I Build My Own LEDs

@Cyrusdavirus, UV-B apparently disrupts the reproduction cycle in some pests. I am re-thinking the use of UV-B for this reason alone....

Anything that imitates the sun is good for the plant in my opinion ,so I am all about using the UVA's. In one of Bugbee's videos, he mentions that more than 10 minutes of UVC would burn the plants. UVB seems to cause a lot of the plant's stress response, but even if I did have access to UVB diodes, I would not use them in my space. Too much of a safety issue.

@NegotiatedBubble, sorry mate for the long reply. I have only really shipped down to my friend in thailand but I am about to try send some lights (LM301H/240w) to the US (south carolina) with a driver,dimmer and other goodies like wire hangers etc. This at cost for me is around 140-170usd in total. Shipping at the moment from China globally is getting cheaper with the large amount of new companies starting to enter the market so its about find a good one. To Air frieght to thailand has cost me around 15 usd for kilo then +$3 for every kilo up to 20 kilos. From talks with contact here the US should be the same. Shipping to the US i will let you know how it goes. Right now I have two options. 1. send in one big package and pay taxes. 2. Send in two smaller packages as gifts so i dont have to pay taxes. Conditions for this option is i have to keep the total value under $100 and both packages cant be recieved on the same day so im going to ship them out a week a part.

@Bingbings_garden, I live in the US, so I have to Air Freight the bars unfortunately. Meanwell drivers are not much of a discount from here, so I ordered the drivers domestically. If you have any good sources for components or shipping hacks, please share!

@Bingbings_garden, it is very sad to see so many people paying a ton of money for their lights. Building lights is quite addicting. I am about to order more light bars and a 480w Meanwell AB driver. The 480w has a feature that their lower wattage drivers do not: it can increase to %120 of the voltage at the expense of reducing the current to 80%. Compared to other 480w drivers, this is 1 extra light bar per build! I have added a picture to this diary that has a screenshot from the HLG-320H-C manual and HLG-480H-C manuals. I stumbled across this by accident. Very cool.

@420DeepGrow, thank you for taking the time to stop by!

@NegotiatedBubble, ok thx

@NegotiatedBubble, I´m trying to find a store who sells and specializes in lamps. They are asking what I need, and don´t understand why I ask a lamp in WATTS. Do I ask about intensity/brightness? They also talk about normal lamps not leds....

@Domingocito, germination of the seeds does not take much light intensity due to the lack of leaves (around 70% humidity is crucial). Once the normal leaves are established, it will be time to increase the light intensity. I use the dimmer on my regular grow light to lower the intensity. I would go with a high wattage Meanwell driver that has dimming built in. The price difference is not much more for higher wattages and you can always add more light bars later (light bars are the cheap component). I am already wishing that I would have bought the 480 watt Meanwell. I recommend watching the "DIY LED basics: getting started building your own grow lights (episodes 1-6), GrowMau5" videos that are linked above in my diary comments.