DIY leds Discussion Thread for all your how tos and doubts and anything related

[Aristoned]

I can't use 2 part epoxies, or I a break out in contact dermatitis for weeks. I'd be gluing fittings in the ends of the square tubes all day long if I wasn't allergic..

I'll know if my new 1000w water cooled induction heater coil makes perfect weld\braze joints for my linear WC'ed strip light blocks ( 1/2 aluminum baluster decking rails, perfect size for bxeb gen 3 slims) soon enough..

Stick the end of the square tube and fitting in the coil, and wazzam! Perfect induction brazed joints.

I was running the 4000K strips @ 20W ea. with nothing more than 1/16” aluminium angle 1” x 1”. Temperatures were fine, with a fan oscillating it made it even better. The strips give us an opportunity to place fans above the luminaires and plants, cooling the strips and circulating air while teasing the stems.

Now, if we could only find a diode that can produce real IR.

 

[Ca++]

Hospital Bracket | Pipe Clips - Thomas Dudley

Brass Hospital Bracket.

www.thomasdudley.co.uk

Solid looking. Cob sized plate on the bottom. Pretty much done (your overdraft)
The hospital saddle has a greater standoff, so we could get pipe insulation in place. Without which, the pipe would be as good a radiator, as our radiator. The hospital saddle is more likely to be solid also. As the idea is no dirt traps.

It would work, but I must keep to that walking away idea. Proper blocks are a couple of dollar, and fuel hose is nice insulation.


Just rubbing my head, over induction coils around lamps. It should be ok, as the lamp should offer it's own magnetic cancellation. I wouldn't couple up lots though, then short it. Best keep them electrically insulated.

 

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I was running the 4000K strips @ 20W ea. with nothing more than 1/16” aluminium angle 1” x 1”. Temperatures were fine, with a fan oscillating it made it even better. The strips give us an opportunity to place fans above the luminaires and plants, cooling the strips and circulating air while teasing the stems.

Now, if we could only find a diode that can produce real IR.

I plan on over driving the piss out of them. I don't want them to last 10 years or more by liquid cooling, because new tech will be out by then, and I'll wanna build something new, lol.

 

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I want my poor mans $1 foreign slave labored & government subsidized 9w LED bulbs on my new veg light fixture to last that long though. They better!

That's why i'm water cooling them with coil wraps next week when my aluminum tubing shows up, haha.

 

[Aristoned]

I want my poor mans $1 foreign slave labored & government subsidized 9w LED bulbs on my new veg light fixture to last that long though. They better!

That's why i'm water cooling them with coil wraps next week when my aluminum tubing shows up, haha.

Oy vey! Not slaves!

 

[Aristoned]

I plan on over driving the piss out of them. I don't want them to last 10 years or more by liquid cooling, because new tech will be out by then, and I'll wanna build something new, lol.

The 590mm EB3 Slims will max @ ~35W, they won’t last very long up there. The strips are made from fibreglass and it acts as an insulator, I’d recommend no more than 700mA on the 4000K and no more than 1050mA on the 3500/3000/2700K.

Also, the harder you drive them the more of a hot-spot that will be generated below the strip. That means, the harder you drive the more distance you will need to soften the intensity. You could use a reflector of sorts to help focus the light, some of the LED channels made out of thin aluminium would work.

16-18W on the 590mm is great, 20W is better but you really see a hit in performance per Watt consumed @ 20W, there is a huge advantage to 16-18W from 13.4W, but little advantage from 16-18W up to 20W.

I have some more parts coming in to finish the 3000K 80 CRI EB3 Slim build, I’ll post the final build once I settle on a decent height/spread. I’ll be running (x12) EB3 Slim 3000K 80 CRI from 150-200-240W to see how well they perform, no doubt I’ll have to push the “reds” all the way up to 1050mA to break through the phosphorus, and the hotter they get the less “red” they become at any given input current, the strips will also lose emission efficacy at higher temps. The closer you can run the strips to 45°C you will stay over the 90% emission rating.

You paid for the strip, you deserve to get all of the performance.

On a side note, if you really want to get crazy with Bridgelux check out their High Performance line of strips:

590mm = 26.9W nominal / 56.28W max

 

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[Aristoned]

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Nah, fuck that.

Dip those puppies in epoxy and dunk the whole thing.

Those things just suck, I’ve used them before in veg and clones. They are cheap and easy to setup, but that’s it. You could take a piece of cardboard hot glue some EB3’s to it and run them nominal or under-drive forever. You could even paint the cardboard white to increase efficiency.

Water-cooling is going to show the most benefit to COB’s and less to everything else due to the fundamental design.

 

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My 15.5w warm white and daylight bulbs basically are little mini cobs, with built in drivers. They even add a little extra needed heat, especially around the housing I'm gonna wrap tubing around, which is alot cheaper than the other designs I came up with.. SILs are easily scaled into whatever size footprints you need. Too late, I already bought boxloads of them a few years ago now, before I learned about the new strips. 1000's of watts worth, for less than 20 cents per watt. You can't even get just the LED module PCBs themselves that they use for that price, let alone the entire bulbs with drivers. I like the redundancy too. Not to be underestimated, even if they're a little bit less efficient compared to the newer modules & strips, etc. There's a whole thread based on SILs here on ICmag. Many have gone overboard and wired up whole tents/rooms.

I could probably even add larger sized cob lenses around the rim where the diffuser globes were previously attached.

Anyway, I'm trying to hurry up this last SIL grow fixture, and then move onto liquid cooled strip modules instead

 

[Aristoned]

My 15.5w warm white and daylight bulbs basically are little mini cobs, with built in drivers. They even add a little extra needed heat, especially around the housing I'm gonna wrap tubing around, which is alot cheaper than the other designs I came up with.. SILs are easily scaled into whatever size footprints you need. Too late, I already bought boxloads of them a few years ago now, before I learned about the new strips. 1000's of watts worth, for less than 20 cents per watt. You can't even get just the LED module PCBs themselves that they use for that price, let alone the entire bulbs with drivers. I like the redundancy too. Not to be underestimated, even if they're a little bit less efficient compared to the newer modules & strips, etc. There's a whole thread based on SILs here on ICmag. Many have gone overboard and wired up whole tents/rooms.

I could probably even add larger sized cob lenses around the rim where the diffuser globes were previously attached.

Anyway, I'm trying to hurry up this last SIL grow fixture, and then move onto liquid cooled strip modules instead

The strips don’t need water cooling, the fiberglass backing is the biggest problem.

Photographed below is a 3000K EB3 Slim with the fibreglass backing, below on the left is a Vero SE and below on the right is a standard Vero. COB’s will have a heat spreader on the back due to the diode density, the strips are spread out so they do not need a heat spreader.

I would estimate that water cooling would be just slightly more efficient than air cooling at a massive cost of money, time and energy. If you want to do it to say you did it that would make sense, but to do it for efficiency does not as you will only gain a margin that we probably won’t see in the yield. I’d imagine temperature and humidity would have a bigger role to play than a few photons that you would gain.

I’d spend the money on a kiddie pool and the PPK system from @greyfader

 

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My grow ops in a trailer (wish I had more insulation..) BTW. If I'm gone and my transfer switch (not installed yet) fails to kick over the generator, everything in there will freeze, including my light fixtures.. Having glycol based coolant will solve any problems of them freezing up too, and possibly cracking. I'm also gonna be using my DIY glycol window banger chiller to cool multiple different loops with stainless wort coils, all from one res.
I have my reasons to use it. Just saying, it works fine. Not exactly recommending you guys use antifreeze over water with additives in your loops..

 

[Aristoned]

My grow ops in a trailer (wish I had more insulation..) BTW. If I'm gone and my transfer switch (not installed yet) fails to kick over the generator, everything in there will freeze, including my light fixtures.. Having glycol based coolant will solve any problems of them freezing up too, and possibly cracking. I'm also gonna be using my DIY glycol window banger chiller to cool multiple different loops with stainless wort coils, all from one res.
I have my reasons to use it. Just saying, it works fine. Not exactly recommending you guys use antifreeze over water with additives in your loops..

If you are in an area that will freeze then you need anti-freeze.

Propylene Glycol is the only anti-freeze I would ever recommend to you for your Health & Safety.

 

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I would challenge greyfader to a grow off to see which of our hydro system designs is best, but I think he uses cheap screw in LEDs too, and I don't wanna lose to that, haha.

 

[Aristoned]

I would challenge greyfader to a grow off to see which of our hydro system designs is best, but I think he uses cheap screw in LEDs too, and I don't wanna lose to that, haha.

To each their own!

I’d like to see a ceiling covered in those little bastards, that would just be hilarious!

One thing though, you guys have better coverage per cent than we do. I’m having to buy reflectors, rebuild fixtures, calculate distances and heights with cross-illumination from the emitters while you guys just have one every so often.

Easy mode.

 

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Yeah, It is kinda cheap skating.. My e26 sockets cost me less than .50 each ( I have hundreds of them still), my bulbs around a buck or so (thanks to the government, and the lighting cartels), and the wires are hacked up 12 foot extension cords that come with recepticle ends and the plugs built right in. Basically just wiring up string lights to a frame or panel, depending how fancy you wanna get. Trust me I don't get off that easy. The money saved goes right back into my love of the hobby, and water cooling components to fullfil my fantasies.

After all the messing around, and correctly wiring up dozens and dozens of sockets though.. yeah, you might as well just buy a nice LED bar light fixture and call it a day, lol. Or go for the newer strips or maybe even some cobs with a driver and DIY. Its all cheap as chips now days, and good deals whether you DIY or not.

 

[Aristoned]

Yeah, It is kinda cheap skating.. My e26 sockets cost me less than .50 each ( I have hundreds of them still), my bulbs around a buck or so (thanks to the government, and the lighting cartels), and the wires are hacked up 12 foot extension cords that come with recepticle ends and the plugs built right in. Basically just wiring up string lights to a frame or panel, depending how fancy you wanna get. Trust me I don't get off that easy. The money saved goes right back into my love of the hobby, and water cooling components to fullfil my fantasies.

After all the messing around, and correctly wiring up dozens and dozens of sockets though.. yeah, you might as well just buy a nice LED bar light fixture and call it a day, lol. Or go for the newer strips or maybe even some cobs with a driver and DIY. Its all cheap as chips now days, and good deals whether you DIY or not.

I found something that might help you transition. I’m going to try two different methods of building the flowering fixtures, one will be mechanical and the other chemical. I’m also going to use the smallest aluminium extrusion to fit the EB3 Slims since they do not require heatsinks. I know a drill & rivets can be easily obtained, but if we can utilize a thermally and electrically conductive adhesive that is strong enough all we would need is a hand saw and a marker with a tape measure to build the fixture. That would reduce cost, time and effort which could be used elsewhere.

 

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I found 1/2 or 3/4" wide water cool-able square tubes that are even thinner than 1/16th, and cost less than 3 dollars a piece in bulk for 26-40 inch long bars. Perfect for the slims, especially if they weren't fiberglass?..... Hmm, that rains on my parade a bit..

The threaded ends of brass fittings fit right in snug, ready to braze with my induction heater when I get another bundle and the strips soon.. Such a good deal that I even used the ones I already had in my stash to hold my light bulb sockets for my new screw in fixture, and are way more rigid and light compared to using flat bar or angle. Rivets sound like a good Idea for sure. I imagine my self tapping screws I used (not sure but they look zinc plated) might eventually corrode against the aluminum bars at some point. Ah well, haha.

 

[Aristoned]

I found 1/2 or 3/4" wide water cool-able square tubes that are even thinner than 1/16th, and cost less than 3 dollars a piece in bulk for 26-40 inch long bars. Perfect for the slims, especially if they weren't fiberglass?..... Hmm, that rains on my parade a bit..

The threaded ends of brass fittings fit right in snug, ready to braze with my induction heater when I get another bundle and the strips soon.. Such a good deal that I even used the ones I already had in my stash to hold my light bulb sockets for my new screw in fixture, and are way more rigid and light compared to using flat bar or angle. Rivets sound like a good Idea for sure. I imagine my self tapping screws I used (not sure but they look zinc plated) might eventually corrode against the aluminum bars at some point. Ah well, haha.

Fucking over-kill.

I would compete with you using flat-white bathroom paint, a piece of cardboard and some hot-glue with shoe strings to hang.

These EB3 Slims are so good all you need is an oscillating fan above them pointed through the strips at the plants.

The (x12) 590mm 4000K 80 CRI were producing over 2,000 ppfd @ 20W a piece on 1/16” thick aluminium angle. This fixture is going to be broken down and rebuilt with a smaller footprint and a driver half the wattage. That’s how powerful they are.

 

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Heck with the POS oscillating fans that crap out (especially when using pulleys and strings to move your HPS cool tubes back and forth a foot ). I would just zip tie the EB strips directly to the plastic grill on the output side of a cheap 20 inch walmart box fan, aiming down at the canopy, and be done with that shit. Thats too easy and effecient though, lol. I would add my furnace filter directly to the box fan too.. although making a DIY filter box for the intake ports on a tent is boss af, and helps block any stray light rays that try to get in.. Keeps all the nasties out of your cannabis.