General LED Circuit maths question

Please Help (This will probably be simple for someone.):ironic:

I have 4 cree LEDS in a direct drive circuit, for the sake of this question the LEDs are designed to run in a voltage range of 5v to 6.25v.
(I understand there are a lot of variables etc and with direct drive I can only talk about the point in time that I took measurements)

The battery under load is at around 12.2v (measured parallel with LEDs connected)

The LEDs are wired in a 2S2P configuration.

If I measure the current in the circuit (measured in line at the battery) I get a reading of 2.3A

So according to my maths the total power consumption is 28W

now here is my question...

is each LED using 7w or is each LED using 14w?



The reason I ask is that logic (my logic) says that they are all using 7W but all the data on these LEDs says at around 6.1v they are being driven at approx 2.3A (14w each)


There should be enough there for someone to answer without knowing more about the type of LEDs or the setup but I will expand if it will help
thanks in advance:thumbsup:. (please let me know how sure you are of your answer also)

Alex

power out of the battery must equal power delivered to the load (i.e. LEDs).

Power = voltage x current.
You should be able to check the voltage across each LED and the current through each one.

There will be some voltage drop across your meter when measuring current. You can measure the voltage across the meter with a voltmeter to quantify it.

I'm pretty sure that the LEDs aren't consuming 56 watts if you are measuring 28 watts out of the battery.

Full documentation of the experiment will be needed in order to fully communicate the test details to others. i.e. photos, schematics, datasheets on components, etc.

If the tailcap reading is 2.3A, and you have 2S2P configuration with direct drive, then each LED can only be getting about 1.15A. For each LED to get 2.3A you would have to pull 4.6A from the battery.

As Steve K suggests, the meter in current mode could be introducing enough voltage drop to alter the current substantially. Is the light noticeably dimmer with the meter in series? You have to be careful in answering this because a 30% drop in light is not obvious if you are looking at two lights several minutes apart.