Graytail's 3rd: 4x4, HiBrix, Latest LED Tech, Lots Of Light!

[Graytail]

I have some Purple Haze regs, along with Golden Tigers, so I can start enough of those to get a girl, and I have Caribe, Panama, Strawberry Blue, Carnival, and some others. I have three more Rio seeds so I could try another one of those. I lost the clones for CarnA and DrG, so I want to try to reveg them in the veg space while it's open ...

Yesterday, I read back through the last couple months of this journal and that helped a lot. I do grow better plants than these. We're just at the peak of the annual whitefly boom is all. The plants I start now should flourish through Spring and finish June through July, just before the worst of the heat hits.

 

[SmokeyMcFly]

Have you tried Strawberry Blue yet GT? I have a couple freebies of it I almost started last night but wasn't sure so I went with Kali China x PCK instead.

Plants look great hope you can get those flies killed off, living in the desert has it's benefits and the lack of bugs is one of the best of them

 

[Graytail]

Have you tried Strawberry Blue yet GT? I have a couple freebies of it I almost started last night but wasn't sure so I went with Kali China x PCK instead.

Plants look great hope you can get those flies killed off, living in the desert has it's benefits and the lack of bugs is one of the best of them

I've had the freebie for awhile but never fit it into the schedule. A few growers have run it and they all liked it, so this time it gets its chance.


[Edit] I just remembered that recent DrG x Rio seed I found ... I'll hafta run that fer shure ...

 

[HealthyToker]

Always a true joy to stop in and check out your Monday updates. Glad to hear that you pushed on through the bug problems and your own down turn in motivation, we all love what you show us! Way to persevere and keep them ladies chugging along...

Keep em green and sticky

 

[Conradino23]

And did you take Brix reading of the infected plants?

 

[Major PITA]

Beautiful as always, GT!
I hope you find your happy place in the grow room. I can imagine the bugs and all that trimming would get old. I know the mites piss me off and affects the joy I get from working with the plants.

 

[brightlight]

Thanks for regular Monday show....always great to see. Good to hear the white flies are losing the battle. Yeah as much as we love our hobby a short break can be refreshing.

 

[Graytail]

Thnks, all you 420 members!

And did you take Brix reading of the infected plants?

I tried my best to get a valid reading on Grieg1 but failed - too much bug crap - the initial pressing got me a high reading off the scale. So I thoroughly washed a bud and tried that and got 7s, probably because of the pores absorbing water in the wash. I could have tried letting it dry more, but what precisely is the correct dryness? The stem had already been severed and the bud would simply continue to lose moisture. As the hours passed, Brix would rise as the bud dried out. No good.

The Grieg1 smokes very smoothly though, so I suspect Brix is fairly high.

 

[Duggan]

Top of the day to ya Gray...another cool update. Not sure of the strain but , the one pic there , with the tops almost EXACTLY the same height. This is free hand people ,..no net , no strings, just skill. Very nice job indeed!
Sure will be nice to be rid of those flies i bet. Anyhow , cheers Gray.

 

[DrZiggy]

GT incredible entry for NOTM!... good luck!

 

[SmokeyMcFly]

I've had the freebie for awhile but never fit it into the schedule. A few growers have run it and they all liked it, so this time it gets its chance.


[Edit] I just remembered that recent DrG x Rio seed I found ... I'll hafta run that fer shure ...

Sweet thanks, I will be watching as always, hope it's a winner

 

[Graytail]

For a few month now I've been toying around with ideas for a white COB design for the bloom room. I've always liked the idea of widely dispersed lights all over the ceiling instead of a few concentrated panels. At one time I thought it might be nice to spread 5 watt LEDs uniformly over the 4x4 space. But that's a lot of soldering! The newer Cree and Vero white COBs have also been interesting and I've spent a lot of time getting a feel for them, reading as much useful stuff as I could until I think I finally have a grip on them. The Crees have an advantage in efficiency and the Veros have an advantage in cost and convenience. The model most people are excited about right now is the Cree CXB3590 which pretty much blows the competition away in efficiency. You can run them very soft at 35 watts or less, or you can run them hard at 100+ watts, and their PAR/watt will be better than most any other source. But those suckers are $50+ a pop! I want 800 watts worth and that'd cost me $500-$1500 just for the COBs, and the $500 would only get me enough for a 3x3 pattern - 9 in all. I don't get the diffusion I want with nine 100W lamps.

But I hadn't looked into the Vero line or any of the older COB chips by either company, and in searching the pricing I discovered that Vero13s can be had for $6 each. MUCH better! It's an older design and not as efficient, but I can run them at 700 milliamps for 23 watts each, and 41 of them only cost $250!



I can combine them into 5 panels and cover the ceiling uniformly. I took a screen shot of some of the spreadsheet I've been playing with:

Cool, huh?

 

[SweetSue]

Definitely cool. Do it Graytail! What a sight that'd be. You'd have a blast playing with it.

 

[Radogast]

Very nice tiling of the 9,8,7 COB panels. Only 2-4" gaps to align with the 44" panels.

You have the right brain to make this idea work very well.

Are you able to get the results you need without diffusion domes? Or are they part of the Vero 13 units.

 

[Graytail]

And I can get the COBs right up snug against the walls at 3-4 inches away - a two inch gap at the wall plus another 1.00 inch to 1.75 inches from the edge of the heatsink.

If I understand it right, the LES chips are 150+ degrees wide by themselves, on a parabolic intensity curve. They add the lenses to focus them - always seemed backwards to me - I want dispersion.

I'd like to use some domes, but only clear glass ones to protect from foliar sprays. Or ... at $6 a pop for the COBs, I might just decide to skip the protection. Gotta either tap holes to attach them or find some other method - might be more trouble than it's worth.

 

[Stage]

GT,
I do love your idea. I believe, COB tech is the future. DIY COB tech especially. Rock on Bruddah.

 

[Major PITA]

I've been very interested in just such a project.
If you decide to do it, I'm all over it.

 

[Graytail]

GT,
I do love your idea. I believe, COB tech is the future. DIY COB tech especially. Rock on Bruddah.

I've been very interested in just such a project.
If you decide to do it, I'm all over it.

And for those readers we never see, this design with the solid heatsinks and the Veros is super easy to assemble.

The Vero line has a plug-in connector so you don't have to solder a thing! And ... since they're so low-power and cheap, you can just glue 'em on with thermal grease/paste. You don't have to be so careful to get excellent contact with the heatsink by torquing 'em down really tight. You just paste them on and apply pressure with a stack of books or something. No having to tap screw holes in the heatsink - if it fails or you want to replace it, you just scrape the old one off, re-prep the area and paste a new one down.

The solid heatsinks function as a panel - the whole thing hangs from the ceiling with no case or brackets, etc. I've seen other designs that use aluminum L-bar to attach things together. Actually, I saw a good idea that used a large T-bar to hold a row of COBs attached to the bar itself - nice and simple, but you still have to connect all them together, too, or individually hang them - lots of drilling and bolting. And since they cover the entire area, these large sinks are bigger than needed and can cool at least 50% more power. Fans are barely necessary. You can get 12v computer case fans for under $5 and drive them with a cheapo 12v wall-plug thingy like we already have all over the house. The Chinese make 'em cheap!

Connecting to the drivers is simple - wire the leads from all the COBs together in series and hook 'em to the driver output. Easy peasy. The Mean Well line is top-notch reliable, and this design leaves them enough headroom so they won't be driven at max.

Ya paste the COBs down, wire 'em up, connect to the Mean Well, attach the fans and wire them to the 12v transformer, hang it up, plug it in, and Bobs yer uncle! No soldering, no screw hole tapping, only some drilled holes for mounting the driver and fans and hanging the sink - it's aluminum - soft - simple.




[Edit] And! ... the drivers and heatsinks are basic foundational stuff. I could mount anything to the sinks in the future, and the drivers will drive any other COB or LED design. It's not really a wasted, faddish investment.

 

[Evo-Rat-93]

Hey Gray , sounds like a great build . Could there possibly be a play by play video . Thanks for all your hard work and sharing .

 

[Graytail]

Hmm ...

I was reading an article about Puerto Rico and their financial crisis, possible bankruptcy, the crash of the economy and the flight of wealth, etc - tough times these days. The article was about the implications of the Presidential election and what it might mean for the future of the commonwealth. They want/need a bankruptcy/bailout of some sort to recover, but their present structure is most of the problem - lots of free stuff for too many cronies - so help has been slow to come. But something will have to be worked out and when that's done, the economic crisis will be followed by a recovery, just like what happened in Florida and Phoenix. The next year or two will be a temporary opportunity for investment.

Last year, Gov. Alejandro Garcia Padilla signed an executive order legalizing medical marijuana, and three days ago he called for full legalization, in part to stimulate the economy.

I checked out real estate prices these days and a 1000+ sqft 3 Bdrm 2 Bath house on a small lot goes for well under $100,000. Prices for rural homes on acreages are similar.

Interesting, no? It could be the kind of place a Northerner always hoped to retire to ... US territory ... nice climate ... much closer than Guam ...