Lighting My DIY COB Setup (in the making)...

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Yea if you wanna PM me your address I will send a couple over to test...i bought 10 of one type and 8 of the other type...but they look like they are exactly the same so dont know how or why they differ...the 18 holders cost me £9.04 and the shipping was £12 on top...so it made them fucking expensive!

this is the slightly cheaper one...

http://eu.mouser.com/search/ProductDetail.aspx?r=571-2-2154857-3

 

[Doo-flop]

Yea if you wanna PM me your address I will send a couple over to test...i bought 10 of one type and 8 of the other type...but they look like they are exactly the same so dont know how or why they differ...the 18 holders cost me £9.04 and the shipping was £12 on top...so it made them fucking expensive!

this is the slightly cheaper one...

http://eu.mouser.com/search/ProductDetail.aspx?r=571-2-2154857-3

Thanks, I've sent u a pm


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[BigSm0]

Shit shit shit how did I miss this!? I have some reading to do

 

[BigSm0]

thanks! ive only done 2 grows so far so im pretty new to it all, but this builds been driven by the sheer amount of heat given off from a HPS/MH light that i can really do without!

i have to run a 250W light in my 0.8x0.8 tent with a 5" fan and the temps are kept respectable and around 26/27°C but my issue is that the 250W light barely seems to cover 4 small plants...im hoping with this COB i can cover the entire tent have good coverage and some slightly larger plants in there without sacrificing the heat for light....from the calculations its going to give me the same output as a 400W hid but with a better spread and hopefully more usable wavelengths of light etc...

Are you using COB's to grow at the moment? If so how do you think they compare? From a bit of googling/youtube people are easily getting buds as dense and the same quality to traditional HID setups which made me stay clear of MAR's lights unfortunately...i couldnt justify the 2-300 pounds on one when they seem to get very mixed reviews in comparison to the COB's...

I have constructed the entire frame and drilled my heatsinks so far I just need to attach the COB's to the heatshinks and wire it all up...I have some additional photos I will upload tonight I think...I will also include my drilling template for my holders for people to use if they want it

Im moving at the end of Dec/Beginning of Jan so will have it up and running for then 100%. Im excited to see how it compares myself!

I have some more reading to do but wanted to reply. This build looks amazing and you will be nothing short of flawed when you see them in action. I have set a goal for next crop to hit 2gpw. Very possible with photos but a difficult task with autos. That's how much confidence I have in them. I currently pull 1.5 in pretty much all my cob grows with great quality. I also sell a specific style light locally which has been a major success. 200-300 cobs on the bench at all times. Only because they work.

 

[Site]

I have some more reading to do but wanted to reply. This build looks amazing and you will be nothing short of flawed when you see them in action. I have set a goal for next crop to hit 2gpw. Very possible with photos but a difficult task with autos. That's how much confidence I have in them. I currently pull 1.5 in pretty much all my cob grows with great quality. I also sell a specific style light locally which has been a major success. 200-300 cobs on the bench at all times. Only because they work.

Thanks for the reply! Yea ive been using the MH/HPS at the moment, ive only grown twice and it was autos...ive been impressed but ive made some new comer mistakes with it but now i know whats gone wrong I think the next grow I do should be so much better....been a good learning curve! So im hoping instead of being able to use a 250W due to temps, using this COB setup it should kill my tent with light...or so I hope! I was nearly tempted to add a few more COB's in to match a 600W and really pack the tent out but decided the same Lumen output as a 400W is probably sensible for the time being...the 2gpw is what made me really consider a DIY COB build over buying cheap LED like mars etc...all the grows ive seen its easily achieving this goal or at least 1.5gpw which is much better than what im doing now...my last grow of 4 autos under the 250W light yielded around 4oz which i was really happyu with but it only works out at 0.45gpw which isnt the best really...i would like to be able to put a few extra plants in, or just grow some bigger autos where they will have plenty more light to hand...

what brand of COB's are you using at the moment? I only went with CREE due to the much higher efficiency over the Citizens...and as the COB/LED setups are all about efficiency I decided theres not much point in having somethign which is 40-50% efficienct even if it does outdo the HPS/MH still...thought it was worth spending the extra bit of cash to buy more COB's but drive them at a lower current...

appreciate the kind words though, I am literally so excited to move and get this going now...fortunately Ive got some nice blue kush to keep me busy for a few months now

 

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I also forgot to add i dont believe the yield of each plant will be significantly better through the use of COBs over the hps/mh but its more the efficiencies of them which give the gram per watt...which is where i think a lot of people get muddled up and dont believe/understand the benefots....to match a 250W light it would probably be a 120W draw from the wall which would have given me easily 1gram per watt and thats a second grow with tonnes of mistakes (soil ph dropped to around 3/3.5 for a week on some 9week autos which really stunted them...

 

[BigSm0]

There are discrepancies between the citizen and Cree calculators. I follow a guy very closely who is absolutely nuts about citizens and he has disected just about every angle of both cobs. In the end Cree and citizen are close but citizen does had a slight advantage even with the middle of the road cobs. Price is much better too. Either way Cree has a phenomenal product.

Yes your right about the gpw and that being so important but don't think individual plants won't do just as well or better than hps. I have pulled well over 1/2 lb autos from cobs and do that regularly. Their efficiency is through the roof but they also have the power. I know a guy who had a full hps room and is just finished swapping them all out for cobs. I too have built hundreds of lights and I hear nothing but positive feedback from new growers as well as experienced hps guys. I still have catching up to do on your build. It really does look amazing.

 

[Site]

I wonder if the efficiencies are wrong in the calculator then, if they were in the 60's i would 100% be going with them just for the cost factor...im still a tad dubious of my calcs as it said its only emitting 37,000 lumens and companies claim ther 400W HID's have 50,000 lumens but im not sure how this will actually compare...i thought 8 cobs at 700ma would have been plenty! either way the ppfd is at 750 so im hoping that will do the job in my tent...if not i might add a few extra cobs and individual drivers and possibly have a VEG function built in so i can run 4 COBs at 5k or something just to veg then have this setup for flower...will just wait and see how the first grow goes though i suppose...

Let me know if theres anything you spot when having a read through that you think could be improved

 

[BigSm0]

I think you will be just fine with what you have hanging. 8 cobs will do much better than 4 with twice the wattage.

 

[BigSm0]

This is a chart I found from cobkits

they are all very close at the wattage we run them at