# Generators



## Murphy (Aug 10, 2005)

1mainiac said:


> I guess my concern would be without cooling fins it would simply absorb heat not remove it. I hope it works I suppose it is going to come down to the amount of time they run.


Ya.. and I have considered that.. 
To be honest, I have not run the math to see what 10 watts of heat is going to do to 2 feet of aluminum flat stock.. I would suppose this wouldn't be a problem during the winter.. but if I ever flipped those LED's on during a hot summer night, things could get warm...

I was considering using a piece of 2x2 aluminum square tubing and mounting a fan to one end to blow air through it while the leds are mounted to the outside surface(s).. Active cooling is always better than passive.


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## 1mainiac (Nov 23, 2008)

Murphy said:


> Ya.. and I have considered that..
> To be honest, I have not run the math to see what 10 watts of heat is going to do to 2 feet of aluminum flat stock.. I would suppose this wouldn't be a problem during the winter.. but if I ever flipped those LED's on during a hot summer night, things could get warm...
> 
> I was considering using a piece of 2x2 aluminum square tubing and mounting a fan to one end to blow air through it while the leds are mounted to the outside surface(s).. Active cooling is always better than passive.


I like the tubing idea it would give you more surface area for cooling and you could hide the wiring inside the tubing. Might make for a much cleaner install. That may also solve a issue I am working on as I could run the sq tubing as a diamond and install LED's on 2 surfaces aimed at a reflector. I am trying to low budget lighting for my garage but all my LED projects are too directional so it looks like a bunch of flashlights hanging from a ceiling. Even the areas that are well lit have too many shadows. Cross firing LED's into a reflector would solve much of that.


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## Murphy (Aug 10, 2005)

The problem with pointing the LED up is that the heat sink would then be below the heat source.. 

Wouldn't it be better to put a diffuser under the LED's than to put a reflector above?


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## 1mainiac (Nov 23, 2008)

Bending light in a lens or diffuser involves loss where using a reflector has almost zero loss. I am also considering dual reflectors but then the fixture size gets large and complicated. I am using 4ft florescent fixtures as a base the current replacement bulbs are expensive and only fire straight down. The bulbs we have looked at cost 130 bucks ea and we would need over a 100 of them. This chat has been a good exercise for my brain as I just came up with a new design idea that is different from my last attempt. My other brain project is redesigning some lights in the warehouse. This will have to be a dual reflector design but heat is a enemy since I need close to 500w make it work.


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