Milk’s first grow

No worries, I knew that but wasn’t really thinking about it.

Thanks for awesome diagram too! I have a few ideas for that piece. I just need to see what we can fit on there and look at cost vs performance aspect. I am currently juggling a lot of things at home, so may take me a little bit. But I’ll do my best to get something together quickly.

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@dbrn32 No rush, I’m going to start getting the other items on order and on the way. Seeds may be a week out or so depending how fast they get and process my payment. I won’t need the lights for awhile during germination and starting anyway.

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@Milk They limit the posts the first day you joined. I didn’t know that happened either

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I’m looking at Samsung f-series gen3 strips. Their 560mm strip is 18mm wide. Wondering if you feel like you could fit two of these strips in this space. Like 1 on each side of the channel cut into them.

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I’ll grab the specs on it and model it up to see if they would fit. I’ll have something in a bit.

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8 of those strips on hlg-185h-c1050a would be a pretty nice rig if they’ll fit. Its maybe a touch smaller than we would typically do for a 3x3. But I think that’s roughly $170 for leds and driver.

If you wanted to build without your aluminum… I would say go for 10 of those strips on hlg-240h-c1050a driver. You would just have to purchase heatsink extrusion or find enough of a different material.

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@dbrn32 It looks like I can just fit 6 on the baseplate, too bad they don’t make shorter ones to run the other way on the ends. By adding the extrusion I could run 10 and would have the ability to rotate the outer two on each side to increase the spread if needed.

That would give me a 16” wide x 22” long lighted area.

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@dbrn32 Or with extrusions I could run a 10 array of 24” x 26” like this. Could even add the red led’s later in the gaps if it’s beneficial.

This is a light profile so it’s pretty thin and open. Do you think the aluminum profile would be enough to act as a heat sink?

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Bottom line. Less the $1 a watt! If u can get more of that aluminum (free) and more strips and drivers (-$1 a watt) DO IT!!!

Ok i read the rest before pushing send so not an edit… but ur flexible. Man samsungs have gotten there DB?.. maybe its the free aluminum

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@PurpNGold74 If I have the right LED’s picked out then the 10 array and driver is only $210 before discount on digikey. This is a no brainer if the aluminum extrusion will work as it’s own heat sink and completely flexible if I want to ever go larger or smaller in the future. I assume this would have equal or even greater light than the QB260 from HLG.

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Your second design is much more in line with what I would like to see. You have enough of the 80/20 to do it?

The additional 660nm is latest movement in led lights. So that would be “better”. The photo boost strips are usually in stock about once per month. You could email or maybe hit him up on ig to see when he is expecting stock. Cutter electronics has products like that too. They are in Australia though, and a little more difficult to get and work with.

Or, you can add some 660nm strips to something like that too. You will likely need different drivers to do that.

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@dbrn32 I signed up for an email when Pacific gets the photoboosters in stock so I’ll just build the frame with the intention of installing them when they come back in stock so I’ll need a separate transformer for that also. I plan to mount them outside the tent and just run wires inside for both. I’m ok with the A style dimming as long as they are in stock (digikey has the 240 a series on backorder right now)

So if your onboard I’ll try this out and make it. I understand your busy so no rush on it but could I have a list of items to purchase and a vendor you recommend? Thanks for all your help, it’s really appreciated.

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Ya. If you do hlg-240h-c1050a driver it will fit 8 of those photoboost strips. You can do 10 strips, but will most likely need to do two drivers for that. You could also push the 8 strips at higher current if you wanted. These strips are 25mm wide, and I’m not sure how much surface contact the strips will have with those extrusions?

@dbrn32 I found some 1.5" wide x 1/8" aluminum flat stock I had laying around so I can use that to mount to extrusion with screws and thermal paste then mount the strips to that. Seeing that the photoboost may be awhile out I’m thinking of going back to strips and QB18’s. So here’s my parts list for that set up, let me know if this looks good.

(10) LED MOD FSERIES GEN3 3500K STRIP SI-B8U261560WW
(1) Meanwell hlg-240h-c1050a LED Driver
25’ 18AWG Solid Wire 300V min
(1 pack) 2 port Wago connectors
3 prong power cord
Water proof connector

(4) QB18 V2 Quantum Boards
(1) Meanwell HLG-120H-54A LED Driver?
Wire, wagos above
3 prong power cord
Waterproof connector
Thermal paste/tape

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You could probably get by with less of the qb 18’s, and use a constant current driver instead.

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I’m looking, why don’t you go with 3500k on your Samsung strips and do qb 11’s in 660nm?

The qb 11 is same length as Samsung strips, and you really don’t need the other wavelengths that the qb 18 provides. Three of the qb 11’s should fit nicely on hlg-60h-700a driver.

Also there is a tee available on Amazon that would let you wire both drivers into a single power cord. I can get link if you would like?

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That’s perfect, I wasn’t sure if I needed the full spectrum of the 18 or if the Gen3 strips covered most of that.

Yes if you can get me that tee information I think I’m set to order then.

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I bought these in the past. You may have to open up the end to fit over cord for hlg-240 a smidge, but they are legit otherwise.

https://www.amazon.com/ATPWONZ-Junction-Waterproof-Electrical-5mm-10mm/dp/B01N0V4F1P/?tag=greenrel-20

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Perfect, thanks! Once it’s here and built I’ll add pictures and a parts list in your DIY thread in case people are looking in the future for a set up like this.

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