I have one 3 years old now and a fan is slowly dying in it. It’s the bearings, if I move it so it’s at an angle the fan starts making noises.
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3 years is not bad going for a fan any way you look at it… I just replace them with a half decent PC fan and they are cheap and loads quieter… I have also looked at amplifier PSU boards such as these:
These are of surprisingly good quality… FAR better than the standard cheap 1000w Chinese PSU’s you normally get off eBay etc but slightly pricier.
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Wondering if I did my math right… a 2x2 space would do fine with 8 of the 22 inch strips and a 150w meanwell correct?
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That works out to 37.5 watts/sq ft based on the Meanwell max rating - which you could push to close to 200 watts reasonably safely. That sounds like a reasonable max to me.
If you do run 8 strips at that power, that works out to 150 watts / 8 = 18.75 watts per strip. Thats actually a lot of heat to get rid of in my opinion, so I would highly recommend decent heat sinks. If you oush it to 200 watts, thats even worse of course.
I have a 15 watts soldering iron that runs pretty darn hot - just as a reference.
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So the 60 watts per square foot is phooey?
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yeah would be a good start and should be decently sufficient, and depending on the driver xlg or hlg would only need a 100watter thats turned up a little but saying that if using say the XLG-150-L-AB you could just add 3 more strips for 11 and that would what you could run nominally off that, or say round down to an even 10, as really cost at that point is only what $10-15
Do it 
Over kill unless you need to throw the light at least 2-4 feet before it hits your plants when already in full bloom and even still, more realistic with today’s output i would say 30-40w/sqft but thats all based on efficiency of the light and how far away you are
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Maybe not phoey, but remember, this is ALL opinion and YMMV as they say.
No one has done any real scientific studies of what is really the optimum light level for pot growing. If you Google “how many watts for growing pot” or something similar, you will see results from 35 watts/sq ft to 80 watts/sq ft for flowering. A large number of those recommendations fall more in the 40-45 watt/sq ft range. I consider that more or less a “normal” max number.
Just as an example - I can crank my LED lights up to 320 watts, based on my driver max rating. If I go to max power, I have to keep the lights at least 18" to 24" away from the plants or they burn. My tent is 7.38 sq ft, so thats 43 watts/ sq ft. No way could I ever go up to even 60 watts/ sq ft. I would never be able to keep the tent temps under control and all my plants would die of radiation burns. At 80 watts/sq ft my tent would likely melt and or catch on fire
If you have a large enough grow space, and great temperature control, more watts might be practical - or maybe not.
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I’m right at 60watts a square foot in a 10 sf, I don’t have a problem but my lights are air cooled.
And also hps, again light efficiency vs distance from plants, ect ect all come into play
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Exactly. You cant compare HID, etc to LED on a watt/sq ft basis. Apples, oranges. You might need 60 watts/sq ft of HID to equal 45 watts/sq ft of LED.
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I was wantin to build a lil seedling n clone box outta a Costco 27gal tub. 3 of the little 2ft Bridgelux EB Gen 2 strips in 3000k or 3500k will work I figure. I dont buy into the blue spectrum for veg with LED coz they already keep plants stocky.
So I figured ask all yall smart folks here. What drivers best for them 3 strips & has built in dimming pot? I dont wanna hafta wire a dim pot. Hope for 90%+ efficiency & good warranty but dont wanna spend much.
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Will be hard just for that low of wattage , but the IDLC-45-700 or ODLC-45-700 still gonna have to wire up a dimmer though, literally two wires to a 100k linear potentiometer, easy peasy
or pickup 4 strips run them in a dual parallel series config and run off a xlg-50-ab at 500ma a side which puts it at the same wattage as running 3 at 700ma, but you can over drive it and probably get it at 1.4a or 700ma a strip.
Better efficiency, more light if desired, more coverage and for only about $10-15 more extra strip counted, and what id probably do
Doing the dimmer is easy btw.
other than that its ebay/aliexpress options
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Pretty sure I’ve even seen solderless and pre-wired pots around, if you didn’t have a way to solder and/or were super lazy.
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Thank ya fellers. Not too lazy, want a clean install with least # of wires. Would somethin like a MW LCM-60 work? Its moren I need, but will work for 3 of em EB2 2 footers, right?
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yeah the LCM-60 would work and you can run 4 of the 560mm strips off that, still would have to wire up a potentiometer for dimming though for finer control, otherwise you just have a 500, 600ma, 700ma settings with dip switches if only running 3 strips and them being in series.
But saying that if you did go up to four strips and had two chains in parallel of 2 strips in series, then you could use the dip switches from 1400ma down to 500ma to adjust and wouldn’t really need a potentiometer. Giving you effectively 100%, 73%, 64%, 50%, and 42% with just the dip switches.
So id say doable and enough variability there forsure, driver is a good 20% more expensive than a xlg50 though, unless you can find one cheap
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Thank ya fellers! Sold! I got 4 of them 3500k EB2 strips. Not sure how Ima mount em to the lid of the tub but mebbe thermal tape. Dip switches are good fer me since this is fer seedlings/clones & I want it to be simple & easily hidden.
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Has anyone use drivers like the lrs 350-36.
There not wet location approved but I’ve mounted all my other drivers outside of the tent anyway. The price is half of other hlg models. This would significantly reduce cost of builds!
looks like you could with a 39.6v max adjustability range, but you won’t be able to set current with them as it will just push whatever is needed depending on temp of whatever voltage you set it at. Also the smaller strips “280 and 560mm” you would have to do 2 strips in series and then those in parallel with other groups to get what you need.
But doable ? yeah probably
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So a safety precaution should be brought up from some discussion that was had with @TrevorLahey over in discord chat , its something i wasn’t concerned about myself but its a good measure to be safe about it.
These bridgelux EB2 series strips on one side of the strips have bare solder points for your positive and negative sides of the circuit if one wasn’t using the attached wire connectors, saying that if handling these strips while turned on which you shouldn’t anyways these would have a potential to short out through these points and potentially electrocute you.
So just to be safe applying some Liquid Electrical tape, silicone, rtv, or non conductive paint to these spots will help eliminate any potential issue.
Bare contact points
Covered contact points by use of Liquid Electrical tape.
Edit by Jellypowered: This has been inserted into second post to reflect the FAQ/Guide nature of this post.
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Nice job 