COB LED DIY Build Journal

PDX Joe said:

Thanks for the tip. This was my pre solder mockup. The soldering went well and I got good solder coverage across the entire wire connection.

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I feel like i should use diffusers in my angelinas.

I finished wiring and fired it up and... it works! Hot damn. Wow, it's bright. I blinded myself a little bit when I turned it on. I had the potentiometer on low and it still surprised me. This photo is with the fixture dimmed to 10%.

With the fixture turned up all the way it is drawing 285 watts and 2.37 amps at the wall. Dimmed down to the lowest setting it is drawing 36.3 watts and .36 amps at the wall.

good lookin light joe,nice clean wiring job to.need to get you to wire up my stuff ,im sloppy but it works lol

Ya I run mine at 1750 too. It is very bright indeed.

sixstring2112 said:

good lookin light joe,nice clean wiring job to.need to get you to wire up my stuff ,im sloppy but it works lol

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Thanks, I'm a bit of a neat freak.

I wired up my Soler Palau TD-100XS at the lower 100 CFM setting. It works and seems very quiet. I need to install that and my carbon filter before I hang my grow light. But, it will be nice to actually get the grow light up and hanging in the closet. It will be great to see how bright the closet is with the reflective walls. The goal is to be up and growing by the fall.

Awesome build man. I pulled a couple ideas from this for a future build. Thanks for sharing!

HydroRed said:

Awesome build man. I pulled a couple ideas from this for a future build. Thanks for sharing!

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Cool, I'm glad I could contribute in some way. I know I'm just doing the basics that I learned from all the other builders here that are much more advanced. But, I think I bring a good eye for design and my work is fairly well crafted. Okay, that was my small brag. I think I will now start a grow closet thread and document putting that together. I have a couple modest ideas for setting it up.

And here is the fixture with the cover attached and ready to go. It's sort of neat to look through the ventilation holes and see the COB reflectors glowing in there. I'm also getting good air flow through these perforations.

Definitely looks pro joe i would think you bought that from a commercial production co if i hadn't seen it from the start.nice fuckin work man

PDX Joe said:

And here is the fixture with the cover attached and ready to go. It's sort of neat to look through the ventilation holes and see the COB reflectors glowing in there. I'm also getting good air flow through these perforations.View attachment 3760712

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Dude fuckin sick job on that perforating. It looks so nice. I'm glad it helped!

Sweet job buddy. The drilled vent hole arrangement is a dream. Well done.

Looks really nice!

Have you tested with a heat gun the surface of the cobs when running for awhile to see what the temps are at different amp settings?

Uberknot said:

Looks really nice!

Have you tested with a heat gun the surface of the cobs when running for awhile to see what the temps are at different amp settings?

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That's a good idea. I don't have a heat gun, but will get one once I get the closet up and running and I will do some test runs on everything to dial in the climate. This will definitely be good to know. Hopefully I will get a little bit of heat from the light. I'm growing in the basement and the average temperature in the fall and winter is around 65 F, so I want the light to raise the temperature a little bit. Worst case is I do have a wall heater in the basement and can raise the overall temperature that way if needed.

Once I get the light hung up, I might run it for a day and get a sense of how warm the light gets.

PDX Joe said:

That's a good idea. I don't have a heat gun, but will get one once I get the closet up and running and I will do some test runs on everything to dial in the climate. This will definitely be good to know. Hopefully I will get a little bit of heat from the light. I'm growing in the basement and the average temperature in the fall and winter is around 65 F, so I want the light to raise the temperature a little bit. Worst case is I do have a wall heater in the basement and can raise the overall temperature that way if needed.

Once I get the light hung up, I might run it for a day and get a sense of how warm the light gets.

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You're running those cobs hard as fuck. I would be very surprised if it did raise temps.

Airwalker16 said:

You're running those cobs hard as fuck. I would be very surprised if it did raise temps.

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I assume you mean it will raise temperatures?

Ya, your gonna get some nice ambient heat from it. Likely to put you right in your temperature "sweet spot" in the cooler basement temps. The light came out pro man. Looks very clean -Well done!

I hung up the fixture and installed my ventilation system.

Okay, I need some help with my climate control and ventilation. I've fired up the COB grow light in the closet and have been running the oscillating fan and the inline fan and taking temperature readings in the closet and outside the closet. The closet is running a bit too hot at around 85F degrees with the intake air at 71F degrees. So a temperature difference of around 14 degrees.

I also took temperature readings with the carbon filter removed and temps were around 79F degrees in the closet and a temperature difference of around 8 degrees between the closet and the room. So it seems I'm getting too much resistance from the carbon filter and not enough draw from the fan.

Here is a sketch of the setup. I'm wondering if I should go with a larger carbon filter, or go with a more powerful fan and larger carbon filter, or maybe even upgrade to a 6" fan and larger filter? Does anyone have any thoughts? I'm assuming a good grow temperature would be around 80F for LED growing.