Howdy folks. Here is my latest project that I just finished (the epoxy is barely dry).
A friend at work has a solar panel and charge controller attached to a 12 Volt battery, and uses 12 Volt bulbs for lighting his front porch at his country property. He wanted an LED 'lightbulb', and I suggested that I could do it - using some left-over 1-Watt Amber Luxeon Stars.
Here is the result...
This photo shows the Edison base that I recycled from a burnt-out CFL bulb. I have soldered my Constant-Current Driver onto the two leads. NOTE: This is meant to be used ONLY for 12 Volt systems - NOT 120VAC.
This shows the V8 juice can that I recycled - epoxying 4 1-Watt Amber LEDs on the sides. NOTE: I have punched vent holes in the top of the can for air to circulate and exit the can here.
This shows the various bits laid out on the table. You may notice that the top has a trio of LEDs mounted on it. I didn't go with this for the final 'bulb', and instead used a single LED on the top of the can.
Here is a photo of the single 1-Watt LED epoxied onth the aluminum disc. A heatsink is epoxied to the bottom of the disc.
Here is the whole 'bulb' in its' finished form.
A view of the end of the 'bulb'.
The 'bulb' ready to be lit up.
The 'bulb' lit up.
This LED lamp uses 350mA of current - plus 50mA for the fan for a total of 400-mA.
The LEDs are rated at about 25 Lumens each - for a total of 125 Lumens of Amber light.
I chose Amber - because this is an outside light - and bugs do not seem to be attracted to amber light.
The can gets a bit warm - but not too warm... I think that I measured 43-degrees C as the hottest that it gets - after about 30 minutes of operation.
Regards,
James Jackson
