crunkyeah

GREENTHUMBWANNABE This is my new name check out my new grow sometime

hey man i wanted to know from where you bought you 120w led grow light. 10x

I've been jailed 3 times on MJ realted offenses... My life will not be the same for at least 7 years because of this. I used MJ to control my symptoms of Bipolar disorder, which I inherited from my mother. Why is America's War on Weed still going? Because the 50 million US tokers and millions of others worldwide are more concerned with getting high than making change, apparently. This war not only affects you and me, but the trade practices of the ENTIRE WORLD. American Tobacco, Poison, is sent out throughout the entire world, while everyone else's weed trade is illegal, and ALL BECAUSE AMERICA SAYS SO. So then, when will stoners grow a pair?
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Unfortunately, I have not. To be honest, I haven't been very active on here lately. Unemployment woes, ya know? My buddy and I are planning on growing very soon though, and when we do, I'm going to propose the idea to him about the LED pole, and see if he would be willing to kick in on the construction cost. Unfortunately, though, I think that we're going to be forced to use CMH bulbs in cooltubes for our first few grows until both of us have steady jobs and can afford to put more towards the hobby.

by surface mounting the components, you eliminate having live energized parts on the bottom of the PCB,. then it is a matter of a simple spray coat or 3 of polyurethane on the bottom of the PCB (i like to take precautions. the poly acts as an insulator when dry) then once it is dry and not tacky, you just simply screw the PCB to the heat sink...
as far as the wiring of the cooling fans... i would run in them in parallel with the 12vdc that is powering up the board. that way if the board is energized, the fan is on at all times.

and that is how you would normally make a PCB.
however in this application it will be problematic, due to the heat sink, you dont want it contacting the energized components on the pcb, and causing a short circuit condition.
so the solution is to surface mount the components to the PCB. however this requires careful planning and execution when actually fabricating the board, the LED's will have to be slightly raised in order to fit a conductor to the leads on the bottom of the LED. the componets are in turn held in place by the solder contact rings on the PCB.

to be honest i dont know how to calculate how much heat would be generated. im guessing it wouldnt be 3 times as hot.... more likely 1.75-2.25. really and truly ambient temps and whatever the panel is enclosed/mounted to will greatly affect the temperature.
in some of the led fixtures i have seen, there are banks of cooling fans mounted on the top side of the fixture so that they exhaust air that is supplied via vents in the bottom of the fixture where the led's are, sucking cold air through the fixture and exhausting heat out the top.

as far as attatching the heat sink, its pretty simple... but it changes the basic design of the PCB.

on the youtube vids, he has components mounted to the top of the board, and the circuitry on the bottom

4. contrary to popular belief, LED's get hot. quickly. they must be cooled by either a heat sink or a fan, preferably both.
5. it would be best if you built 'panels' of LED's on PCB's. this just makes it simpler and more compact, as all the components are mounted to a pcb, which in turn is mounted electrically isolated to a flat peice of metal that will act as a heat sink.
6. Learn to solder properly. there are several different methods of soldering, one thing you dont want to do is cold solder, or tap solder this stuff. it will cause problems later on with components burning up.
7.Steal someone else's design... its the american way. you can learn alot by a little back engineering.

here's a couple of sites that might help you out with the design principles.

http://superpositioned.com/2006/02/25/diy-led-lighting-guide

http://www.hebeiltd.com.cn/?p=zz.led.resistor.calculator

1. your going to need different circuits for the white led's, at least as far as i know.
2.as far as determining the resistors, first you need to figure out how many LED's per circuit, before you can go any farther.
3. you definitly need a better power supply. the one you have listed is only 1 watt.. so that power supply would run exactly 5 led's.... you need alot more power, more wattage.

first thing you need to worry about is getting ahold of some small printed circuit boards, you will need them to mount all this shit to.
they are also great for mounting the LED"s to.
something like this-
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=370217887246&rvr_id=&crlp=1_263602_263622&UA=WXF%3F&GUID=f8a85ac21260a0aad2946fb4fedd61bf&itemid=370217887246&ff4=263602_263622

for sure, although i think you will find it tedious and boring, unless you get turned on by soldering

To answer your question about the differences between a few nanometers, here is my short answer: Consider that only 10nm separates 625nm (red) and 615nm (orange) -- so yes, having the exact spectra (within 2-5nm either direction) should produce the most desirable results. Concerning the high-power LEDs, I'll be using 60 of them on a hexagonal tube, 10 per side, at 5W apiece, for a total of 300W. The reason that the high-power LEDs are better is because they are able to be run at higher constant amperage than their regular 5mm counterparts. The LedEngin 5W LEDs are able to be run at a constant 1000mA, thus providing the maximum amount of light energy while retaining their longevity (750mA low, 1000mA nominal, 1500mA peak).

According to the response that I received from the sales manager at Rambo, they can make pretty much any light customized with the spectrum you like. Depending on the variety used, the price fluctuates somewhat, but like I said, pretty much whatever you want. As far as the other question, basically there are the primary spectra used by plants for photosynthesis, and then there are supplemental spectra that are used to aid the plant in performing their primary functions. As an example, 612nm is a "helper" spectrum to aid the plant in using the 630 and 660nm wavelengths of light. It basically helps to promote carotenoid production.

That said, I won't be purchasing any LEDs anytime in the immediate future. There were not enough people who made it known that they were interested, and thus, the group purchase will not end up happening. Instead, I'll be using 300W of HID in my next grow, and will work on saving the money to build my own design high-power LED "pole" (think V-ScrOG!). I would ask the mods to delete the thread, but even without the actual group purchase aspect, there is a significant amount of valuable information in that thread. Anywho, if you have any more questions, feel free to shoot me a message.

Again, welcome to RIU! Hope you enjoy it here -- I do! (most of the time)

Welcome to the forums here @ RIU!

I'll be completely honest. My experience extends only to the research and science of LED grows. I know the science behind it, but as of yet, I've had neither the finances nor the opportunity to purchase any LED lamps to grow with (hence the group purchase thread).

As far as your question goes, the answer is yes. The blue spectrum (approx. 455nm wavelength) is ideal for promoting vegetative growth. At this point, the options are abundant, though limited in their overall quality from one manufacturer to the next. There are many LED grow lights out there, but to be fair, only a few of those are actually worth the money spent. The rest are fleaBay junk, pawned off by unscrupulous sellers who are making a quick buck. And to be quite honest, I have no plans to use tube fluoro's or CFL's in any of my grows. I am quite confident that equivalent or better results (for sure in Veg, potentially in Flower as well) can be had by using the LED grow lamps.