LED lights for your snowblower that don't flicker!
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- Опубліковано 12 вер 2024
- This is a brief video of a DIY way of adding LED floodlights to your snowblower using a bridge rectifier that creates DC voltage from the existing AC voltage from your snowblowers headlight circuit. Typically all you can use on this circuit is some sort of incandescent light like a halogen light since it won't flicker with AC voltage. If you just add an LED light to this circuit as is then you will get flickering with the varying AC current. I used a bridge rectifier, model KBPC5010
www.alltronics....
The snowblower that I put these LED floodlights on is a Toro Powershift 1028
The LED floodlights used were an off brand which are 9 watts per light and work on DC voltage 9v-32v.
The addition of a capacitor is a new addition that was found to keep some LED fog lights from dying prematurely. Please see the full thread I created from this concept at this link
www.snowblowerf...
I am very thankful for the thread you posted online and this video, just what I'm looking for, ty!
I just installed LED lights to my snow blower using a Milwaukee drill battery to power them. They use so little amount of juice I decided to also add heat grips too. I order a battery recepticle off Amazon to plug the battery into and run the neccessary wires to the lights and grips with switches and a volt meter to monitor the power supply. It works very well being I don't have a stator in my engine.
can we see your connections ? Also my original light on my snowblower is out , can I use the wire that goes to my light to connect the rectifier set up for LED lights ?
Do you have a wiring diagram for the rectifier?
Will only a rectifier do the trick or would I need capacitors? Electric confuses me
Bridge rectifier and a capacitor
I have a single wire stator on 8hp Tecumseh. I'm guessing it's the smallest power output? Any idea what my amps/watts are coming out? Roughly at high idle. Trying to figure out what light I need to get
I used to know what that stator outputs, you may have to consult the forum, I bet someone knows.
@@superedge99 I created an account and asked...ty sir!
I used an old 12V battery powered drill, the 12V battery from my lawn tractor( small size) and a double pole double throw toggle switch with center neutra for this modification.l. I removed the top half of the chute direction shaft, chucked remaining shaft tightly in the drill and mounted the drill under the operating console. I now can rotate my chute quickly left to right or any position in between, using the toggle switch. I have a 3 sided canopy on my 30" 10.5 hp Snowblower and have a rotating blue light on top of it. Just because I could! Also a HCSL from a Blazer with a 12" row of red led's at the top of the rear of the canopy. Battery will last several hours without recharging. County guys always wave.
Some snowblowers have already installed a rectifier for some reason or another for the components that they included. I had a bolens (mtd) with a light and heated handgrips. They already had a rectifier on there for the headlight but still ran the handgrips with ac I think if I remember correctly. They could have kept ac on the headlight but decided to do that for some reason.
Very Cool, Thanks for sharing!...I dislike that "shoot shadow" on my blower...Nice Fix!
I was reading that forum. The problem is there are 29 pages to go through, and I have yet to find any with any actual step by step pics. Yes my snow blower had a 12v, 20 watt bulb.
This may be a ridiculous question, but house current is AC and LED lights do not flicker. Why would it with a snowblower?
Enigma, depends on what you're describing. Led replacement bulbs for lights in a house won't flicker because they use a bridge rectifier. Most led Christmas lights don't use rectification so they flicker at 60hertz which means that they turn off and on 60 times per second. Most people can sense a flicker which is even more evident if the light source is moving (try swinging a coiled up set of LED christmas lights at arms length in front of you and you'll notice the flicker more easily) Your snowblower is typically creating AC voltage at 40-50 hertz which is why it is even easier for your eye to perceive as flickering.
Your rectifier has 4 contacts. 2 for your ac in, and the other two are your + and - dc out. You connect the ac contacts, one to the wire coming out of the engine, and the other to the ground on the motor/body. There is no polarity for this. The + and - on the rectifier then go to the + and - to your dc light. Very simple.
Here is a link to a thread I created that goes over install questions.
www.snowblowerforum.com/forum/general-snowblower-discussion/6602-upgrading-your-snowblower-lights-led-lights.html
Any chance of showing the actual wiring schematic? I have yet to see what wires go where. I know the parts needed, but just want to know where everything goes and if you put capacitors on yours. Also, how do you know how many watt bulbs you can get away with safely. I have a 28" Pro Ariens 11 hp. Thanks. Great video.
Here is a link to a thread that I created to address a lot of questions about wiring and diagramming.
www.snowblowerforum.com/forum/general-snowblower-discussion/6602-upgrading-your-snowblower-lights-led-lights.html
Do you currently have a light on your ariens?
You can read above what I wrote about wiring. I did not include the use of a capacitor. Chances are your generator is 18w at least but more may not be so. A safe bet is a "18w led round flood" which you can find on ebay. I use them and also the 27w version. They are good and durable. My 10/30 snapper with a 10hp tecumseh has the 18w generator.
4bosox, just check the existing bulb for what wattage you have to work with for the LED.
oh, sorry. The output are most on board generators are 18w for just a light. The generators are all pretty much 12v although actual is a little higher. Some have higher output in wattage/amperage and are rated in amps otherwise. 1 amp at 12v is 12w. Remember amps times volts = watts. The only generators that are rated in watts that I have seen,are the 18w ones, the rest give amps. So the 2 amp ones being at 12v is 24w etc. You can calculate. You will find led dc lights give the wattage they use. There is a good light you can buy which is sold for trucks and off roading which is a 18w 6 cree led round light which is also available in 27 w versions and more. That 18w throws 1200-1600 lumens.
Thanks
Didn't even show how's it get done.
I wasn't planning on using a capacitor unless I absolutely had to. I didn't realize that's what you did. So the capacitors have a set of 4 terminals total? What size did use? Wire gauge? Any idea maximum size wattage of led's I can use. Currently have 11.5 Briggs and the bulb is 12v, 20 watt.
If you read the first post of the thread I linked to it mentions that your LED's may fail due to the dirty voltage, so doing the capacitor install is a must unless you want to gamble. It's impossible to know for sure if the LED headlights you are using are sensitive to voltage ripple or not. The capacitor that I used was a single 50v 1000uf capacitor, it has a positive and a negative like this one www.amazon.com/Nichicon-SE-1000uF-Electrolytic-Capacitor/dp/B0079Q78GC/ref=sr_1_8?s=industrial&ie=UTF8&qid=1414521219&sr=1-8&keywords=50v+1000uf
16 gauge wire is fine for this application since you're only drawing about 1 amp of current.
You can use 20 watts of LED's since your original bulb was 20 watt. It is doubtful that Briggs would have placed a larger stator for a headlight circuit than what was needed for the 20 watt incandescent that came on the blower. So basically you can assume that you have a 1 amp stator. 20 watts of LEDs is a HUGE upgrade from the incandescent you had. If you do a search for "10w Cree LED foglight" on ebay or google you will find some nice options. I would recommend the foglight and NOT the spotlight version (foglight has a fogged lens) because the foglight is going to have a wider dispersion of light, while the spotlight will be very narrow.
Your wattage is probably 18w coming out which is what most of these engines have such as on my 10/30 snapper with a 10hp tecumseh. I suggest the led light I mentioned above. Look up 18w led round flood on ebay.
What did you use to connect the capacitor to the wires from the lights with, a wire nut? That capacitor just sits out in the elements exposed like that?
I soldered the connections to the capacitor. I then wrapped connections with electrical tape. My connections are all under the dash of my snowblower, so not really exposed much at all. If your installation is more exposed then you may want to get an inexpensive plastic junction box to protect things.
nice video, i have a question not sure when you going to answer. it is supposed to have current in + and - after the rectifier?
If I understand your question correctly, yes there is a positive and negative coming off of the bridge rectifier. Please restate the question if my answer doesn't make sense.
+superedge99 , Thank you for the quick response. my question was " it is normal to have some positive current in the negative side? i used my tester and there is current in both sides, (after the rectifier) one is very strong and the other one is kind of weak. and also after the rectifier i have a capacitor and than a toggle switch installed, but it's doing nothing. it won't shut the light off when turn it to off position. Can you help me with that? Thank you very much.
+superedge99 , Thank you for the quick response. my question was " is it normal to have some positive current in the negative side? i used my tester and there is current in both sides, (after the rectifier) one is very strong and the other one is kind of weak. and also after the rectifier i have a capacitor and than a toggle switch installed, but it's doing nothing. it won't shut the light off when turn it to off position. Can you help me with that? Thank you very much.
+ideaslandscape the capacitor is installed after the rectifier to clean up most of the "dirty" voltage that comes from the rectifier, so what you're seeing from testing is normal. I'm not sure why your switch isn't working to turn off your light, possible that you have wires touching where they are connected on the switch?
oh ok, Thank you, so it is normal to have some positive current on the negative side after the bridge rectifier?
Well- that should sufficiently scare the *crap* outa the neighbors. Change out 2 (1@ side) bulbs with Hyper BLUE. Much more soothing, natural contrast against white snow. Higher K-value.
I kinda thought that the higher K-values (above about 6500K) the light ceased to render colors very accurately and was kind of distracting, too much blue. I stuck with these at 6500K because I thought that they were close to daylight. Thanks for the comment!
hey there i installed a led lamp to my snow blower aries deluxe 28 i installed a switch a fuse the bridge rectifier it still flickering how can i eliminate that
you need to get your hands on some 2200mfd 50v capacitors.
Is it possible to continue to run the halogen also?
Douglas Borgaro probably not advisable, you may overload the circuit.
superedge99
How about 3 led?
I could remove halogen?
Douglas Borgaro you'll have to do the math for the amperage draw of the led vs the halogen.
Better to let the blower charge a battery than run 12 v led off battery
lottsalasagna what are you talking about? I'm confused. The is no battery on the snowblower.
superedge99 yes I know ..let the engine charge a battery and run lights off a battery
Just future reference
lottsalasagna either a battery or capacitor, makes no difference. I used a capacitor. It's all explained in the link. Capacitor is a fraction of the weight and bulk.
So if I understand this correctly. You took the 2 wires from the stator and snipped those and went to the 2 AC parts of the Rectifier. And the 2 led's positive and negative are tied together and go to the other DC + and DC -? What did you use after you connected the light wires to go to the Rectifier connection wise? A 3 way connector? And how do you know how many watts you can away with? Thanks
Typically there is only one wire that comes off of the stator as one side of the AC current, the other side is the frame of the snowblower. I'm not understanding what you mean by "...the 2 led's positive and negative are tied together and go to the other DC + and DC -?" The LED positive and negative go the capacitor positive and negative, then the capacitor positive and negative go to the rectifier positive and negative. The rectifier gets one side of the AC current input from the frame, the other from the stator.
Awesome! I'm going to do the same on my Yard Man 10 HP Model #31AE5KLF801 which has a Tecumseh lh358sa engine. Can you post or send me a wiring diagram on how to wire the lights correctly?
www.snowblowerforum.com/forum/general-snowblower-discussion/6602-upgrading-your-snowblower-lights-led-lights.html
I'm sort of confused here. All snow blowers that I've personally seen take a 12V DC bulb. They all appear to put out DC voltage. I don't know your exact machine, but Toro only sells sealed headlights that connect via a single wire to a common Tecumseh engine with a stator. The rectifier should be completely unnecessary.
Buggyspam, the sealed halogen/incandescent bulbs that you see on most snowblowers will work off of AC or DC. Bulbs using filaments don't care if they are receiving AC or DC as long as the voltage is within parameters that it can handle which is why you've seen DC sealed halogen bulbs on snowblowers. Only snowblowers that have an on board battery have a voltage regulator that takes the AC voltage from the stator and changes it to DC voltage. So about 99% of the snowblowers out there past or present have AC on the headlight circuit, which makes a bridge rectifier required in order to add LED's and not have flickering. I hope that I explained this well enough, let me know if you have questions.
Ok, I know that at the base level a stator puts out AC, so if the bulb doesn't care and it's all AC, I can accept that. I'm still skeptical that a rectifier is needed. I personally have never swapped the light like you, but I've seen a few videos like yours (which is why your video popped up in my suggestions) for LED conversions. None of the other LEDs appear to flicker like an incandescent bulb does. Did you try anything with LEDs prior to adding a rectifier?
buggsyspam LED's are "light emitting diodes" so when they are hooked up to AC current which is alternating polarity then the LED flickers since the LED turns off once polarity switches. This is why LED lights flicker without a bridge rectifier. There is nothing to be skeptical of here, physics dictates that if you don't want the LED's to flicker on AC current you need a bridge rectifier to change the voltage to DC so that the LED's aren't turning on and off 40-60 times per second. Incandescent bulbs don't flicker on AC current because 1.They are not diodes 2. They can't cool down fast enough to be seen as "flickering" on 40hertz-60hertz AC current.
Didn't even show how to get it done. WTH!