A Closer Look At Chinese eBay Fixtures

[Horerczy]

My frag tank has long been without a single light fixture as a source of light. Ever since my twin strip T8 lamp blew a transformer. With the advent of new frags from a local swap and a new mantis shrimp to liven up the tank for the time being I decided I needed a new light.

 

My criteria for the light was simple. Something that works well enough, isnt costly, and will be strong enough for the eventual upgrade to a 29 gallon tank. (Im looking for a skimmer with this criteria if anyone has a suggestion)

 

So I got a 2014 layout Evergrow D120 from eBay for $85.59. It matches my criteria and I always wanted to pop ones of these open to see what makes it tick.

 

The Fixture:

 

Fixture Layout:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v62/misogi/Evergrow2014Layout_zps808b0de2.jpg

 

When I got the Light I plugged it up and turned it on. It works adequately but there was an interesting feature I wasnt fond of. The fans are wired to each of the pots and turn on only when the pots are tuned to ~35-40% power. Interested in why this is I was further drawn to popping the thing open.

 

The guts:

 

The wiring is very clean.

 

As you can see the fans are wired to the drivers instead of their own power supply. I would rather they had their own power supply and were in a constant state of on seeing as the leds of either channel are scattered across the entire MCPCB. The fans are actually very nice. Theyre super quiet and I can feel a lot of air moving which is good since there isnt a heatsink. Suddenly the Supernovas cooling method decisions make a lot of sense.

 

Fan close-up:

 

Driver close-up:

 

Now lets get to the other side of that MCPCB. Its held in place by 10 screws that are well isolated from the MCPCB through gratuitous use of plastic washers and some sort of plastic tube that goes through the MCPCB.

 

The other side of the MCPCB:

 

Without optics:

 

This is why they keep the actual power below 120W.

 

 

The optics were held in place by pressure from the screwed down PCB and this half of the fixture body:

 

Close-up of the optics back:

 

The optic separated from its holder. The lens itself is 90° .

 

The leds appear to be held down only by solder on the anode and cathode with thermal grease under the diode itself for the thermal path.

 

Curiosity sated for now I put the fixture back together and back on the tank. Is it a bad fixture? Not really that bad for the money spent but I can see a lot that can be made better (spectrum, fans, maybe control).

　

 

Of course I like to tinker so Im planning on making some adjustments.

 

I plan to later change out some of the leds and make the spectrum better.

 

Thinking about pulling the blue and turquoise leds off of these if I can if not I will have to acquire some elsewhere.

 

The reef breeders layout is a good base for decent spectrum but I will make something that is a little different Im sure:

 

At that time I plan to wire in a simple 12VDC power supply to the blue channels plug prong thing since that will likely be the channel that turns on first and off last. If I can find some drivers with a high enough voltage output I may make a swap there as well.

 

Maybe slip a 6.080 low profile heatsink extrusion from heatsink USA in there as well if I can swing it. Not that its necessary but every little bit helps.

 

Also planning on hacking away at the face of the fixture to rid myself of needing the optics. May put some good quality diffusion material there as well.

[wishba]

My frag tank has long been without a single light fixture as a source of light. Ever since my twin strip T8 lamp blew a transformer. With the advent of new frags from a local swap and a new mantis shrimp to liven up the tank for the time being I decided I needed a new light.

 

My criteria for the light was simple. Something that works well enough, isnt costly, and will be strong enough for the eventual upgrade to a 29 gallon tank. (Im looking for a skimmer with this criteria if anyone has a suggestion)

 

So I got a 2014 layout Evergrow D120 from eBay for $85.59. It matches my criteria and I always wanted to pop ones of these open to see what makes it tick.

 

The Fixture:

 

Fixture Layout:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v62/misogi/Evergrow2014Layout_zps808b0de2.jpg

 

When I got the Light I plugged it up and turned it on. It works adequately but there was an interesting feature I wasnt fond of. The fans are wired to each of the pots and turn on only when the pots are tuned to ~35-40% power. Interested in why this is I was further drawn to popping the thing open.

 

The guts:

 

The wiring is very clean.

 

As you can see the fans are wired to the drivers instead of their own power supply. I would rather they had their own power supply and were in a constant state of on seeing as the leds of either channel are scattered across the entire MCPCB. The fans are actually very nice. Theyre super quiet and I can feel a lot of air moving which is good since there isnt a heatsink. Suddenly the Supernovas cooling method decisions make a lot of sense.

 

Fan close-up:

 

Driver close-up:

 

Now lets get to the other side of that MCPCB. Its held in place by 10 screws that are well isolated from the MCPCB through gratuitous use of plastic washers and some sort of plastic tube that goes through the MCPCB.

 

The other side of the MCPCB:

 

Without optics:

 

This is why they keep the actual power below 120W.

 

 

The optics were held in place by pressure from the screwed down PCB and this half of the fixture body:

 

Close-up of the optics back:

 

The optic separated from its holder. The lens itself is 90° .

 

The leds appear to be held down only by solder on the anode and cathode with thermal grease under the diode itself for the thermal path.

 

Curiosity sated for now I put the fixture back together and back on the tank. Is it a bad fixture? Not really that bad for the money spent but I can see a lot that can be made better (spectrum, fans, maybe control).

　

 

Of course I like to tinker so Im planning on making some adjustments.

 

I plan to later change out some of the leds and make the spectrum better.

 

Thinking about pulling the blue and turquoise leds off of these if I can if not I will have to acquire some elsewhere.

 

The reef breeders layout is a good base for decent spectrum but I will make something that is a little different Im sure:

 

At that time I plan to wire in a simple 12VDC power supply to the blue channels plug prong thing since that will likely be the channel that turns on first and off last. If I can find some drivers with a high enough voltage output I may make a swap there as well.

 

Maybe slip a 6.080 low profile heatsink extrusion from heatsink USA in there as well if I can swing it. Not that its necessary but every little bit helps.

 

Also planning on hacking away at the face of the fixture to rid myself of needing the optics. May put some good quality diffusion material there as well.

Following. Would like to see how this fixture looks in a real system.

[k4ndyk1ng]

Looking at getting one of these, is it dimmable?

[glennr1978]

Looking at getting one of these, is it dimmable?

 

They are dimmable, but not controllable. I've got a few of these over one of my tanks and they're decent lights. Well worth $85.

[MOJOEJOEJOE]

Nice writeup.

So they dont use any heat sink in the fixture, Just passive cooling ?

[evilc66]

You mean active cooling. The fans will be critical to keeping the fixture alive.

 

Horerczy, did you see anything attached to the MCPCB that would indicate a thermal cutoff? That's a deal breaker IMO, because if a fan dies, so does the fixture. A simple thermal cutoff switch to kill power to the drivers would save a lot of headaches.

[MOJOEJOEJOE]

yep your correct I should have said active. In any event you stated the point i was making about fan cooling with no heat sink. If the fan dies the temp continues to go up and poof your led is dead.

[Formula462]

I've said it before and I'll say it again. This hobby and this site in particular is turning into an electronics discussion forum. If I see one more picture of a pulled apart light fixture and an entire thread discussing layout of LEDS and which one is best ( all the same) I'm gonna...complain some more.

[Paandemonium]

I find this super informative

[hey]

I've said it before and I'll say it again. This hobby and this site in particular is turning into an electronics discussion forum. If I see one more picture of a pulled apart light fixture and an entire thread discussing layout of LEDS and which one is best ( all the same) I'm gonna...complain some more.

 

Im sure you know the hobby has always been a glorfied electronics game since keeping live plants and corals came about, remember not so long ago where threads were all about how to cram as many power compacts as possible into a hood to maximize your watts per gallon lol.

[farkwar]

Whats the one for growing pot called?

 

That Dart frog ad in Classifieds got me thinking if doing a terrarium.

 

I have the parts to make the lighting, but at $85 thats worth it to grow moss.

 

My ebay skills are lame, I can find it, but its $110.

[Partagas]

I've said it before and I'll say it again. This hobby and this site in particular is turning into an electronics discussion forum. If I see one more picture of a pulled apart light fixture and an entire thread discussing layout of LEDS and which one is best ( all the same) I'm gonna...complain some

 

 

This hobby has it all, science, technology, art. You can never have too much of those three elements, it's what makes it great. I'm personally grateful for all the people that experiment and share with us in these forums. If you don't like these threads you can simply ignore them, and go look for something that suits your interest. Thank you Horerczy for this informative thread.

 

[Horerczy]

You mean active cooling. The fans will be critical to keeping the fixture alive.

 

Horerczy, did you see anything attached to the MCPCB that would indicate a thermal cutoff? That's a deal breaker IMO, because if a fan dies, so does the fixture. A simple thermal cutoff switch to kill power to the drivers would save a lot of headaches.

Nothing between the MCPCB and any other components besides the driver outputs but the fans are also attached to the drivers so later tonight i'll pop the case open and see if the driver recognizes when the fan's disconnected. I'd do it now but the fixture is in use and I don't want to confuse and/or upset Judy.

 

Edit: No fan failure detection apparently. Unplugged a fan while the lights were running with no changes whatsoever.

 

Whats the one for growing pot called?

 

That Dart frog ad in Classifieds got me thinking if doing a terrarium.

 

I have the parts to make the lighting, but at $85 thats worth it to grow moss.

 

My ebay skills are lame, I can find it, but its $110.

For pot growing? You look for "X Band led grow light" X can be anything from 2-11 the more bands the more the fixtures tend to cost.

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/300w-IR-Full-Spectrum-LED-Grow-Light-Indoor-Hydroponic-Veg-Flowering-Lamp-Panel/191268595451?_trksid=p2045573.c100034.m2102&_trkparms=aid%3D555012%26algo%3DPW.MBE%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D25411%26meid%3D081f414743324e78800fa51f99a21843%26pid%3D100034%26prg%3D10672%26rk%3D2%26rkt%3D8%26sd%3D261529970353

 

Here's one for plant growing but they'd look like crap for visual appeal.

 

I find this super informative

Thank you.

[farkwar]

For pot growing?

 

I just meant for plants. People dont use plant growing lights indoors for tomatoes and squash.

 

I have no idea what bands are, or what they are for. Ill need to research that.

 

Thanks for the link.

[BattleAthletics]

I've said it before and I'll say it again. This hobby and this site in particular is turning into an electronics discussion forum. If I see one more picture of a pulled apart light fixture and an entire thread discussing layout of LEDS and which one is best ( all the same) I'm gonna...complain some more.

Why don't you mind your own business and stay out of the threads then? Jackass.

[farkwar]

Why don't you mind your own business and stay out of the threads then? Jackass.

 

I thought it was a sardonic joke.

 

Funny either way. I liked it.

[Horerczy]

I just meant for plants. People dont use plant growing lights indoors for tomatoes and squash. I have no idea what bands are, or what they are for. Ill need to research that. Thanks for the link.

color bands. horticulture people are wierd so they consider their lights by how many individual color bands are involved in it. theres a particular brand out there that has redone the spectrums of each channel so you use one channel to encourage flowering and the other to encourage the growth of actual fruits.

 

though involving mj in the search actually does broaden your search results on some multichips.

[Formula462]

Why don't you mind your own business and stay out of the threads then? Jackass.

It's a forum, it's everybody's business dummy. And yeeah I was partially joking...

[Lawnman]

Why don't you mind your own business and stay out of the threads then? Jackass.

http://s915.photobucket.com/user/Lwnman/media/77596b5c-3bb4-42e3-808f-5e710b94bc39.jpg.html'>

[Horerczy]

So i totally spaced on the fact i own a kill-a-watt so I'll get actual power consumption details when i get home tonight.

[Horerczy]

Alright I got the numbers in from the kill-a-watt just now.

First the voltage in the house:


Blue channel AC Current Draw:


Blue Channel Actual Wattage:


White Channel AC Current draw:


White Channel Actual Wattage:


This is actually surprising given how many sites say it's a 120W fixture. The 165W rating was an obvious lie but it appears that both are lies. The fixture is drawing 102.3W.

The numbers check nicely compared to the given current and voltage draw that the leds actually have.

 

On the LED side the Blue channel uses 87.9vdc while the white channel uses 85.6vdc as measured with my fluke multimeter. For some reason the thing kept giving me overload as the current of either channel so I cannot say whether they're giving max current at the high or low end of their rating (490 mA-510 mA).

 

Given these numbers the Blue channel is drawing somewhere between 43.071W and 44.829W while the white channel is drawing between 41.944W and 43.656W.

 

If we assume that each fan is drawing it's full capacity of .1A@12Vdc (1.2W) then that means the blue driver is producing between 44.271W and 46.029W while the white driver is producing between 43.144W and 44.856W.

 

I would estimate with this data that the drivers are 86%-88% efficient at converting United States Standard 115V AC Power to DC Power. Not that bad compared to similar products within it's type.

[Horerczy]

Fun factoid: while looking at alternate layout ideas for the light (as I do plan on some minor changes) I calculated that to change the light over to the same layout as the Reefbreeders value fixture layout It would cost me $30.80+Shipping for the leds I'm missing from reefbreeders. So with my unit costing $89.59 that would put it at $63.60-uncalculated shipping costs cheaper than the reefbreeders value fixture proper.

[Horerczy]

I got bored so I mapped out the MCPCB for those interested.

 

http://smg.photobucket.com/user/misogi/media/schemeit-project1_zps480f54fd.png.html'>

 

This is just a rough approximation not a true schematic for reproducing the board.