Heat dissipation u-profile

[BuddyColas]

I am always trying to build the light with the most photons and the least price.
I attached a photo of I light I recently built using steel studs from a lumber yard.
Not sure if they use steel studs in your part of the world, but they are cheap and quite effective as a "U-Channel" heat sink!

Hi Buddy, good to see you are posting on here, steel does dissipate heat but not anywhere near as good as aluminum, you need a lot more surface area with steel, from memory it was 4X more to dissipate the same amount of heat. It's good if you are getting it for free though and have the room for it and can handle the extra weight. Fan cooled steel doesn't work too bad at heat dissipation.
As leds get better they can handle higher junction temperatures also.
When I first started with leds you really didn't want to push them above 65° junction temperatures. Now days 85° is quite normal with some going upto 120°

We may get to the stage where heatsinks are not required at all one day, we can actually do without a heatsink on many strips already if they are driven soft, the copper traces provide enough to do the job. I tend to use extra copper in my strips for this reason although it does add to the cost of manufacturing

Yes, very good to see you here as well!
You are right on all points.
I just brought it up as some have do some improvising in their local...even using sheetrock corner beading.
Check out out bad steel is for conducting heat on this chart.

In spite of the chart it actually works pretty good in practice...and even better with a fan blowing across the canopy.
"Pretty good" as measured by droop not a thermal-couple.
I have also used my gutted old T5 6-bulb light fixtures as heatsinks, and they work great...plenty of area.
I haven't figured how PM here just yet.

[TEKNIK]

If you are using your phone turn it on its side and you can see the private messages butting at the top. I can't work out how to send a picture on here

[StanLee]

Thank you guys, i guess a U-profile with a oscillating should do the trick for me Should 2mm thick aluminium provide enough strength to carry the entire construction of ~8 led strips?

[unkle_psycho]

I think there are some complex ratios between weight and strength.

I use extrusions that vary between 0.6mm to 3mm, and definitely prefer the thinner model. Its so thin that it bends easily, but with external drivers a 2x4 fixture weighs a few kg. So easy to move and setup, although I treat it with silk gloves. The light with 3mm thick extrusions is only for a 2x2, so its half smaller, but feels like it weighs 4x more. It already needs a handy attachment mechanism, because its hard to hold it up with one hand for too long.

For some reason the thicker profile always feels hotter, although they have the same strips at the same power. But if I suffer a home invasion I can probably use the heavy light as some type of weapon of war, and it would still work afterwards. Also when it comes time to recycle, it will be easy to get the strips of the thicker extrusions, while the 0.6mm extrusions will just get trashed.

I would skip the steel just for the weight without thinking about heat transfer.. If you say a friend will help place it, and it will be in one place, so weight does not matter... I would say just go for super thin aluminum, leave it in place, and strength does not matter. Both end up with minor inconvenience if need to be moved, but the aluminum dissipates better. I payed 1.99e for 3m extrusions, doubt steel would be any cheaper. Whole 2x4 frame cost 9e, in probably the most expensive country of the EU.

[unkle_psycho]

Oh, and the 4 foot double strips in the f-series take over 100w of power, so that is quite a bit to dissipate... I can't really say because I never went to those power levels.

I have been using double diode Vestas, and I would say they are too hot for my taste even when I use 750mA per side, or 1500mA per strip. They have a max of 2A but I would say anything over 1A on vestas will run at 50c or more. @ 1.5A when they start really heating, they are only putting out about 20w/ft of strip.

[TEKNIK]

I think there are some complex ratios between weight and strength.

I use extrusions that vary between 0.6mm to 3mm, and definitely prefer the thinner model. Its so thin that it bends easily, but with external drivers a 2x4 fixture weighs a few kg. So easy to move and setup, although I treat it with silk gloves. The light with 3mm thick extrusions is only for a 2x2, so its half smaller, but feels like it weighs 4x more. It already needs a handy attachment mechanism, because its hard to hold it up with one hand for too long.

For some reason the thicker profile always feels hotter, although they have the same strips at the same power. But if I suffer a home invasion I can probably use the heavy light as some type of weapon of war, and it would still work afterwards. Also when it comes time to recycle, it will be easy to get the strips of the thicker extrusions, while the 0.6mm extrusions will just get trashed.

I would skip the steel just for the weight without thinking about heat transfer.. If you say a friend will help place it, and it will be in one place, so weight does not matter... I would say just go for super thin aluminum, leave it in place, and strength does not matter. Both end up with minor inconvenience if need to be moved, but the aluminum dissipates better. I payed 1.99e for 3m extrusions, doubt steel would be any cheaper. Whole 2x4 frame cost 9e, in probably the most expensive country of the EU.

2mm should be fine
I suggest you build a frame that can be reused, they take time to build and although they are not that bad it's still something that you would need to do again in 2 years time when better technology has been released and you may want to upgrade.

[unkle_psycho]

All the builds I made since I learned Nuggles technique are totally adjustable and rebuildable...

what do you call this stuff:
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=kierretanko&t ... &ia=images

I use these to hold the extrusions together, and I can adjust strip distance with the bolts.

Only thing that wont make it is the 0.6mm thick extrusion, if I ever need to rip the strips off, the extrusion will just become trash. At 0.70e/ meter it will have already served its purpose. Till now its really my preferred solution.

I actually scored almost 30m of 30x30 L-bar thats 3mm thick, but its just going to sit around for now.

[TEKNIK]

We call that product all thread in Australia, not sure of the terminology in other countries.

[Marine2143]

I'm not sure of the specifications of the F series, how many watts per bar? You can use basic U shaped aluminum to heatsink most strip products, To give you an idea 20mm U shaped aluminum will dissipate around 40 watts per meter. I always recommend you run a oscillating fan across the bars to help with the cooling.

Aloha & this is a double poly lock channel. Selling for about $3 a foot.https://www.farmtek.com/wcsstore/Engine ... 104211.pdf

[unkle_psycho]

Here our options are limited. The all thread is awesome, so easy to build and adjust. I guess its kinda iron age tech, modular aluminum would be the modern equivalent, but thats like 20x more expensive here.

This week I have 4 types of splitter cables coming in from alibaba, 10 sets of each. Putting DC plugs on all connections, to make the electronics as manipulatable and adjustable as the strips. I found a factory who makes all cables to spec, so if I had a standard build I can just get all the wires made and cut to my spec. Everything becomming more simple and clean.