alot cleaner, and with the 14 gauge solid wire, It would be hard going from 1 wire to 6.

Capture 2.JPG (42.01 KiB) Viewed 1482 times

What do you think?

[LEDG]

That'll work too. It'll be a lot of effort, but it'll work.

14 gauge is tough to work with - I'd be tempted to just use a marrette or terminal strip or something but neither are ideal in something that moves often.

[Ted]

Well, the crimping was a giant pain in the ass. I kept on messing it up and and having to redo it, so I ended up using push in connectors, which I found very easy to work with. I havent turned it on yet, but will do so later today.

[LEDG]

Looks really clean dude, nice work! Eager to hear if this solves your issue.

[Ted]

Just finished testing it, and it works great now.

IMG_1186.JPG (2.15 MiB) Viewed 1452 times

Its also more powerful than the older configuration, before it maxed out at 9.75 amps per lead (or 19.5 amps for both, as there are two leads from the driver). The driver is rated for 20 amps so I didnt think too much about it. Now it draws over 11amps per lead or 22 amps for both.

IMG_1188.JPG (2.23 MiB) Viewed 1452 times

I think the daisy chaining was causing a voltage drop, and thereby reducing each subsequent strips current draw. So i probably have been running some of those strips at or near their limit for the past week.

Right now its running at 23.3 volts and 16 amps of current. Before the rewire it was at 23.63 volts and 15.5amps.

This should help alot with heat, as the brightest strips were getting hot, whereas the the subsequent strips were cold. Overall very happy now with this configuration.

[LEDG]

Huzzah! Glad it's working well.

May I add this build to my LM561C blog post?

[Ted]

Of course!

[Tune]

Hi Ted,

Did you get to harvest these plants?
Or better in which week of flowering are they?

[Ted]

Hi Ted,

Did you get to harvest these plants?
Or better in which week of flowering are they?

Check out my grow journal in the show your grow section!

viewtopic.php?f=13&t=72

[Ted]

I took the plunge and got 21, 660nm deep red mono leds and 21, 730nm far red leds to add to the array of strips. I also got two mean well plm-40-700 constant current drivers to go with them.

The plan is to have the strips, deep red, and far red on seperate channels, and to leave the far red on after the other turn off to speed up flowering and possible allow me to switch to 13/11 or 14/10 light cycle during flowering.

Ill post an update when its done.