Can I make this black box led apex dimmable?

[Wes910]

I have seen video is people modding other black box leds to work off the variable power ports. However I have not seen done to this type of setup. I took the to red and black wire that says dimmable and connect those to the variable port however the lights only go on or off I.E. If I set it to 40% in fusion the lights are at 100%. I set it to 10% in fusion the lights go off. I've tried number between those and the light just stays at 100% or off.

 

[dantimdad]

It looks to me that those are 3.3PWM controlled.

Does your Apex do 3.3v control? I am not familiar with APEX enough.

But, I have seen people convert others to work but, most of them I have seen are 0-10v analog or 0-10v PWM.

Sorry I am not more help.

 

[Wes910]

I did but a meter on it and it looks like it working in the 3volt range

 

[Michael Lane]

Can you show a good picture of the other side of that board?

 

[Wes910]

I'll post one tonight. I know there's several micro chips on the back

 

[dantimdad]

Keep in mind that board also controls the fans.

 

[Wes910]

Here's the back side of the board

 

[Michael Lane]

I don't have much experience with analog circuits or reverse engineering, but I think we can figure this one out as a group.

I can't really make out what either of those ICs are. I thought U2 might be an op amp or 555, but it doesn't seem to match any pinout I recognize for them. I'm almost certain U1 is voltage regulator, but again the pinout seems strange to me. It's hard to see many of the traces, so I could easily be wrong (as always).

I would start by testing V1, V2, and V3. I would find the voltage on each of these points when the potentiometer is turned all the way down, midway, and all the way up. Also, if your meter has a frequency setting, it would be nice to determine the frequency on V3.

It might be as simple as connecting the Apex signal to v1 or v2 (assuming Apex is 0-10v analog).

 

[Wes910]

on Lowest setting Im getting
0.0 on V1
2.92 on V2
.02 on V3
Mid
1.20 on V1
2.91 on V2
1.24 V3
High
3.02 V1
3.02 V2
2.94 V3

V3 measures 0.0 Khz when at 0 and 2.04 Khz as you turn the light to half way and full

 

[Michael Lane]

The bad news is that you can't just whack in the apex signal anywhere on that board. The good news is that we understand the signal being used to drive the lights and you can make a signal converter to turn 10v analog signal to 3.3v pwm (at 2 kHz).

There are lots of ways to do that depending on what you are comfortable with.
- You could piece together this analog to pwm converter (5v pwm output) and chain it to any kind of level shifter to get it down to 3.3v. Sparkfun has a simple one.
- Make your own converter using a triangle wave generator (pair of op-amps) and a comparator.
- Use an IC, like LTC6990, to generate pwm from analog
- Throw a microcontroller at it and genarate pwm using built-in Analog to Digital Converter.

I'm sure there are other ways, but that should cover the range of options. What is the brand on the black box light? I'm interested in what the insides of the different lights look like.

 

[Wes910]

Like an Arduino?

 

[dantimdad]

Yep that would do it.

 

[Wes910]

I guess its time to get after it

 

[dantimdad]

LOL. Keep us posted!

 

[CDAzman]

I have the same setup- curious what your final solution was?

 

[Lvgmman]

Interested as well, have a 4 - Viparspectra 300w fixtures and the dimmer is 0-3.3v PWM as well. I ordered one of the Steve's LED converters but it's designed to output 0-5v PWM. In theory I could just figure out where the 0-10v signal from the apex hits a max of 3.3v on the output for the pwm controller but that seems a bit questionable as a solution in my mind.

 

[Michael Lane]

Interested as well, have a 4 - Viparspectra 300w fixtures and the dimmer is 0-3.3v PWM as well. I ordered one of the Steve's LED converters but it's designed to output 0-5v PWM. In theory I could just figure out where the 0-10v signal from the apex hits a max of 3.3v on the output for the pwm controller but that seems a bit questionable as a solution in my mind.

If I follow what you are saying, then I don't think this would work. 5v PWM uses a square wave that goes from 0v to 5v, (almost) regardless of the input voltage. So, if you are talking about this interface board, a 1v signal will present a 5 volt square wave at 5v 10% of the time and 0v 90% of the time (1/10 = 10% duty cycle).

Sparkfun has a good image that shows how pwm and duty cycle work.

I don't know what frequency the converter board uses, but a simple level shifter can turn the 5v pwm into 3.3v pwm.

 

[oreo54]

What a mess.. Boards says 3.3V and I'll assume PWM..
Many drivers work w/ a range of PWM voltages.. i.e Meanwell LDD-h can use 2.5-6V...
Frequency is another story..

I'd suggest try the 5V and see if it works..BUT your decision..

I'm not really seeing drivers.. 48V power supply..
blue box looks to be a 48-12V converter..
fans..

big chip prob a 555Timer u2
u1 probab. 12 to 3.3v vltage regulator..

all guesses on my part..

Need more info..

 

[Lvgmman]

If I follow what you are saying, then I don't think this would work. 5v PWM uses a square wave that goes from 0v to 5v, (almost) regardless of the input voltage. So, if you are talking about this interface board, a 1v signal will present a 5 volt square wave at 5v 10% of the time and 0v 90% of the time (1/10 = 10% duty cycle).

Sparkfun has a good image that shows how pwm and duty cycle work.

I don't know what frequency the converter board uses, but a simple level shifter can turn the 5v pwm into 3.3v pwm.

You are exactly correct on all of your assumptions. I saw that board 5v to 3.3v converter earlier in this thread and was thinking that was the solution. Looks like that little board is capable of up to 5 channels which is great. The only issue is trying to get it into my hands quickly. So basically I'll be going from the apex 0-10v to the stevesled 0-5v pwm converter to that little tiny 3.3v converter on the HV1-4 inputs. I just dont like the idea of stacking converters normally. Last thing is do I have to grab a true common ground at each converter

 

[Michael Lane]

You are exactly correct on all of your assumptions. I saw that board 5v to 3.3v converter earlier in this thread and was thinking that was the solution. Looks like that little board is capable of up to 5 channels which is great. The only issue is trying to get it into my hands quickly. So basically I'll be going from the apex 0-10v to the stevesled 0-5v pwm converter to that little tiny 3.3v converter on the HV1-4 inputs. I just dont like the idea of stacking converters normally. Last thing is do I have to grab a true common ground at each converter

If you have resistors on hand, you could make a simple single direction level shifter using a voltage divider.