Finishing Touches - Any advice appreciated

Hey guys!

I am so glad an LED head stumbled across my grow journal and pointed me in this direction!

I have been doing a lot of research regarding this cob fixture I will be building to cover my 20"x46" closet to replace the Mars Hydro 600 blurple that is currently over my plants.

I settled on the Vero SE 29 with the built-in holder and poke-in wire connectors. I just ordered them on Thursday night, and somehow they already arrived today!
I finally decided on the 3000k 90CRI after a lot of reading and asking people opinions. This fixture will only be used for the last two weeks of vegging and all of flowering once the plants are under their screen.

This is the frame that I am going to build out of aluminum angle. I plan on buying 5 pieces of 36"x3/4"X1/16" which means only one cut for the side supports.

I have already placed my order for 6 140x70mm pin heatsinks that are rated for up to 70-80w of heat. Also on this order are the Meanwell 320h 1400 b, a power cord, wago connectors, extra wire, thermal grease, and a prewired cased dimmer knob.

I still have not decided what (if anything) I will add for supplemental lighting. Someone recommended the hortilux fs+uv and 660 2' t5s which would be awesome, but I'm not sure if I could get them close enough to the plants without blocking precious COB photons with the T5 fixture. Any ideas on what I could put in this space to up my spectrum even more? Is it even necessary?

My second question comes with mounting the driver remotely. I am considering mounting the driver on the outside of the closet and extending the leads 6-8' so I can run them in and hook them up to the COBs. Is this something you guys would or would not recommend?

What am I missing here?

I know I have to hit Home Depot for my aluminum angle and a rivet gun. I already have a drill and drill bits. Maybe clamps to hold the angle in place while I drill?

I want to make sure all my bases are covered so that the day my package arrives with the driver and heat sinks, I can go right for the assembly.

From the looks of these new VERO SE with the built in holders, this should be a pretty straight forward build.

Re: structure

I would reccomend bumping up to 1/8 thick angle. The cost and weight is marginal but it will be significantly more sturdy.

For the end caps, Home Depot sells a c-channel profile designed to cover the edge of 3/4 sheet goods. Great little product for cleaning up the build.

Brewery said:

Re: structure

I would reccomend bumping up to 1/8 thick angle. The cost and weight is marginal but it will be significantly more sturdy.

For the end caps, Home Depot sells a c-channel profile designed to cover the edge of 3/4 sheet goods. Great little product for cleaning up the build.

Click to expand...

I was thinking this as well since I opted for lengthwise supports. I wasn't sure how thing 1/16" was going to be until I really got my hands on it

Curious what you do with the supplemental lighting. I personally wrote off the idea of the hortilux fs-uv in favour of agromax pure uv.

My arrays were designed to have supplemental lighting attached also. I'm planning on a uv and far red but want to get a run or two done first to (non-scientifically) compare the results.

Maybe design this so that you could drop one (or even two) Quantum Boards in the center? I don't own a QB, but the grows that are going on right now sure look promising. If the QB's work as well as we all hope, that would make a kick-ass addition to your project.

+1 on going to 1/8"

Brewery said:

Curious what you do with the supplemental lighting. I personally wrote off the idea of the hortilux fs-uv in favour of agromax pure uv.

My arrays were designed to have supplemental lighting attached also. I'm planning on a uv and far red but want to get a run or two done first to (non-scientifically) compare the results.

Click to expand...

I will definitely be bumping up to 1/8" aluminum. As far as the supplemental lighting, there are so many options. The problem comes in when it comes to how far the supplemental lighting needs to be from the canopy for optimum PPF.

I had not given the quantum boards a thought yet, but that is definitely something to consider as well.

The hortilux t5s are awesome, but from what I've read, the 660 would need to be closer to the plants than the COB to be effective, and I'm not sure how to lower it to the plants without the fixture blocking the light from my COBs.

The other option I've been considering are the smaller 5w and 10w Cree chips that Amare uses. My friend at RapidLed had some supplemental kits on 2' and 4' heat sinks that could be mounted.

It took some time for me to understand the COBs and how to power them, and the smaller chips seem like an even larger learning curve.

I've got about 5-7 days before the stuff arrives to build the initial fixture

Closet-Gardenholic said:

I will definitely be bumping up to 1/8" aluminum. As far as the supplemental lighting, there are so many options. The problem comes in when it comes to how far the supplemental lighting needs to be from the canopy for optimum PPF.

I had not given the quantum boards a thought yet, but that is definitely something to consider as well.

The hortilux t5s are awesome, but from what I've read, the 660 would need to be closer to the plants than the COB to be effective, and I'm not sure how to lower it to the plants without the fixture blocking the light from my COBs.

The other option I've been considering are the smaller 5w and 10w Cree chips that Amare uses. My friend at RapidLed had some supplemental kits on 2' and 4' heat sinks that could be mounted.

It took some time for me to understand the COBs and how to power them, and the smaller chips seem like an even larger learning curve.

I've got about 5-7 days before the stuff arrives to build the initial fixture

Click to expand...

where did you read the 660 eye hort needs to be closer than other lamps ? a 54w t5 lamp reguardless of color does not need to be any closer to the plants than a 3 or 5 w diode,the plant can see its light from a long ways lol.its just adding to your spectrum,not doing the bulk growing.same with uv lamps,just having the color there is adding to the fixures spectrum,not really adding punch to the power of said fixture.uv placed too close will actually lower yields by burning plants just like our skin lol.

sixstring2112 said:

where did you read the 660 eye hort needs to be closer than other lamps ? a 54w t5 lamp reguardless of color does not need to be any closer to the plants than a 3 or 5 w diode,the plant can see its light from a long ways lol.its just adding to your spectrum,not doing the bulk growing.same with uv lamps,just having the color there is adding to the fixures spectrum,not really adding punch to the power of said fixture.uv placed too close will actually lower yields by burning plants just like our skin lol.

Click to expand...

Oh you know, just some of our lovely friends over on the Amare thread

Hortilux recommends 8-16" above the canopy with 12" being optimum. I plan on running the COBs 12-18". I Will just hang a low profile2' 2 lamp t5 HO fixture directly in the center of the cob fixture. That way I can adjust the heights independently.

Mellodrama said:

Maybe design this so that you could drop one (or even two) Quantum Boards in the center? I don't own a QB, but the grows that are going on right now sure look promising. If the QB's work as well as we all hope, that would make a kick-ass addition to your project.

+1 on going to 1/8"

Click to expand...

Wow, that would be cool to space out 2 quantum boards across the 36" fixture. Definitely something to consider in the future

If you're concerned about using some other tech, such as t5's or whatever that might have different "height above canopy" specs, the QB's might alleviate that. Unless I'm mistaken, COB and QB height above canopy seems to be roughly equivalent.