Opinions on this cob led

Chris Edward

Well-Known Member
Personally I would be weary of this...
Square COBs that look like these tend to be cheap Chinese COBS and usually half the LEDs in these COBS are either not working, or malfunctioning.
But you won't see this when the COBs are running and without prior experience you will think the lights are pretty bright. To see the damage you have to back the voltage down so you can see the individual LEDS within the COB and then count how many are burned out or malfunctioning.
All damaged LEDs in the COB are potential fire hazards.

Check out bigclivedotcom on YouTube, he has some great videos that show just how crappy these Chinese COB's can really be.
Here's a great video:
 

Chris Edward

Well-Known Member
You are much better off going with something like this from Gromau5

The company who is sponsored in the video is from Australia.
There are companies all over now who sell these kits, but they are crazy expensive.
You can source the parts yourself and make one for about 60% of the price of these kits.

I built the light shown in the video about 2 years ago using 3,500k Citizen COBS, which were like 1/3rd of the cost of the Cree chips and the light is wicked bright!!!
I got all my supplies from cobkits.com, because they had the most affordable price I could find.
Except the LED driver, which I don't remember where I got...
I even added little fans to the heat sinks and even at full power (200watts), the light gives off minimal heat, nothing compared to what even a couple of t5's give off.
It's a good light and well worth it's price.
 

Chris Edward

Well-Known Member
Check out Gromau5's other COB videos, he explains the whole thing and even has a series where he explains each part so there is no doubts.
 

coreywebster

Well-Known Member
These days the word cob is a buzz word for selling lights. But not all COBs are equal.
Your unlikely to find anything on amazon that is a good COB based light.

For a good LED light you need good parts, COBs or diodes, drivers and heatsinks all add to the efficiency and good parts cost significantly more than cheap parts.

Have a look at
timbergrowlight.com
cobkits.com
rapid led do a cob set up
cutter.au also have kits.

Also kingbrite on Alibaba are reputable.

You can build your own easy enough too.
 
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