High Efficiency LED for Joule Thief, etc.

[SoManyWires]

Hi everyone,

if someone would be ready to buy 2 of either style of the below LED Grow lights to be sent to a Joule Thief Guru like TK or LaserSaber so one can be moded and the other kept original in order to test how much power can be saved and still be able to grow a plant hopefully at the rate as the non moded one, that would be of great service.

Box light: http://www.ebay.com/itm/300W-LED-Grow-Light-Hydroponic-Plant-Veg-Flower-Full-Spectrum-Panel-Lamp-/301507617587?hash=item4633412333
or: http://www.ebay.com/itm/MarsHydro-300W-LED-Grow-Light-Full-Spectrum-Panel-Indoor-Medical-Plant-Veg-Bloom-/171620287365

Strip light: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Waterproof-81w-LED-Grow-Light-Strip-Red-Blue-Bar-Hydroponic-Indoor-Plant-Lamp-/301663638915?

Please post if you are ready to do this or if you want to stay private send me a PM.

Thanks for your help

Luc

that is a good idea!

i wonder if different manufacturers or suppliers might allow donating one or two of their panels in place of crowdfunding.
if the results are to be open sourced and are actually useful, there is a opportunity for good marketing PR with sponsorship.

[MarkE]

interesting stuff mentioned above and from others.

wonder what power saving can be had by getting LED's operating at 'useable light' levels for as mentioned, growing lettuce.

can a joule thief create a boost in the LED so it becomes more effective for a plant to produce more yield, while not costing as much as if more emitters had to be used to get the same results?

does PWM really prevent the plant from producing more or even the same amounts, over a 12 hour period or a 18 hour period, when compared to not using PWM or a joule thief?

heat sinks make sense too, liquid cooling by placing the heat producing components into a non conductive clear oil / mineral oil that is not affected towards color change by UV light, or would refraction and dispersion of light from the oil and its lens of a container make the lighting less effective at being 'useable light'?

maybe just placing the LED right attached to the inside of the surface of the cooling tank.
suppose a fresnel lens type of refraction could also be scribed onto the tanks lower and side surfaces if that is helpful,
and or making the tank much thinner only at the points where light will be passing through it to prevent the erosion of light.
passive liquid cooling might be most affordable, dampens sound, and eliminates the need for fans or metal heat sinks.

High power LEDs are readily mounted on metal core circuit boards that can then be attached to heatinks of any kind:  liquid cooled, heat pipes, simple fins, etc.  The only issue is cost.

[MarkE]

Hi everyone,

if someone would be ready to buy 2 of either style of the below LED Grow lights to be sent to a Joule Thief Guru like TK or LaserSaber so one can be moded and the other kept original in order to test how much power can be saved and still be able to grow a plant hopefully at the rate as the non moded one, that would be of great service.

Box light: http://www.ebay.com/itm/300W-LED-Grow-Light-Hydroponic-Plant-Veg-Flower-Full-Spectrum-Panel-Lamp-/301507617587?hash=item4633412333
or: http://www.ebay.com/itm/MarsHydro-300W-LED-Grow-Light-Full-Spectrum-Panel-Indoor-Medical-Plant-Veg-Bloom-/171620287365

Strip light: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Waterproof-81w-LED-Grow-Light-Strip-Red-Blue-Bar-Hydroponic-Indoor-Plant-Lamp-/301663638915?

Please post if you are ready to do this or if you want to stay private send me a PM.

Thanks for your help

Luc

The purpose and value of a JT is using the last few percent of a battery's capacity.    That is not an issue when a lamp is mains powered.  There are many LED driver circuits that yield well over 90% efficient power conversion to the LEDs that are also relatively inexpensive.

[SoManyWires]

The purpose and value of a JT is using the last few percent of a battery's capacity.    That is not an issue when a lamp is mains powered.  There are many LED driver circuits that yield well over 90% efficient power conversion to the LEDs that are also relatively inexpensive.

oh right, thankyou for explaining that.
just wondering something else about joule theives,

is it possible for a joule thief to make better use of solar panels if being used for lighting purposes to get more useable light from LED's if no battery/storage was being used?

could one be used to get a car or a electric start mower even to be able to turn over and start the engine successfully if the battery has lost alot of power from lack of use?

would it matter if trying to recharge a capacitor setup, maybe speed up the charging rate for the capacitor from a nearly dead battery?

been thinking about trying to copy (safely of course) a capacitor based car battery replacement that uses a hand turned dynamo crank on the dashboard or a floor pedal to be able recharge the capacitor to start a car, also good for if stranded somewhere, camping.

are there certain types of capacitors better suited to last maybe indefinitely that can handle being around engine heat, and also arctic cold?

[MarkE]

oh right, thankyou for explaining that.
just wondering something else about joule theives,

is it possible for a joule thief to make better use of solar panels if being used for lighting purposes to get more useable light from LED's if no battery/storage was being used?

A JT is generally not a very efficient power converter.  A JT is good if you are just going to use it with otherwise dead batteries.  Otherwise, you are better off using a high efficiency power converter that gets the most out of the battery whether or not it works below 0.8V.

could one be used to get a car or a electric start mower even to be able to turn over and start the engine successfully if the battery has lost alot of power from lack of use?

If it was paired with a supercapacitor or another battery, then a voltage boost converter could theoretically be used, but you might have to wait 20 minutes or more to charge the capacitor from the nearly dead car battery.

would it matter if trying to recharge a capacitor setup, maybe speed up the charging rate for the capacitor from a nearly dead battery?

That is pretty much the idea:  Slowly charge a low impedance device like a capacitor from the low voltage high impedance nearly dead battery, and then get one or two shots to turn over the engine from the charged low impedance capacitor.  There are a number of lithium battery power packs on the market that also serve as jump starters.

been thinking about trying to copy (safely of course) a capacitor based car battery replacement that uses a hand turned dynamo crank on the dashboard or a floor pedal to be able recharge the capacitor to start a car, also good for if stranded somewhere, camping.

You would be cranking for a long time.  One of those lithium power packs seems a better back-up.

are there certain types of capacitors better suited to last maybe indefinitely that can handle being around engine heat, and also arctic cold?

Yes, there are.  The trouble is the energy density goes to hell particularly in cold.  If you want to invent something for arctic cold (you can't patent it because I am describing it to you here and Tesla already sort of does this), then build a lithium pack where the cells are packaged in a well insulated container and add some alkaline cells that run heating wires when the unit is needed to bring the lithium cells up above 10C.  Tesla uses coolant to manage the temperature of their Li-ion cells, both to keep them from getting too cold and too hot.  One embarrassing episode for Tesla was a case two years ago where it was so cold that when a customer plugged into 110V the heaters drew more power than the charger provided.  It's not good when hooking up to charge batteries drains them.