Final checklist for QB build

The boards are arriving tomorrow and the driver is arriving on Tuesday. Today is the deadline to place orders on amazon and have them arrive with the driver, so this is what I’ve ordered so far. The only thing I haven’t decided on is if I should spring for lever connectors or just use wire nuts.

So far I have on order:
2 120 watt quantum boards with heatsinks, hangers, and hardware
HLG-240h-56b driver
0-100k ohm potentiometers
Mountable aluminum enclosure for pots
18awg solid copper wire, black and red
Soldering iron, solder, and soldering tools


Am I missing anything besides the wire connectors? Any advantage to using those fancy lever nuts instead of plain old twist on wire nuts?

I will document the build in this thread as well. As soon as the boards arrive and I can get exact measurements I’m going to start building the frame. May get a jump on planing the maple down today.

If your getting the soldering iron just get heatshrink tubing and skip the connectors. Also ive never understood getting a B driver besides remote dimming. I mean who dims and raises their wattage that offen? Also ive heard A drivers typically max out higher. Is that true?

SwiSHa85 said:

If your getting the soldering iron just get heatshrink tubing and skip the connectors. Also ive never understood getting a B driver besides remote dimming. I mean who dims and raises their wattage that offen? Also ive heard A drivers typically max out higher. Is that true?

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I dim mine for veg, and turn up for flower.
No idea if a's max out higher, or even why that would be a benefit.

SwiSHa85 said:

If your getting the soldering iron just get heatshrink tubing and skip the connectors. Also ive never understood getting a B driver besides remote dimming. I mean who dims and raises their wattage that offen? Also ive heard A drivers typically max out higher. Is that true?

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I would rather have solderless connections if I can. Soldering solid wire is harder than soldering stranded too. I canceled soldering iron because I read your post wrong. I have a butane powered one somewhere that I can’t find. I mostly just bought the soldering iron for the pot and in case I have to solder the wires onto the board. I bought the B driver because it was available on cobkits for cheap. I had no preference but I am going to add 4 cxb1820s that I already have and another driver and I like the idea of having a couple pots in one place instead of having to fuck with a screwdriver and fiddle with each separate driver. I’m building the pots into a nice aluminum box that I’m gonna drill out.

Edit — reordered the soldering iron kit and some heat shrink tubing as well. I have to stop by the hardware store in a bit and I’ll just look for some good connectors in their DC/low voltage section. I would rather do solderless connections for everything but the pots if I can, just so it’s easier to make future modifications. This is just a mindset that comes from building PCs I guess.

Edit 2 — what boatguy said about dimming is spot on. I’m going to be using this light for veg, and would like to be able to run it at the most energy efficient setting possible, however I would like for it to be able to produce some kickass nugs as well. It will be 360 watts altogether once I get the cobs in. Any idea what that would produce compared to my 600 watt HPS? Does this have the potential to be one of those legendary 1.5 GPW lights I keep reading about?

TerrapinBlazin said:

I would rather have solderless connections if I can. Soldering solid wire is harder than soldering stranded too. I canceled soldering iron because I read your post wrong. I have a butane powered one somewhere that I can’t find. I mostly just bought the soldering iron for the pot and in case I have to solder the wires onto the board. I bought the B driver because it was available on cobkits for cheap. I had no preference but I am going to add 4 cxb1820s that I already have and another driver and I like the idea of having a couple pots in one place instead of having to fuck with a screwdriver and fiddle with each separate driver. I’m building the pots into a nice aluminum box that I’m gonna drill out.

Edit — reordered the soldering iron kit and some heat shrink tubing as well. I have to stop by the hardware store in a bit and I’ll just look for some good connectors in their DC/low voltage section. I would rather do solderless connections for everything but the pots if I can, just so it’s easier to make future modifications. This is just a mindset that comes from building PCs I guess.

Edit 2 — what boatguy said about dimming is spot on. I’m going to be using this light for veg, and would like to be able to run it at the most energy efficient setting possible, however I would like for it to be able to produce some kickass nugs as well. It will be 360 watts altogether once I get the cobs in. Any idea what that would produce compared to my 600 watt HPS?

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get a killawatt meter off amazon for cheap if dont have one. that way can see wattage as you adjust.

Hell yeah I’ve been wanting to measure everything for a while. Got any recommendations on a decent cheap PAR meter as well? Isn’t it true that brightness and PAR don’t have a directly straightforward correlation, like the spectrum, intensity, and distance all have an effect? I want to know how to set up the light so the plants are able to maximize photosynthesis.

TerrapinBlazin said:

Hell yeah I’ve been wanting to measure everything for a while. Got any recommendations on a decent cheap PAR meter as well? Isn’t it true that brightness and PAR don’t have a directly straightforward correlation, like the spectrum, intensity, and distance all have an effect? I want to know how to set up the light so the plants are able to maximize photosynthesis.

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What boards did you buy exactly? PAR meter wise i dont know of any on the cheap that work. What i do is use a cheap Lux meter when first setting up quantum boards and keep the plants around 10k-15k lumes when introducing the lights to plants so not to light stress them which is easily done when you first start using boards. Then move lights closer slowly or just let plants grow up to them over time.

Yep

I bought a cheapish dr. Meter Lux meter, works great and is very simple.

Think it cost me $50 cdn on amazon

booms111 said:

What boards did you buy exactly? PAR meter wise i dont know of any on the cheap that work.

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I bought two of these kits from Amazon, along with the driver that is recommended on the page. I know it’s an offbrand board but it’s a good price considering that it comes with heat sinks and hardware. It also does have legit Samsung chips in it.

TerrapinBlazin said:

I bought two of these kits from Amazon, along with the driver that is recommended on the page. I know it’s an offbrand board but it’s a good price considering that it comes with heat sinks and hardware. It also does have legit Samsung chips in it.

Amazon.com: Atreum Lighting 288.2 LED Grow Light Board Kit, Horticulture Full Spectrum Grow Light Panel, Samsung LM301B with Heatsink, Hanging Rope and Solid Copper Cables : Everything Else

Buy Atreum Lighting 288.2 LED Grow Light Board Kit, Horticulture Full Spectrum Grow Light Panel, Samsung LM301B with Heatsink, Hanging Rope and Solid Copper Cables: Everything Else - Amazon.com ✓ FREE DELIVERY possible on eligible purchases

www.amazon.com

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Mikes boards are actually really nice for the price point. I have 8 in various spot throughout my spaces.

Don't forget, check out @Prawn Connery he's selling those kickass highlite qbs. They are bigger boards than the hlgs and are putting out stellar numbers. He's a good dude, easy to chat with and help out.

If I was buying boards, he would be my first call.

TerrapinBlazin said:

It will be 360 watts altogether once I get the cobs in. Any idea what that would produce compared to my 600 watt HPS?

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My gen 7 vero 29 x 4 cob light easily competes with a 600 hps, with the newer technology and quantum it's going to go above and beyond that
I dont know if it helps but a "rough" ppfd estimate is lux divided by 1000 x 15. You can download a lux measuring app through a smart phone that is surprisingly accurate ....

I’ll check that out. Anyway now that I’ve got the electrical side of it figured out now I can start figuring out the form factor and I think I’ve pretty much got it. I have a bunch of really nice maple that I pulled off a job. Some of it has some really nice curled figuring. I’m going to build a rectangular box that will contain both boards and all 4 cobs. The sides will be high enough that the drivers and controls can be mounted to slats running along the top, and the inside will be open enough that heat won’t have any trouble escaping.

Each driver will be on its own slat across the top, and they’ll run into the controls mounted onto the center slat. The power cords from each driver will run into a control box with toggle switches and a single cord running to the outlet. I’ve already built this.

Finally, since both drivers are b series there will be a second box with separate dimming pots for the cobs and boards.

The maple will be sealed with boiled linseed oil, and finished with a custom tinted urethane acrylic that I’ll spray on, but first I have to chisel off the glue, pull out all the nails, and plane it all down. I’ve gotta indulge my love of woodworking for this project too, and my style inspiration is an electric guitar. I might even get top hat knobs for the pots. It may seem like I’m going a little overboard with this, but I’ve only spent about $300 and this is going to be super fun to build and I should be really pleased with the finished product.

Here’s a little mock-up of the acrylic on the maple. Nothing fancy to tint it — just Kroger brand neon blue and green food coloring in a 2:1 ratio. It’s pretty much the same shit as fancy woodworking dyes and a whole lot cheaper. Plus way more convenient if you only want to tint a pint of something instead of 5 gallons. Once the boards come in tomorrow I’ll be able to start building the box, make sure everything fits securely, and get about 5 coats of acrylic sprayed on it. I would have started cleaning and milling the wood today if I had been home.

The Dr. Meter LUX device is the most valuable, cheap tool in my DIY LED gearbox, hands down.
I don't give a frogs fat ass what my actual PAR reading is, but knowing the Dr. Meter reading has proven indispensable.

Just got the boards in and put them together. They’re even nicer than I was expecting. I expected this to be like any other inexpensive Chinese product, with descriptions that make the product seem nicer than it really is. I expected the PCB to be 1/16” composite sheet, instead I got 1/8” aluminum. Nice. The heatsinks are really nice anodized machined aluminum, and I was expecting cheap painted extruded aluminum. They also provided some nice lengths of heavy gauge solid wire — more than enough for this build. The hangers are not quite what I wanted, but some ropes with cam locks will work really nice to hook the carabiners to the rails at the top of the tent. I’m feeling kind of lazy otherwise I would already be milling down maple and mahogany. I hope I get a second wind because the first driver is getting here tomorrow and the second on Wednesday and I’d like to have a good start on the enclosure by then.

And I just pulled myself together and did the rough millwork. The wood looks amazing after a few passes through the planer and a quick coat of penofin. This shit was all free. The maple came from a cap on a pony wall in an eye doctor’s office and the mahogany came from a pallet, incredibly enough. Killer figuring around the knot on the piece of mahogany — almost looks like Hawaiian koa. Some nice subtle quilting in the maple as well. I’ll probably do a quick black dye wash and sanding on the maple to bring out the quilting a little more. I guess tomorrow I’ll start making cuts. No point in messing with it anymore tonight because it’s dark and I need to buy screws.

I’ve been slacking on the woodwork since Monday but I’m about to jump into it. If I really hustle I could have this thing built tonight. I’ve got all the circuitry built on the AC side — just waiting for the cob driver to come in so I can plug the leads into the switch box. Ideal in-sure and spliceline connectors are awesome for this. You just gotta tin the leads on your stranded wire. I’m not gonna fuck with wiring up the DC side until I get the housing built. I don’t know if the power switch box was really necessary, but the drivers only come with like 8 inches of lead wire. Seems like the perfect situation for a switch box with a really long cord.

And here’s another update. Enclosure is pretty much done. I’m letting the glue dry for a bit before I start on the mounting plates for the drivers and controls. I decided to make it super simple, kind of like how lights sit in a drop ceiling. It’s still rough and will need a considerable amount of sanding. After I get it finished I’ll have to decide whether I still want to do the turquoise clear coat or if I just want to leave it natural to save time.

I don’t know if I would say it’s finished, but all of the lights work. 2 boards, 4 cobs, and 2 drivers all running together. The cobs need to be secured better but I could start running it right now if I wanted to. Wiring everything in parallel was a lot more work but I’m glad I did it.

Alright well I’m excited as fuck. I’ve been wanting to build me a custom LED light for most of the year, and with a little over two weeks left in 2019 I got it done. Here it is in the tent. This is full power, 360 watts, which is probably overkill for veg. Thankfully I’ve got nice little potentiometers do independently dim the boards and mini cobs (cxb1820s)

Now that I’ve got the light built and working, I’m wondering if I can replace my 600 watt HPS with this one and do just a single board in the tent for veg.

Here’s the light in all its full power glory. Obviously I need to get some height adjustment ropes.