noob about to make a final decision. Please help.

Chuff420 said:

AU$1683 and that's before postage to Australia.

That's a bit excessive for 4.165668 Feet² of cabinet.

And how would I get a 4 Foot wide light into a 3.38 Foot wide cabinet?

Thanks anyway.

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Chuff420 said:

I need some additional information in order to continue my decision process.

My original design was to limit the flowering chamber to a height of 4 feet. After having a few people mention that 4 feet was quite restrictive, I changed the design of the cabinet so I would end up with 5 feet of height, and it is this 5 feet that the discussion has been based on since.

If I was to utilise the entire cabinet to flowering I would end up with a base dimension measuring 860 * 500 mm (33.8 x 19.6 inches) given me an area of 0.43m² (4.62852 Feet²) and the height of the chamber would increase from 1500mm (4.92 feet) to 2200mm (7.22 feet).

Given the new height limit, does this open up the possibility of better utilising the space I now have?

This is my latest spreadsheet. I've added 2 lines in the CXB2530 grouping labelled 0.7T2 & 0.7 witch mathematically calculates the 0.7 values & 0.7T2 values based on the average difference between the T2 & U2 Bins for the CXB2530. My mathematical calculations assume a linear relationship, which obviously isn't the case in the real world, but it gives you the ability to quickly and easily compare figures at a glance.

View attachment 3619408

Also, in opening up the cabinet to purely flowering, I have made some savings as I no longer need to build an internal cabinet to segregate the chambers as originally planned, so there's a bit more cash available for lighting.

I'd also like to know what the ramifications would be if I were to bump up the amperage of the 3 x 3590 to 2.1A in this area. Would the higher cabinet allow for it, and would it be beneficial or detrimental?

Also, my initial plan was to go SCROG due to my 5 foot height limit. Having almost 8 feet of height now available, would I have enough space to eliminate SCROG and do a normal grow, or would I be better of sticking with SCROG?

Thanks.

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thetr33man said:

With that amount of light, id say reflectors are not necessary. You could cut pieces of 3/4 inch plywood just large enough to give you about an inch around the outside of your COB, angled @ 45% on the inside and paint it white, it would reflect a good amount of the light going out horizontally down to the plants. This would be relatively cheap and you could probably just glue it to the heatsinks using a high temp adhesive, to save you from drilling your heatsinks any more than you already are. Also if you have access to a computer repair place, or even a local dump, you can scavange some pretty wicked heatsinks from old PCs and use them individually, hanging alone or built into a wooden frame of some sort. These would have to be actively cooled, but any decent sized CPU heatsink will have more than enough cooling ability to cool even the most powerful cobs.

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klx said:

IF your fans go out they will overheat after an unknown period of time but the probability of that happening is low. The problem in Oz is the stupid price of heatsinks. It even works out cheaper to import heatsinks even with the weight and shipping. Crazy. For me, CPU coolers are the go here until I find a heatsink supplier with realistic prices. I have checked em all, fastron, conrad, ullrich etc. Hundreds of dollars per bar. Joke. If you are on a budget passive is going to be tricky. If you find a good source please let us know.

I must ask, if you are in Oz, why are you ordering your COBs from China and not getting from cutter.com.au? I am chiming in late sorry if you already mentioned why.

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benbud89 said:

Since this is a thread for a final newb decision, perhaps I could get some pampering myself, please. Id like someone to link me up to a place where I can buy 50-100 selftapping screws and a drill bit fitting for that size, appropriate for the ideal holders. It would just be nice if someone knew where to get it from the same place and save some on shipping ^^ Sorry that I am so lazy, I blame it entirely on the different ways the measurements are listed!

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pop22 said:

In a cab that small, i see no need for any reflector. Painted white inside that cab will be blindingly bright!

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