Budget friendly adjustable bench Power supplies perfect for testing LED's and other uses!

First off I am NOT the manufacture nor do I have anything to do with these power supplies. I was talking to the manufacture on aliexpress and I suggested that he make an account on here as BLF has a need for high current power supplies like he offers. He doesn’t speak English perfectly and requested that I help him post a thread.

You may contact user RD tech with any questions : http://budgetlightforum.com/user/20499

His aliexpress store: http://rdtech.aliexpress.com/store/923042

Here is a copy/paste of the message from him:

This is a good deal, I would just spring for the 5015 myself for the extra $3. I love my 3012.

You can see my (uncompensated) review of these here: Review of DP50V5A & DPS3012 bench top power supply modules, best bang for the buck around!

Pics from review:


You will also need a power supply to power these with. For LED testing an old ATX power supply works well unless you want to play with XHP35’s. The ATX power supply will limit you to around 11v max.

If you want the full abilities of the voltage then I am using a cheap “48 volt” power supply from ebay. http://www.ebay.com/itm/131664355579

Mine is adjustable down to around 36v for use with the 3012 (test voltage before you connect it). I am using the 150w version of the ebay power supply but if you plan on pumping a lot of power you can obviously get the 400w version as well, due to the low wattages we use with LED’s I did not see a reason for the higher wattage though.

Out the door you should be under $50 for a power supply that is capable of 50v and 15A.

New version released 10-31-16

For those that want to use an ATX or other simular low voltage power supply this same company just released a new buck/boost version of the power supply module.

It outputs 0-32V and the input is 6-40V with a 5A max current.

https://www.aliexpress.com/store/product/RD-DPH3205-Buck-boost-converter-Constant-Voltage-current-Programmable-digital-control-Power-Supply-color-LCD-voltmeter/923042_32760528221.html

This really opens the door for more compact and easier to build power supplies if you do not need the higher current and voltage abilities of the DPS5015

It is on sale during the introduction for $28.99 for 3 days, grab it while you can, they always do this when released and the price DOES go up after that.

Email I was sent about this:

Thanks for this, I’ve looked for a reasonably priced power supply capable of greater than 30V and 10A for close to a year. The sub $100 10A 30V power supply’s are easy to find, and it’ll work for most of the emitters we use here, but I’ve got some projects coming up with COB LED’s and they’re usually have a Vf around 36V. Reasonable 50V power supply’s are also fairly easy to find, but most often have current outputs below 5A, and some even below 3A, which knocks out high-amp/low-Vf LED’s.

Until this it seems it’s been a choice between either high amp, low Vf tests, OR high-Vf, low amp tests.

This seems to fill the void IMO.

Off to read the other threads before I spam you with questions lol.

-Michael

I’m very interested in one the DP50V15A, but I would like to see more reviews for it.

Check out my review in the OP. I review both the DP and DPS series (all the models in the series are the same, just different voltage and amperage ratings).

Although I don’t think there is a 15A version of the DP series? Did you mean the DPS5015?

The DPS5015 is the same as my DPS3012, just with more voltage and amperage. I wish it had been released when I ordered mine as that is what I would have ordered.

Here are some pictures from pinkpanda3310 from this thread with his DPS : Serious battery charging station setups on a budget


This was my reason for ordering it as well. I could find power supplies offering either the amperage I wanted or the voltage but never both.

Plus even a 50v 3A was around $50. When I realized I could get one that would do it all AND come out cheaper then even a basic power supply, well it was a no brainier for me.

I was really glad they worked as described, I didn’t buy one for a week or 2 as I could not find a review and was scared of it not working as it should. Then I said ailexpress will protect me and ordered anyways lol. They get daily workouts now days powering all sorts of things.

They also make a great high amp battery charger as well.

Will these read a voltage connected to the output? Or is there a way to incorporate a volt meter into the final design?

The DPS3012 and DPS5015 will indeed read voltage connected to the output, for example when connecting to batteries for charging it will read the actual voltage on the output line. It is quite accurate as well.

The DP series will not read voltage and honestly are not nearly as good as the DPS, particularly for our uses.

I think I confused the threads lol, posting in the other as well, sorry.

Here’s the only one I’ve found, 50V and 20A, all for the low low price of….

$310! :open_mouth:

http://m.ebay.com/itm/201652445861

-Michael

I put in an order for the dps5015. Seems it will be of great value as I move forward in electronics. Thanks for the discount.

TA thanks, another great addition to your ever growing high quality input here, I felt humbled by the old timers and you are another good humbling factor here for me :wink:

This is true. You have accomplished much in so little time. But the thing that gets me is that you have published your accomplishments as well. I find this so hard to do, in fact, i believe I have yet to do it once.

Thanks for all the compliments everyone.

I am pretty sure you are saying this as a good thing. I always feel like I am bragging posting accomplishments.

I have always firmly believed that EVERYTHING can be made / done / built better. It is just a matter of desire and time dto figure out how.

Even the things I have done, as soon as I finish them I immediately start picking them apart noting how I could do it better next time. :smiley:

The nice thing about flashlights is they are a lot quicker/simpler/easier then my normal hobbies (cars, guns, cars, paintball, sports, working out, cars, computers, video gaming, cars. you know, the basics for a Texican). Although sadly once you have played with all the cheap flashlights things start getting more expensive to keep playing with them in a hurry lol. There was a time when a $10 flashlight was considered a big investment……That was a long long time ago….

I am glad that others have benefited from what I have been able to share. I know I have benefited far more from what I have learned on here from others.

Anyone know what the actual accuracy is with any of these.

To get the sort of accuracy you are asking for we’ll need to ask HKJ or someone with the right equipment to test it.

I tested both of mine vs both my fluke and UT139C multimeters (they agree on basically everything).

The power supplies agreed with my multimeters to within the stated tolerances. Generally no more then .01 off or so except in the super fine voltage regain.

I can run an actual official test if people want it. After running them through the voltage range while connected to my multimeters in both current and voltage mode I decided that I didn’t need to do anymore testing.

At any given point the power supplies were generally not off by more then .01. A few spots they were slightly further off but still within spec from my back of the hand math as I ran through the numbers.

The only “inaccuracy” I noted was that when making super fine voltage adjustments it would sometimes “miss” a change. I would not expect them to reliably adjust voltage more accurate then .01 at a time, trying to adjust in smaller increments it will still show the correct voltage it is outputting but it may not be exactly what you set it for.

For what I do with these and what most of us here would use them for this is already far more accuracy then we need for LED’s.

Honestly the larger inaccuracy comes from cheap test leads / banana plugs. I was getting up to .1v of voltage drop per amp with cheap leads and banana plugs. Upgrading to 14 gauge wire dropped it to around .08v per amp. Using better banana plugs/connectors dropped it down further to around .055v per amp.

Finally I connected it with an XT60 connector, this nets me around .03v of voltage drop per amp. This is about as good as you can get with 14g wire. Direct connecting it was around .25v per amp drop.

I tried some larger 12 gauge wire as a test and it dropped it a bit further but it also was harder to work with so think I am going to stick to 12 gauge. I did make up some 4 gauge leads but I need an XT60 connector to plug them in.

For high current work good test leads are key and this is not an issue with the power supply itself, simply an issue with dealing with higher currents.

Also an example of why all the OEM flashlights are in series battery config, higher voltage is easy compared to high amperage.

LOL, you’re promoting these ‘budget’ power items but you have a fluke! I have one of those cheap and nasty yellow DMM’s. I had 2 but the battery went flat in one and when I replaced the battery it still didn’t work. It took a few minutes to work out the + and - terminals had been labelled incorrectly :rage:

^
I think TA is more just alerting us to what he feels is a good deal for decent equipment that is being sold by it’s own designer. Hopefully, that means the price is low, but the equipment is not cheap. Plus it should have better customer support with trouble shooting and such.

Order place for a 5015. Still not sure what I what I will power it with yet.

Not totally sure what a fluke multimeter has to do with a power supply? They are completely different devices. The power supply outputs power, the fluke multimeter reads how much it is outputting.

FYI, I picked up my flukes for $10 each from a garage sale (well I had another one from a pawn shop for $18 but I sold that one to pay for the rest, so I actually ended up with the ones I kept for free lol).

That said I actually prefer my UT139C over the flukes unless I am dealing with really high voltage (like over 220v mains), over that and the fluke does have better protection. Under that the UT139C is more accurate, more features and easier to use IMO. The price is great for a nice multimeter, think I paid around $35 for mine.

The funny thing is that I still end up using my harbor fright free multimeters the most. They are simple, quick and I don’t care about them. So I generally just grab one of those (calibrated with my other ones so it is actually quite accurate) and do what I need to do. Only when I need precision or features do I grab the UT139C.

Exactly, I have no connection with these power supplies other then having talked to the designer a few times about possible future features.

After having searched high and low for an adjustable power supply that would handle the high currents that LED’s need and finding nothing in the sub $50 range, I figured there might be others in my shoes.

Having used these for a month or 2 and them working flawlessly I figured they had proved themselves to me enough to let some others know about them.

I was not sure what I would do with them besides using them to test LED’s at first but since I got them I keep finding more and more uses for them. It is nice for testing all sorts of electronics. Also nice for electroplating, making colloidal silver, anodizing among other things I could not do before.

In our case, if you get the 5015 you can use it as a 15 amp (with a fan blowing over it) capable battery charger (obviously you would want a few batteries in parallel if charging at full current). I use it for fast charging sometimes although my B6 works fine for that as well if I just put 2 cells on it.

It is nice for battery recovery as well, if you have really discharged cells you want to hit them with really low currents (under 50-100ma per cell) till around 3.5V, then slowly increase the current from there. This is much easier to control with a power supply them my charger at low currents.

I went ahead and ordered me a DPS5015. I’m a sucker for a good deal.