How to calculate the ampere consumption for an LED strip, diode

Today, LED products have firmly entered our homes and have become indispensable. This statement applies not only to light bulbs, but also to LED strips, with which you can create beautiful lighting effects at home or outdoors.

LED Strip Light

But in order for the LED strip to work for a long time and efficiently, it must be connected correctly. And for this you need to find out how many amperes the purchased tape will consume. This is a very important parameter that a person who makes LED backlighting using these products with their own hands must know. Everything you need to know to find out how much a led strip consumes is in this article.

Why you need to find out

An LED strip is a device that has a flexible base on which diodes connected in series are placed. These products operate at low voltage (12 or 24 volts).

Note! The most popular are 12 volt tapes. Their main advantage is that they are cheaper than 24 volt products.

Due to the fact that these products are low-voltage, there are difficulties in connecting them to a standard 220-volt network. After all, if the connection goes directly, then the 12 volt tape will simply burn out. Therefore, to connect LED products of such a plan, special voltage converters are used - power supplies.

Power supplies for LED strips

The power supply unit lowers the voltage of 220 volts to the required level - 12 or 24 volts. To supply power to these products today there is a fairly large selection of converters, which makes it difficult to choose. In order to choose the right power supply, you need to know what current or how many amperes the LED strip used for backlighting will consume. And this is not a constant value, which depends on the following parameters:

  • length (how many meters are used). This product can be cut into various lengths. The main thing is that the cutting is carried out in clearly defined places. Otherwise, the tape will be damaged and not be able to work;

Note! These products are sold in reels. One coil contains five meters of led.

Place for cutting

  • led type;
  • type of LEDs;
  • density of placement of light sources.

All of the above parameters are necessary in order to calculate the power consumption of the LED strip, namely, what current or how many amperes it can consume.

Consider the types of LEDs

To calculate how much current or how many amperes a diode strip will consume, you first need to know the type of its chip. Today, chips vary in power. Consider the most popular chip models:

  • 3528. This is the very first product to hit the market. They are not as powerful as later models, but they are economical;

Diode Chip 3528

  • 5050. These are chips of a new generation. They are characterized by high power. The tape contains fewer LEDs per meter.

Diode Chip 5050

What current the led strip will consume depends primarily not so much on the type of chip as on the density of the LEDs on the product per 1 m of its length. In order to find out how many diodes are located in 1 m, you need to know the type of chip, the brand of led, and also have the following table at hand. Data shown is for 12 volt products.

Note! The amount of current consumed for 1 m of the product must be indicated in its accompanying documentation. But if it is not there, you can use the table below or find a more advanced version, which also takes into account rare models.

Number of diodes in one meter

As you can see from the table, 30, 60 or 90, and 120 diodes can be placed in 1 m of products with a 3528 chip. There are even models for 12 volts, where 240 pieces of LEDs are installed in it. The most common products are 3528 for 12 volts with 60 diodes per meter in length.
The diode tape with 5050 chips has four varieties, which are divided depending on the number of LEDs in 1 m. The table shows the values ​​of what current will be consumed by the lighting product when 30 or 60 diodes are placed in 1 m. Such lighting devices are used to illuminate home premises. But there are also models that have 72 and 120 pieces in 1 m. They light up shop windows, billboards and buildings.

Outdoor lighting of buildings

In addition, the table shows such an important parameter as the consumed current (amperes) for different lengths (1,2,3,4 and 5 meters). For devices with a length of 5 m, this figure will be one ampere. This table is very convenient to use when the backlight has an exact number of meters (for example, 4 or 5 meters). In this case, the calculation of such a parameter as the current consumption will be quite simple.

How to calculate the required parameter correctly

To determine how many amperes or what current the led for 12 or 24 volts will consume, you just need to find out the type of products purchased and, using the table above, find out the desired parameter.
From the table, we get ready-made values ​​for products with a length of up to five meters. Moreover, if the backlight length exceeds 5 meters, you just need to add the required length to the final value of the table. Things are much more problematic when calculating the required parameters in a situation where the backlight length is, for example, 2.4 m. In this case, it is necessary to calculate how many LEDs are per piece (in this case, 0.4 m). This can be found out by manually counting the number of diodes. After that, using the method of proportions, you can easily calculate how much current a specific number of light sources will consume.

Diode arrangement

As you can see, each lighting installation will have an exclusively individual character. Therefore, the calculation must be carried out for each individual backlight. This will avoid the situation of premature exit from the operating state of light sources due to violation of operating conditions.
After that, you can safely pick up the power supply. Since the calculated amount of current consumption will be the parameter by which the converter must be selected. From the power supply, you can power a led with a voltage of 12, 18 and 24 volts.
Having calculated what power 1 m of the product has, you can easily calculate this parameter for the entire length of the backlight. To do this, the resulting value is simply multiplied by the total length of the lighting fixture.
Note! Carrying out calculations for the selection of the optimal power supply, it is imperative to lay in them 20-30% of the final result obtained, thereby forming the safety margin of the purchased converter.
This amount of stock must be done due to the fact that there are sometimes surges in the voltage network. They, in a situation where the power supply has been chosen without at least a minimum margin of 20%, can disable it. This means that the converter may simply burn out. As a result, you won't be able to use your backlight until you replace it. But there are situations when the diodes themselves fail from overvoltage.

LED lighting in the room

To calculate the power consumption of the backlight, you need the power consumption of the entire backlight (taking into account 20-30% of the reserve), you just need to multiply by the amount of time it will be on per day. For example, it is assumed that an LED product will work for four hours. But here in the calculations it is necessary to take into account the color of the LEDs.

How to determine the required parameter for one diode

If it is not possible with the help of reference books to find out what current one LED consumes, then you can carry out measurements with your own hands. This should be done in a situation where the backlight length will not be complete (for example, 2.4 m).

Note! LEDs can emit in different colors (white, red, blue and green). And each species will consume a certain amount of current. For example, a red diode almost always uses 20mA.

LEDs

To determine the required value, you will need:

  • laboratory power supply for 12 volts;
  • fixed resistors (1 kOhm, 560 Ohm and 2.2 kOhm);
  • milliammeter;
  • digital voltmeter;
  • mounting wire;
  • powerful variable resistor for 470-680 ohms.

You need to define it as follows:

  • we find out the polarity of the diode using a mounting wire and a constant resistor. If the diode lights up, it will be "+";
  • we collect an electrical circuit: a constant resistor for the desired diode, a variable resistor, and a milliammeter. A voltmeter must be connected in parallel with the LED;

Voltmeter

  • we put the variable resistor on the maximum resistance;
  • we connect the circuit;
  • we write down the readings of the device;
  • then we reduce the resistance for the variable resistor and look at the voltmeter. Readings should be recorded every 0.1V with increasing voltage;
  • when the voltage rises less than the current, we reduce the resistance of the resistor.

As a result, we get the current of one diode.

Conclusion

Calculating how many amperes a particular LED strip consumes is not so difficult. It is enough to have reference books at hand and carry out simple calculations.

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