Now here is an interesting lamp: I got this on eBay It seemed unusually cheap, but it turns out that the listings that have more sales, the price has gone up, so it's obviously aiming to get feedback and then the price goes up according to the band. And it's made by a company called Sansi. It's an LED lamp, but the most interesting thing is it has a ceramic substrate and I was thinking initially that you know they were just basically it was hype. But no, it's a very interesting lamp that looks as though as though is designed for long life.

and they've got loads of other types of Lights designed for the hydroponic industry and For Colored illumination that use a similar approach of the ceramic but interesting shapes of ceramic. I've ordered more lights, it's got loads of ventilation and I don't know if you're going to see this I'll pop the lid off anyway. I Don't know if you're going to see what's in there, but there's a big fat capacitor in there. like really ridiculously big capacitor.

And looking through, the Gorilla is only rated 3.3 microfarad at 400 volts, but it's enormous. much bigger than normal, suggesting this is actually designed to last a long time. supposed time will tell. Here is my Chinese lamp tester: I shall move that little thing at the way before Avalanches onto the bench.

Let's turn the power on and stuff it into the holder. so it is code white and is displaying uh 14 .7 Watts quite bright I Have to say it is cold White uh, 5000 degrees Kelvin I think it is sansi dots in the vision 5000k 1 600 lumens Let's put this over the way and see if we can open it. This is where things are going to get tricky because uh, the the plastic cover on the front that holds it together has been pushed down through the cover and it really it. I think it's a one minute trip I Don't think this is going to come out easily or that is very flexible plastic.

so I'm going to try and get that under there. This is not going to come out easily is it? And also they've got a little lip here to stop. you're getting down under here. This is going to be destructive I think I'm gonna have to dremel this off I will Dremel it off one moment please.

The Dremeling has been done. Let's uh, go inside. It's worth mentioning they really don't want this coming out. The little tabs in there also have ratchet uh bits on them so it really doesn't come out.

so hopefully now this should be ready to undo. Is that glue as well? Or is it just because it's stuck with me Dremeling I Think it's just because it's with me dreaming. Here is the ceramic insert. Let me Zoom down this just so we can see see it closer.

Um, if I take this off and I reach in and snip those wires in there, we can get this out closer. I Will probably take a picture of it so we can take a closer look. Things worthy of note though: this is ceramic, but they've actually got tracks on it. Interesting.

They've got a layer. Is this printed ink? That would make sense because I'll take a picture of this. But look at this capacitor that is 3.3 microfarad. 400 volts.

Oh, is it 33 megaforad? It's 33 megafied four and volt. That's why it's uh, so big. That explains it. That's also going to be super unrippilly because that is much higher than average.

It's got two linear current regulator chips, right? Tell you what. I'll take a picture of this and we can examine it closer one moment. please. Reverse engineering is done.

Let's explore. The supply comes on and goes through this. 4.7 Ohm resistor turbo direct fire. We've got the smoothing capacitor off board and then we get the two linear current.

Regulators As expected, the LED configuration is unexpected. There are four sections of LEDs Interestingly, if you look at this strange track here, the Inner Circle jumps out that Led and then back in again. and it also does it over here to allow for the difference in number of LEDs around the diameter. So they all have the same number of LEDs and there are effectively four circuits.

Um, the material itself. the ceramic. It's unusually thick I wonder why they made it so thick? I Should Zoom down onto this shouldn't? I It would be better if I got a little bit closer though it is quite big. Why did they go so thick? Is this for strength? Because normally it's not the mass of a heatsink that matters.

it's actually the surface area of it. But I'm guessing that this is basically just designed to facilitate taking the heat from the LEDs uh quickly and then just give a decent surface here for it to go. Um I'm surprised the weight and thickness I mean this is a chunky, heavy piece of ceramic now. I'm guessing it's alumina ceramic.

It could also be aluminum nitride, but it's not beryllium oxide. but I hope it's not beryllium oxide. There are many. Ceramics You can use the tracks I Don't think they're copper I think these are laser sintered on because that seems to be a common approach in manufacturing where they might possibly put a layer of air, the metalization onto the ceramic, and then selectively fuse it on.

Or they may have a laser beam dancing about and uh, actually inject a thyme spray of the metal particles into it to actually get bonded on. Not sure what approach they use for this. It's quite an odd thing. It's notable that that's probably why I Don't think it's going to be as strong as the copper approach.

and that's possibly why they've added this circuit board here so they can then effectively hand solder on the capacitor, the nice generous capacitor, and the electrical connections. Um, anything else worth mentioning: The programming resistors. They've allowed positions for two. They've also allowed other positions for resistors associated with the Pm2013 chip which, uh, they're not using this instance, but they've included them.

and there's various things about this design that suggests that it is really full-on professional. Really? I Think it really is aiming at the market of high output devices for a Hydroponics and other things. There is a hack you could do to this if you could get access to the PCB to half the power of dissipation and that is just to cut that track there and that would effectively remove one of these. Regulators because the two of them are in parallel.

I Shall show you the schematic and it will clarify the circuitry. I Think I've covered just about everything there. Let's Zoom down This: It is not really that surprising. Um, it's very typical of a linear regulator.

LED Lamp: We've got 4.7 Ohm resistor in Rush limiter and also fusible resistor. We've got the bridge rectifier. We've got that fat Juicy 33 Mega Farad Desk beam 400 volt capacitor and two 240k resistors across. that did I point them out before they are two in series for the correct voltage rating.

Other things worth mentioning: the track has a link across here to jump the negative track over the positive track. They've used a really huge Uh surface mount link to allow a good clear passage underneath to avoid tracking on the circuit board, which is very good professional design. The LEDs there are 17 six chip LEDs I calculated and then tested on the LEDs to make sure it was giving a voltage roughly of about a well. Let's see that would be 100 two LEDs roughly 300 volts across the LEDs and that may sound quite a lot, but keep in mind that on the 220 to 240 Supply that particular lamp, same doubt the voltage will be in the hovering the region of 300 to 300ish volts, so that's acceptable.

but they can fine-tune that by effectively and they do this this in some products, you'll get the six chip for LEDs motion, but then they'll slot in maybe a two or one chip uh package just to actually nudge or tweak the voltage. I Didn't see that obviously, but that didn't measure the voltage across every single LED Uh, the two Regulators are in parallel. The dotted lines here are replicated in this one as well, but the these components are not in use they are for. Let me see if I can find the data sheet for that I'll have to zoom out for this.

This is the PM power microbe um chip and it's basically it's got the two ground connections. it's got the drain for the mosfet inside which is used to control the current through LEDs and then it's got the current sense, but it also has a PCR input the data sheet was in Chinese I Couldn't quite work out what that was four. It was a bit vague. a couple of resistors um, there that they've included the positions for them on the circuit board but not use them, but it looks as though it may be for controlling the current sense.

You can dim it or control step up and down I'm not sure it seems to be an extra layer of control in that way, but it was very vague and that is it. So there are two ways you could do with this lamp. You could basically the one I was talking about. there was just cut one of these lines and then that just means it's a single current regulator so it'd be half the power to LEDs and the other is to put the capacitor in series over in the input to dubi.

it usually without discharge resist across it too, but it might not be needed. That would just be for if you wanted some fancible application. You wanted a lamp that lasts forever because this looks pretty robust. Other Advantage is the ceramic are very low thermal efficient coefficient of expansion, which might suit the LEDs better.

Perhaps it doesn't expand much of heat like some of the other materials do, so it may put less stress in the hot LEDs and that is it. It's an interesting lamp, not waterproof in any stretched imagination. I Wonder how absorbent this ceramic would be? a moisture? not sure, but tons of ventilation. That's kind of why it's not going to be great for a waterproof applications, not the many lamb syrup or for student lighting.

And when this is on and sandwiches down onto the circuit board, it's got this port through the middle for ventilation for air to basically flow in from the bottom and out here, or vice versa depending on its orientation. So it does look like it's designed for good insulation with this ceramic and also for a good thermal dissipation. although it does basically I Don't think it couples well onto the plastic case, it is relying purely on the heat flowing around the ceramic substrate. But that is a very, very interesting lamp.

It's not one I've seen before. Very impressive. Very neat indeed.