I did get the 36" heatsink from heatsink USA. The rest of the parts I got from ledgroupbuy.com because I didnt want to wait for shipping from china. So far I am only running 15 LED's in parallel about 4 inches apart. They are running off a 52w dimmable Inventronics driver at a full 1.05A. I can easily add another 15 if needed but at this rate my overwintering plants are almost growing to fast. The reason for the 2 fans is that I am running these LED's at just about peek power. I want to make sure they woudnt burn out. However they probably dont even need to be there. I'm just an IT guy with lots of spare parts so I figured dual fans why not! The stand I made is from left over server rack pieces and screws mounted on some wooden legs from an old table. The best part is I actually made it adjustible so It can be raised up to accomodate growth.N8thaniel said:
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HOW TO BUILD AN LED GROWLIGHT
- Thread starter N8thaniel
- Start date
You know some of you pepper growers would make excellent Cannabis growers. Knowledge of proper lighting, good seeds, and soil mixture is very important with that plant as well.
I'd like to THANK everyone for sharing their LED knowledge. AWESOME topic and information!!!
N8thaniel said:
Finally made up my mind and ordered another vero29 (4000k to reach out in the blue spectrum a little more) with heatsink and 5v fan. Got a 36v 72w constant current driver from dealxtreme.
Should help the plants grow a little more. Iam planning on running this cob on a different timer, so that the blue (4000k) light turns on, then a few hours later the other timer turns on my 2 vero29 3000k, then they turn off and the blue is on a another 2 hours. To stimulate real daylight. Interested to see how the plants will react...
Going to grow peppers and probably tomatoes indoors all season in a 4x4 tent. Mainly I want to experiment with different hydro systems just for fun.
A bit torn on lights but very much leaning towards a DIY LED system atm.
Looking at the mammoth in this thread but I guess I will probably need to expand on it a little to fit my area.
Couple of questions. I'm a truly lazy person and my peppers will be at different grow stages so I pretty much want to just keep my light at one position high enough for the plants to fully grow. Am I fooling myself or can this be done? I.e. will there be enough light several feet (5 at most) from the LEDs?
Are the vero13s the best bang for the buck or should I go with bigger COBs?
Are there Chinese suppliers for the entire shopping cart in the mammoth? Don't care much for the 25% extra tax I will have to pay on top of the digikey amount. Shipping form China typically seem to let me avoid paying taxes and I don't mind the wait.
A bit torn on lights but very much leaning towards a DIY LED system atm.
Looking at the mammoth in this thread but I guess I will probably need to expand on it a little to fit my area.
Couple of questions. I'm a truly lazy person and my peppers will be at different grow stages so I pretty much want to just keep my light at one position high enough for the plants to fully grow. Am I fooling myself or can this be done? I.e. will there be enough light several feet (5 at most) from the LEDs?
Are the vero13s the best bang for the buck or should I go with bigger COBs?
Are there Chinese suppliers for the entire shopping cart in the mammoth? Don't care much for the 25% extra tax I will have to pay on top of the digikey amount. Shipping form China typically seem to let me avoid paying taxes and I don't mind the wait.
Great thread:-) When I got my led panel a few years ago some of the panels could cause burning of the plants. So the company sent out these parts to lower the power from 290 to 180 watts.
My panel works great so I never switched out parts. I still have these,new.
I have 5 of them,what exactly are they?
My panel works great so I never switched out parts. I still have these,new.
I have 5 of them,what exactly are they?
Flaming Youth said:Great thread:-) When I got my led panel a few years ago some of the panels could cause burning of the plants. So the company sent out these parts to lower the power from 290 to 180 watts.
My panel works great so I never switched out parts. I still have these,new.
I have 5 of them,what exactly are they?
the are drivers-ballests for leds
i guess they run at a lower current than u have now
Could I use these in a diy project?
N8thaniel said:
Thanks for the info!
Will the heat sinks from fastech really be enough for the cxa2530s? I figure I would drive them with higher amps as well (around 600mA?). I could of course drive them with the 300mA driver but that seems like a waste of their potential.
Seems like heat sinks and appropriate drivers will be what I would need to hunt for.
Raising the plants would be an option but they will be in hydro systems that will be quite hard to move from the floor (at least if I want to move them during the grow). So it will be easier to move the lights
Since this is just for fun I can just test things and see how it works out. If more light is needed I will have to face the music and ensure I can move them (*cry*).Nizztos said:
Thanks for the info!
Will the heat sinks from fastech really be enough for the cxa2530s? I figure I would drive them with higher amps as well (around 600mA?). I could of course drive them with the 300mA driver but that seems like a waste of their potential.
Seems like heat sinks and appropriate drivers will be what I would need to hunt for.
Raising the plants would be an option but they will be in hydro systems that will be quite hard to move from the floor (at least if I want to move them during the grow). So it will be easier to move the lights
the heatsinks from fastech will work on a single cxa2530 up to about 500mA
if you want to run them harder i suggest you combine those sinks into one loner one and attactch a fan or look for other sink options
you could put a single cob at 900mA on that sink with a fan
https://www.fasttech.com/products/1612/10008212/1734700
aliexpress has a few sinks if u look
Flaming Youth said:
yes although without knowing the current and voltage output it will be tricky to match to chips
An option for heat sinks would be a CPU-cooler with fan. Is there a resource somewhere where one can see what size/type CPU-cooler can be used for a particular LED?
I know the cheap coolers/fans are risky (fan failure) but replacing failing LEDs, if the fan fails, is not that expensive compared to other parts.
I know the cheap coolers/fans are risky (fan failure) but replacing failing LEDs, if the fan fails, is not that expensive compared to other parts.
CPU coolers normally have a max wattage rating. Even a relatively cheap one like an arctic 11 is rated up to 85w.Nizztos said:
I lucked out. A local store had the 70W versions of the Arctic for sale so ordered 10 at around $60 shipping included.
Have had a really hard time deciding how to build the rest of the system though but then I found out about http://pct.cree.com/dt/index.html
Had a bit of an epiphany and came up with this:
Will buy the 2530s from fastech and the cheap 300mA driver, also fastech, mentioned earlier in this thread. Under driving them like that will give me about 15k lumens (I think the COBs might have been T2s). I will use alu L-profiles to connect the coolers in pairs (maybe a foot between them) and get adjustable hanging thingies. Anyone know a good source? The ones I have seen are not all that expensive but needing 20 of them it adds up and I don't know what they are called so having a hard time searching for them.
With this system I can then just change the drivers later on to get up to 50k lumens (albeit at poor performance). It will also be easy to upgrade COBs as the next step. The only disadvantage is that it doesn't lend itself to using drivers that drive more than two COBs altough that is mainly a matter of aesthetics when running the cables as I could connect one driver to multiple "fixtures".
Yet to figure out how to drive the fans and how to fasten the COBs to the sinks. Driving the fans will be trivial I just need to decide on a driver. For the COBs I'm thinking of using tape. Anyone know the name of the type of tape I need?
Anyone with more experience have a suggestion on a change I should do in that setup (provided the description was clear enough)?
Have had a really hard time deciding how to build the rest of the system though but then I found out about http://pct.cree.com/dt/index.html
Had a bit of an epiphany and came up with this:
Will buy the 2530s from fastech and the cheap 300mA driver, also fastech, mentioned earlier in this thread. Under driving them like that will give me about 15k lumens (I think the COBs might have been T2s). I will use alu L-profiles to connect the coolers in pairs (maybe a foot between them) and get adjustable hanging thingies. Anyone know a good source? The ones I have seen are not all that expensive but needing 20 of them it adds up and I don't know what they are called so having a hard time searching for them.
With this system I can then just change the drivers later on to get up to 50k lumens (albeit at poor performance). It will also be easy to upgrade COBs as the next step. The only disadvantage is that it doesn't lend itself to using drivers that drive more than two COBs altough that is mainly a matter of aesthetics when running the cables as I could connect one driver to multiple "fixtures".
Yet to figure out how to drive the fans and how to fasten the COBs to the sinks. Driving the fans will be trivial I just need to decide on a driver. For the COBs I'm thinking of using tape. Anyone know the name of the type of tape I need?
Anyone with more experience have a suggestion on a change I should do in that setup (provided the description was clear enough)?
N8thaniel said:
They might be overkill but it was actually the least expensive option for me.
Even with the low amperage I will be using I don't think I can run them passive but at least they give me room to grow
Not so sure I liked the options on the 2530s though. Made it much harder to decide for me (for some reason I wanted just one type) and the 4000k was a worse bin than the 3000k. Ended up with 4000k anyway as I plan to also grow some lettuce under the same ligth.