The Groffice

[Palindrome]

Ingenious solution on the lights.

Thanks mate, looking forward to see how the heat dissipation will be like.


@MoS Sure, send me a PM mate. Looking forward to hear how your doing, it's been a lot of years ... hope your doing well.


Back to the build

I am gluing light traps, it takes a bit of time with the drying.

 

[Illuminate]

Killing it

 

[Palindrome]

Back of the light traps


Gluing the top, bottom, middle baffle and back.


Front and intake holes


Still got a bunch of gluing to do, but once that's done.
It's on to painting them black on the inside, mounting and testing them.

 

[MoS]

Mkay, would do, but PM for a newbie like me, doesnt seem work.

Looking good by the way mate...

 

[Palindrome]

@MoS ahh yeah, you need 50 posts.



Gluing is done, and moved on to painting the light traps.
First I gave them a light prime coating, before I start painting the inside black.

 

[Palindrome]

First layer of paint

Much much easyer to work with then the cheap waterbased stuff, this flows much better and there is no cloggin of the internal filter.



2nd layer will go on tomorrow, also need to remember to paint the inside of the cover as well.

 

[Palindrome]

Now more waiting

 

[Palindrome]

Final layer is drying - Took pictures and they looked exactly like the one above.
Figure no point in posting another picture of wet black paint, so will wait and post pictures of the finished paint job once it's dry.

 

[Palindrome]

The light traps have dried up nicely over night, and are ready to install into the cabinets.

Will take a bit of time, as I only have one clamp fitting for holding the front cover in place. (broke one the other day)
So nothing new, besides im waiting for silicone to dry not paint.

4 screws into the back of the box, and dark silicone to make sure everything is air tight and blocking any light going thru a seam or something.



Screwed the 4 screws into the side wall, securing a snug fit up against the inlet "slot".


Siliconed the edges on the box, making sure to get a good amount of silicone on. So it will close any potential gab's, between the middle baffel and the side panel of the lightbox.
Siliconed the outside, and pressed the reflector foam on place.
clamped the front panel on, and now I wait again.

 

[Palindrome]

Light traps in the right side cabinets have been mounted, now mounting some foam insulation/reflector.

 

[Palindrome]

Back reflectors in the right side closet.


Now I have moved on, to the electrical part of the build project.

The Ebay seller ran out of LED drivers, so he was only able to supply me with a bit more then half the amount of the strips going into this build.
The solution could be buying 3 MeanWell drivers, but they are costly to buy and I got plenty of stuff to spend money on.
On the other hand, the closets are flower closets. They will be running 12/12, so I kinda already have the drivers needed.

All 6 cabinets will run a total of 54 LED strips, and I have 27 drivers to run one side.
The simple and cheap solution, build a FlipFlop and have 1 driver power 2 strips.
1 MW driver is about 80$ a 2 pole relay is 1$ and a socket is another dollar.
Found a deal on 5 relay's with sockets, that I got 3 set's of at a total of 30$.
This will replace the need for buying 3x 80$ Meanwell drivers, at least at this moment.
I might change all the drivers on a later point, but then I got the FlipFlop and I will still be able to only buy 3 MW drivers to power the 6 lights.

The relays are just a simple electromagnetic switch, for thouse who might not know what I am talking about.
To explain it simple, it have a input pole and two output poles (A and B) and it have two 12V poles for the electro magnet.

The driver + go to the input pole, and a strip in the right side is connected to the A pole. Another strip in the matching left side cabinet, now we power up the LED driver.
Doing that the right side Strip will be turned on, after 12 hours a timer turns on a 12V power supply and all the relays switch to Pole B.
Now the left side is turned on, as long as the 12V power supply is on. After 12 hours the timer turns off the 12V power supply and power is diverted into the right side again.

Still waiting on relays, the first 5 have arrived. So the rest should be here one of the next days, or so I hope - Ebay china it's cheap, but it's often a 5 week wait or more.



The controller will also be controlling the exhausts, watering and cabinet air circulation.
I am not happy with the crappy fan's, I got for my veg cabinet. As they are crappy, and most of them didn't last a year.
So I am gonna try something different, but also waiting for some parts for this.

Hung a light to messure the cable lengths


Drilled 9 holes in the side of the cabinet, and started mounting the cables in the first cabinet.


Now I just need to do the left side match, another 4 cabinets and by then the rest of the relays are hopefully here.

 

[Palindrome]

nice project, but i would not cheap out on drivers

Im not, they where incl in the price for the Strips.
So they will 100% be tested!

The Veg closet already have MW drivers, so the strips going into that closet will be running on MW drivers.
But just discarding the TCI driver without testing the quality, would IMO be stupid as MW is not the only quality drivers on the market.

TCI Italy might make okay drivers, won't know untill I try em out.

 

[Palindrome]

Had to buy another roll of cable, using up alot more then I had figured.
Maybe I should have done the math, and not just guess



First four cabinets have been wired, the top ones will be a bit of a PITA.
Already not the most comfortable position to work in, in the back upper corners of these cabinets.
When your already struggeling with a bad back, but I will mannage to setup something to stand on.

 

[packerfan79]

Man Palindrome,

You got some serious skills. Are you an industrial maintenance guy?

 

[Palindrome]

Man Palindrome,

You got some serious skills. Are you an industrial maintenance guy?

Thanks Packerfan79, I am not.

But I have many skill's in my toolbox, the main one I guess is the thirst for knowledge and learning.

When I was young I didn't really know what I wanted to do, like many others I guess.. But I had the option to try a lot of things.
I started educating myself in Computers and electronics, back in the 90's but it was a bit too stress full for me.
At least the programming part, it was a time where programming languages where changing very frequently.
So I have a few years education, that could have lead me down the path of industrial mantenance.
I got courses in PLC programming, and my knowlage about basic electronics (how to build a flipflop) come from there.
But also the reason I am not doing arduino controllers, I have some mental block on learning to program them

I have had to read up on alot of things, and now days it's much much more interresting and easy.
Just go to YouTube, and there are loads of good tutorials. Beat's reading the text books I read 25 years ago, but contains the same info just delivered smarter/faster.

I have no doubt that I could learn to program an arduino, but for this project I have put my focus else where.
It's no secret that things takes me a long time, I have a hard time keeping track of too many things at once.
Also why I have done everything step by step, where had it been 20 years ago.
I would have been able to glue light traps, while the polyester resin cured and do many of the small tasks like that.
My reality is I got sick and I am no longer able, to do/keep track of what I once could.
Lucky my hands still work, so I have just accepted that things take longer.
Plus side to not rushing anything is, I make a lot less mistakes now days hehehehe.

I enjoy doing the work as well, and of course all the positive comments and K+'s.
Also I truly hope this can inspire others, to do DIY projects.
Im surprices about how many new growers, not knowing about Flipflop solutions, where as I recall it back to the old OG days.
Flipflops where a common thing, as ballasts where not cheap.
Kinda like LED drivers today, in a DIY project it's a fair amount of the budget total.

The strips I got 10$ a strip (90$ per lamp unit)
A MW driver about 80$
Heatsink about 40$

Having one driver run 2 lights, in the end cut the driver cost down to half + a few dollar flipflop relay.

 

[Palindrome]

Finaly done wiring the LED strip cables, inside all 6 cabinets and ready to move on to other steps.



Still need to wire and hook up ventilation, mount and wire the drivers.
Install water pumps, feeding tubes, air circulation fan's and the main control box.

Prolly need other things too, like insulate the attic.

 

[Palindrome]

Moved on to the LED drivers

Starting with soldering all the cable ends.


Then hung em in the closet, so plenty of air can move past them.
As they will be running 24/7, I will use the heat from them and the other electronics.
To heat the lung room, by circulating air from the lung room thru the middle section.


Everything is looking a bit of a mess right now, still need to solder a a bunch of wires and lable the ends of the driver DC cables.
But things are moving along nicely, hope the missing parts I need will be here soon.

 

[DARKSIDER]

Moved on to the LED drivers

Starting with soldering all the cable ends.
https://www.icmag.com/ic/picture.php?albumid=79027&pictureid=1935517View Image

Then hung em in the closet, so plenty of air can move past them.
As they will be running 24/7, I will use the heat from them and the other electronics.
To heat the lung room, by circulating air from the lung room thru the middle section.
https://www.icmag.com/ic/picture.php?albumid=79027&pictureid=1935663View Image

Everything is looking a bit of a mess right now, still need to solder a a bunch of wires and lable the ends of the driver DC cables.
But things are moving along nicely, hope the missing parts I need will be here soon.
View Image

You sure have some skills m8 its coming on nice.

 

[Palindrome]

Thanks DarkSider

While I wait for parts from china, I got the channel bottoms messured up and cut for all 6 cabinets.



Next I started on the feeding syestem, but so far it's just straightening PVC irrigation hoze with my heatgun.

 

[Palindrome]

While I am waiting for parts for the flipflop box, I am working on the feeding system.

DIY drippers - 4/7 mm Irrigation hoze and T connectors.


Plant/pot pattern of the cabinets, at least here to start with.


And all 3 layers are done, next I need to connect the pump and test if it's strong enough for all 3 tiers or if I need more.