# red,yellow, and purple led spotlights not working right



## runeNvash (Aug 8, 2012)

not sure if anyone can help me with this but i figured it wouldnt hurt to just ask. we have some led spotlights we made a few years ago and some of them are not shining bright and when i shine them on a tombstone you can see these rings of light basically its not a smooth color of light and it doesnt cover the whole tombstone in light, it just does a small circle of light. all of our blue and green leds work perfectly but our yellows,reds, and purples dont. 
they came from the same place we got the blue and green leds(in fact got them all at the same time). so why is it that only those colors are doing it. do we need to replace the resistors? is it the bulbs? is it something else? they might have been doing this last year as well but im sure they werent doing this the first year we used them or we would have fixed it right away. 
also these are the clear bulbs not the colored ones though we do have a few of them giving us the same issue. ill try and get a picture of it later but not sure if it will show up. we also cleaned the bulbs to see if that was the issue but it didnt help any.


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## The Pod (Sep 15, 2009)

First off, Greens tend to be extremely bright when it comes to LEDs followed by blue. Purple tends to be more toward the ultraviolet side of the light spectrum and doesn't throw off as much light output. Reds and yellows are on the other end of the spectrum and again, don't throw off as much light. See what the LUM factor is for each LED your using.

You say you "made these", so my question is are they 100% waterproof? I made some pin spots using standard LEDs and the first year they worked great, the following year I started having issues. Tearing one apart, I found moisture had gotten inside and started to corrode/rust the anode and cathodes of the LEDs causing some to not be as bright and some not to work at all.


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## goneferal (Sep 8, 2010)

The Pod said:


> First off, Greens tend to be extremely bright when it comes to LEDs followed by blue. Purple tends to be more toward the ultraviolet side of the light spectrum and doesn't throw off as much light output. Reds and yellows are on the other end of the spectrum and again, don't throw off as much light. See what the LUM factor is for each LED your using.
> 
> You say you "made these", so my question is are they 100% waterproof? I made some pin spots using standard LEDs and the first year they worked great, the following year I started having issues. Tearing one apart, I found moisture had gotten inside and started to corrode/rust the anode and cathodes of the LEDs causing some to not be as bright and some not to work at all.


This pretty much sums up what my first thoughts were.


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## heresjohnny (Feb 15, 2006)

Really stupid question, have you tried a fresh battery (assuming they are battery powered)?


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## runeNvash (Aug 8, 2012)

they are not battery powered.
could you show me a picture of what a red/yellow led spotlight is supposed to be like?


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## runeNvash (Aug 8, 2012)

if it was a water proofing thing what would need to be replaced to fix it? or is the whole thing ruined? i tried to get pictures of it but it doesnt show up in pictures like it does in real life.


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## runeNvash (Aug 8, 2012)

The Pod said:


> First off, Greens tend to be extremely bright when it comes to LEDs followed by blue. Purple tends to be more toward the ultraviolet side of the light spectrum and doesn't throw off as much light output. Reds and yellows are on the other end of the spectrum and again, don't throw off as much light. See what the LUM factor is for each LED your using.
> 
> You say you "made these", so my question is are they 100% waterproof? I made some pin spots using standard LEDs and the first year they worked great, the following year I started having issues. Tearing one apart, I found moisture had gotten inside and started to corrode/rust the anode and cathodes of the LEDs causing some to not be as bright and some not to work at all.


my dad says the anode and cathodes were fine and had no rust on them when he looked at it. but we did have to replace the resistors on them because they had rusted and wouldnt work. now they work but it did nothing to fix the brightness of the light.


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## niblique71 (Dec 2, 2009)

It would help if you let us know who's tutorial you followed. If it was mine, I might have some insight... Otherwise you might get a good response from others based on how they were built..

I must say that my spotlights have been stellar for the most part. BUT I have noticed some small issues which I have been addressing for my future "Ultimate LED Spotlight tutorial" due in 2015. I am curious so I can better my techniques even if your build wasn't based on my tutorial. I am Now up to 200 or so and I only had problems with the pink colors consistently. 

No More Pink....


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## runeNvash (Aug 8, 2012)

yes it was your tutorial we followed.


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## niblique71 (Dec 2, 2009)

I try to protect everything with hot glue after soldering except for the resistor which needs to expel heat... Did you do that???? Also I have found the foreign LED's aren't as tolerant of the minimal resistor value. it's best to go for the next higher resistor value if there is a doubt. Also, If you have a few cold solder joints this will also result in a "Dimming" of the LED...


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## niblique71 (Dec 2, 2009)

Also did you check your resistor values??? I never trust that get what I order when getting an order from overseas..


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## runeNvash (Aug 8, 2012)

yes everything that is supposed to be covered in hot glue is covered. i dont think cold solder joints are the issue because it would have been fixed on the couple we had to fix. we will look into that other stuff this weekend.


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## goneferal (Sep 8, 2010)

I also use liquid electric tape from haunt depot for some extra protection to keep water out. Don't use it in the house though, the fumes are horrible.


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