300w DIY LED components and plan in UK

[dadums]

No matter how good your solder joints are, a homemade panel will never look as professional as a mass production unit.[/QUOTE]

That doesn't mean a homemade can't work as good.

 

[wheely]

Thanks, and thanks dadums, ,i read through your stuff too, nice. I also picking up some air pots.

Hosebomber, are you saying, never mind the red and blue, just get XML white? 10 of them running at 75-85%

XMLBWT-00-0000-000LT40E6 Cree, Inc. | Mouser

 

[Magikjuju]

Hi brother can you make any suggestions on lighting up a 4 x 4meter room for veg cycle for least amount of electricity. Im thinking 6 panels with 20 x 10watt cree xml chips on each. So 1200watts for the room . Do you have any suggestions. ?

 

[wheely]

Ive kinda gone off building one from nothing now, and have just bought LED bulbs instead, they are focused and vented. I bought some 6.5w Feit 3000k, put out 350 lumens (not the best) 50watts. The bulbs cost £4-7 depending what you go for and plug straight in, either GU10 or E27 sockets.

Ive also bought some 6 watt red/blue LED combos and added them.

 

[Hosebomber]

Wheely, thats only 53 lumens per watt... you'll get more light from a CFL at that point. I misses you previous post, no I was not saying used only white, just that it would be an easier build to use white XML's rather than the array models.

Magikuju, I answered you in your own post.

 

[sexycybe]

The LED panel I made consisted of
21 x 430-440nm
13 x 450-455nm
4 x 620-630nm
16 x 640-650nm
14 x 660nm
16 x 730nm

They were all 3W and on an aluminium heat sink with a high powered computer fan cooling it.
I also put 30 3W cool white LED's on it.

I wired it up in circuits that the drivers could handle, as they could only handle 28-45V. That meant lines of 8-12 depending on the light i used (as reds used less V than blues).
I used multiple drivers because of this.

Fixed the lights to the panel using high temperature araldite glue. Soldered the lights into circuit using electrical wires.

The next panel i make will have no whites and im going to wire multiple drivers (2-3) to single power chords as i didn't know i could do this.

Start small as it is very hard initially but once you get good at it, go big.

Also order tons of extra LED's, guarantee you will accidentally blow some and its such a hassle to get more!

SxC

 

[wheely]

Thanks guys.
Ye after building a small rig with the 350 lumen bulbs, i realised there wasnt as much light as when i turn a 35w cfl on in there. The light is however much more focused and crisper than the cfls, but they do get hot!.

How many lumens per watt should i be looking to get?

 

[Hosebomber]

Sexycybe, unless you are building a veg panel, I would highly suggest you keep the whites. Lower your blues and 730's a bit as well... Guessing you didn't flower very well with that panel?


Lumens per watt is really only a good measurement for white light (in which case you should be looking for ~120lm/watt or better. Discrete diodes are labeled and binned by radiant flux in most cases. Remember that lumens are skewed to 525nm and the human eye and are a measurement of white light. While they may list lumens per watt on a red or blue diode, it will be a relatively low number as to compared to what you may be expecting.

 

[sexycybe]

Sexycybe, unless you are building a veg panel, I would highly suggest you keep the whites. Lower your blues and 730's a bit as well... Guessing you didn't flower very well with that panel?


Lumens per watt is really only a good measurement for white light (in which case you should be looking for ~120lm/watt or better. Discrete diodes are labeled and binned by radiant flux in most cases. Remember that lumens are skewed to 525nm and the human eye and are a measurement of white light. While they may list lumens per watt on a red or blue diode, it will be a relatively low number as to compared to what you may be expecting.

No i had very good flowering, the colour was more red than blue during flowering as the amount of light emitted by the red LED's were almost double that of the blue. First two weeks of flowering i had all lights on, 3-8 all reds and whites (to save electricity).
Oh woops, the 730's haha only ended up with 6 of them and added 10 other reds, my bad.
The light was increadibly bright, I was very surprised.

 

[SloStoner]

wheely forget about 3w color led's. Go get some cree cxa3070 3000K. This is the best all in one led. run it on 55W and you get a whole LOT of light, wich also has 14% of blue so it is very good to veg and flower with. Google cxa 3070 diy thread and you will find 2 journals with amazing growth and yields. Trust me this led is all you need

 

[Hosebomber]

Yes, with proper intensity light you can grow with just about any light source. The key to LEDs is to use the monochrome diodes to get the highest production with the least amount of energy used. The CXA's are very efficient, but you can get better growth through fewer watts via a mixture of white and monochrome.

 

[SloStoner]

with monochrome you mean led's like deep blue, deep red, etc ?

 

[Hosebomber]

Yes, monochrome means single color.

 

[SloStoner]

what benefits do you get from adding red and far red in flowering?

 

[Hosebomber]

Red increases flowering and hormone production among many other things.

 

[OldnTired]

another great LED thread.
I'm also looking at going LED lighting and I'm currently undecided between a commercial grow light or going DIY.
I have the skills to go DIY but I’m asking the same questions the OP is. Does anyone have some links to journals so we can compare?
DIY vs. Commercial.
If you Google “DIY LED GROW” we get a lot of hits. Some people are going with LED COBs only and some are mixing COBs with discrete single color ones.
Some are mixing different COBs 3000K and 6000K to get a veg/flower light. The basic wiring is easy as there are many examples and you use quality parts.
-Constant current drivers.
-Heat dissipation
CXA3070 are expensive 46.00ea on digikey, how many would I need?
What about using CXA3050 or CXA2530 together?

 

[SloStoner]

hey Oldn, here you have two threads: https://www.--------.org/t/diy-led-cree-cxa3070.789575/
and this one: https://www.--------.org/t/another-cree-cxa3070-diy-thread.824364/

Read those two threads and you will leard all about how to set up a cxa 3070 diy light. Using bigger leds is better because you get more efficacy.

Oh, those threads are located on RIU, to help u find them easier

 

[OldnTired]

Thanks SS, that second thread looks very recent, and a great read.
At over 60.00$ each unit it is worth it to go with the way he did it in thread #2?

 

[SloStoner]

that way; where every cob is on it's own heatsing with fan is very good for smaller grows because you can raise or lower the light according to your plant's height. if you are planning a larger grow then it is better to get long heatisnks and put let's say 3 cob's on each one with one or two fans. I am planning to do the same as the guy did in thread #2 but i will get 4 led's not 6. probably one 5000k and 3x 3000K. this would work best for me because i have a 2x2 growbox, and 200W of led is over the top for that space and i think it would produce some kick a** buddage

 

[dadums]

This is my first run under leds for the whole flower cycle and I can tell a big difference in size and density of the buds.
I really like the tubes for the heat sink the lights only take up a couple of inches from the top of the flower area. This is a
big plus in tight areas. Look at the luxeon es series of leds they are serving me well.