Hi guys, I thought I would share my home built 30W LED COB lights w/ fans. I ordered the COBs from Banggood.com, I picked up the CPU coolers and power supply unit from used computers, and have lots of spare copper wire hanging around. I've spent just over $40 dollars so far to get everything setup which I'm pretty happy with. The LED are full spectrum and my plants are growing normally under the lights with no oddities popping up.Â
The lights require 110VAC, thermal paste and a small active cooler or a large passive array. They don't come soldered and require a heavy duty soldering iron in order to attach the wires. I recommend putting hot glue over the live wires for safety if you're not going to enclose the light.
The CPU cooler needs 12VDC which is easily supplied by the PSU. There's plenty of videos and guides on turning an old computer PSU into a DIY power supply so I won't get into the details of that.
The lights are quite bright for only 30W and provide a very wide cone of unfocused light. While it's not ideal, it works well enough for my application.
A word of Caution to those who might want to build these lights, make sure that the cooler you use is able to dissipate enough heat and that the thermal paste is evenly applied. Otherwise the LEDs on the chip will burn out from over heating. Below is a picture of my 50W LED COB that was under cooled on the corners opposite the screws which resulted in the death of the LEDs. Beyond that the light was running at 90*C constantly which was too hot and the small cooler was unable to keep up.
The lights require 110VAC, thermal paste and a small active cooler or a large passive array. They don't come soldered and require a heavy duty soldering iron in order to attach the wires. I recommend putting hot glue over the live wires for safety if you're not going to enclose the light.
The CPU cooler needs 12VDC which is easily supplied by the PSU. There's plenty of videos and guides on turning an old computer PSU into a DIY power supply so I won't get into the details of that.
The lights are quite bright for only 30W and provide a very wide cone of unfocused light. While it's not ideal, it works well enough for my application.
A word of Caution to those who might want to build these lights, make sure that the cooler you use is able to dissipate enough heat and that the thermal paste is evenly applied. Otherwise the LEDs on the chip will burn out from over heating. Below is a picture of my 50W LED COB that was under cooled on the corners opposite the screws which resulted in the death of the LEDs. Beyond that the light was running at 90*C constantly which was too hot and the small cooler was unable to keep up.
