magnetar68
New Member
I have 9 Meanwell ELN-60-48D LED drivers. I am using them to drive 9 strings of LEDs (3 white strings, 3 blue strings, and 3 royal blue strings -- each string as 9 CREE XP-G LEDs). These Meanwell LED drivers have a 0-10V input for controlling the dimming level.
I am using a Digital Aquatics advanced light controller (ALC) unit that outputs a 0-10V signal to dim the LEDs using separately controllable Port A and Port B.
My goal is simultaneously dim the 3 white drivers with Port A and the 6 blue/royal blue drivers with Port B.
In a perfect world I could hookup all 3 whites to Port A and all 6 blues to Port B and everything would dim.
The main problem is that the DA light controller is designed for florescent light dimmers which I read typically draw about 1mA, but I read that these LED drivers draw around 25-40mA per driver. The light controller cannot therefore feed all of these drivers. The end results is that the max voltage on the controller is less than 9V and I cannot run the LEDs at maximum intensity.
I do not know why Meanwell designed thier dimmer input to draw so much current. I am stuck with this setup as I have already bought everything and set it up.
I found a circuit **broken link removed** that will drive up to four LED drivers from a single regulated 12V power supply using an LM324 low power quad opamp.
If possible, I would like to use 1 inexpensive regulated power supply to drive ALL of the opamps (one set of 3 opamps for white and one set of 6 opamps for blues).
Assuming the worse case of a 40mA draw, then this means I need at least 360mA just for the 9 drivers (9*40=360). Plus the overhead of the opAms, I am not sure I can get away with a 12V 500mA power supply like this one. Can I?
Anyway, I have to believe this is trivial for someone with experience in this type of stuff, but my experience is limited to a few robotics projects, so I wanted to see the best way to do this. Without any guidance I would try something like this:
The regulated 500mA +12V power supply drives ALL three LM324s on their +Vcc
The portA output goes into the signal inputs of LM324-1
The portB output goes into the signal inputs on both LM324-2 and LM324-3.
LM324-1 OUT1, OUT2, and OUT3 go to the dimming inputs (+) on the three white LED drivers
LM324-2 OUTs go to the (+) on the blues
LM324-3 OUTs go to the (+) on the royal blues.
All of the IN- nodes get tied to their corresponding OUTs.
The LM324 GND nodes and all of the LED driver (-) nodes get tied to the (-) on the powersupply
Would this work? I am not sure of the total draw of the system and I don't know how much each of these LM324s would draw from the light controller.
I am using a Digital Aquatics advanced light controller (ALC) unit that outputs a 0-10V signal to dim the LEDs using separately controllable Port A and Port B.
My goal is simultaneously dim the 3 white drivers with Port A and the 6 blue/royal blue drivers with Port B.
In a perfect world I could hookup all 3 whites to Port A and all 6 blues to Port B and everything would dim.
The main problem is that the DA light controller is designed for florescent light dimmers which I read typically draw about 1mA, but I read that these LED drivers draw around 25-40mA per driver. The light controller cannot therefore feed all of these drivers. The end results is that the max voltage on the controller is less than 9V and I cannot run the LEDs at maximum intensity.
I do not know why Meanwell designed thier dimmer input to draw so much current. I am stuck with this setup as I have already bought everything and set it up.
I found a circuit **broken link removed** that will drive up to four LED drivers from a single regulated 12V power supply using an LM324 low power quad opamp.
If possible, I would like to use 1 inexpensive regulated power supply to drive ALL of the opamps (one set of 3 opamps for white and one set of 6 opamps for blues).
Assuming the worse case of a 40mA draw, then this means I need at least 360mA just for the 9 drivers (9*40=360). Plus the overhead of the opAms, I am not sure I can get away with a 12V 500mA power supply like this one. Can I?
Anyway, I have to believe this is trivial for someone with experience in this type of stuff, but my experience is limited to a few robotics projects, so I wanted to see the best way to do this. Without any guidance I would try something like this:
The regulated 500mA +12V power supply drives ALL three LM324s on their +Vcc
The portA output goes into the signal inputs of LM324-1
The portB output goes into the signal inputs on both LM324-2 and LM324-3.
LM324-1 OUT1, OUT2, and OUT3 go to the dimming inputs (+) on the three white LED drivers
LM324-2 OUTs go to the (+) on the blues
LM324-3 OUTs go to the (+) on the royal blues.
All of the IN- nodes get tied to their corresponding OUTs.
The LM324 GND nodes and all of the LED driver (-) nodes get tied to the (-) on the powersupply
Would this work? I am not sure of the total draw of the system and I don't know how much each of these LM324s would draw from the light controller.
Code:
+12V-----------------------------
| | |
LM324-1 LM324-2 LM324-3
| | |
0V------------------------------