Programming LED's

[ff337]

Can anyone help with this? Thanks for your patience, this is how I installed step by step. I used the manual and lights are running. I am having a difficulty with the dimming features. More clarification at the end.

I bought a few LED fixtures from Reefledlights. They are the P47 lights that are dimmable. I bought their Linkbox which breaks 1 RJ45 line into 4. The fans are on there own separate circuit and require their own outlet.

The whites, blues and fan are separated and plugged into their own outlet on the Apex. I used 10 foot extension cords that have 3 plug ins each. These outlets are named and programmed as:

BLUE_LED

Fallback OFF
Set OFF
If Time 08:00 to 20:00 Then ON
If Temp > 82.0 Then OFF

WHITE_LED

Fallback OFF
Set OFF
If Time 08:30 to 20:00 Then ON
If Temp > 82.0 Then OFF

FANS_LED

Fallback OFF
Set OFF
If Time 08:00 to 20:30 Then ON

I labelled variable ports on the Apex as:
V1 is LED_Blue
V2 is LED_Whit

V1 has this programming:
If Time 08:00 to 18:30 Then PF1_Blue
If Time 18:30 to 20:30 Then PF1_Blue

V2 has this programming:
If Time 08:30 to 18:30 Then PF3_Whit
If Time 18:30 to 20:00 Then PF4_Whit

PF1_Blue is:
Ramp time: 120 minutes
Start intensity: 0
End intensity: 70

PF2_Blue is:
Ramp time: 120
Start intensity: 70
End intensity: 0

PF3_Whit is:
Ramp time: 90
Start intensity: 0
End intensity: 50

PF4_White is
Ramp time: 90
Start intensity: 50
End intensity: 0

The lights are working and look great. The problem is when I change the intensity numbers to say 100 on PF1 PF2 PF3 PF4. There is no change in intensity on the tank lighting. I know the 10% adjustments are subtle but a change from 0% to 100% should be night and day.

I did reset the Apex after changing the programming, and verified none had changed.

Can anyone help with this? This is probably stupid simple and I am overlooking something minor. Either that or I am WAYYYY off.

Thanks for any suggestions.

Also, I am under the impression that I do not need the VDM since the apex box has a v1/v2, v3/v4. Correct me if I am wrong, I would like verification before I drop another $100.

Joseph

 

[chris s]

FF337;881927 wrote:
Also, I am under the impression that I do not need the VDM since the apex box has a v1/v2, v3/v4. Correct me if I am wrong, I would like verification before I drop another $100.

Joseph

Correct the Apex has 4 dimming channels built in.

It's been a while but I believe your PF channels need this as the first line.
"Control type: Ramp"

Also how did you connect your apex dimming channels to the lights? Each of the RJ45 connectors on the apex has two dimming channels.

 

[ff337]

They are currently set to ramp.

I used this :

 

[shanepike]

The first problem I see is that you have the ramp time set to 120 minutes, but you're using that profile for 10.5 hours. It should be:

If Time 08:00 to 10:00 Then PF1_Blue
If Time 10:00 to 18:30 Then On
If Time 18:30 to 20:30 Then PF1_Blue

I used the "Apex Programming" section in this doc to set up mine:

 

[ff337]

I went ahead and built another profile
If Time 08:30 to 10:00 Then PF4_Whit
If Time 10:00 to 19:30 Then PF5_Whit
If Time 19:30 to 21:00 Then PF6_Whit

If Time 08:00 to 10:00 Then PF1_Blue
If Time 10:00 to 20:00 Then PF2_Blue
If Time 20:00 to 22:00 Then PF3_Blue

PF2 is 70% and PF5 50% are set at zero ramp 0

I will eventually change the middle times to ON but I am working on acclimating the corals to the LED's

 

[ff337]

I still am not sure if those are correct.

 

[shanepike]

Just eyeballing them, they look correct. Are they working?

 

[ff337]

They work but I can not tell any difference in the intensities throughout the day.

I can get them to come on and off anytime I want to. My programming skills end there. The profiles are built to ramp them, up and down. But I do not see this.

Is there a way to adjust the intensities through the display screen. Like if I want to see it at 30% is there a place to punch in 3 or 30% and see the intensities?

 

[shanepike]

Add this line to V2:

If Time 21:00 to 09:30 Then PF5_Whit

Then manually turn on the outlet for the white lights. That should get them on.

Then you can just go into PF5_Whit and start playing around with percentages to see if you can tell any difference in brightness.

 

[ff337]

Ok. They are not changing by me manipulating the values in PF5. Is there another way to check this?

 

[ff337]

Shane your a genus. I am a goober. Well, the instruction manual pictures must be out of date.

I used V1 as blue
I used V2 as White

However, the internals of the lights must be wrong. I swapped V1 as White and V2 as Blue. Then rewrote the corresponding values. Now I can control everything correctly.

What a waste of time. I'm emailing them. I had the outlets right, but I am swapping them so everything matches in order.

I might slam a bottle of vodka.

 

[shanepike]

Ha! I also found the instructions to be spurious in a few places. I bought the P47 DIY kit and definitely had to figure some things out on my own

Glad everything's working now!

 

[ff337]

Figured it out 100% I have a faulty piece of equipment. Should be 100% operational tonight.

I'm not as noob as I thought.

 

[shanepike]

I also </em>found that I had two RJ45 jacks from them, and one was wired to pin 4 instead of pin 5 (or vice versa). Can't believe I noticed it.