Lighting Viparspectra par600 cob conversion

[Royalroacho]

I popped the viparspectra open today, and found it has six 50-70v 650-700mA drivers. I was thinking this would work with six 1818s, although the description on cobkits.com says it runs more efficiently over 90w? (Auto correct demanded that I must have meant "ovary" right there. Stop thinking about efficient ovaries, Samsung.) Also, it looks like all the drivers donate some voltage to 3 12v fans. Those are the wires with black terminals. Maybe someone could help me deciding what to do here. To me, It looks like my best option is to run the 1818 at 35 watts each? I don't understand enough about efficiency to know if that's worth it over dropping more on better drivers, Which I could dooo...but I'd like to work with this if possible, and upgrade when I have more dollars. Any input is greatly appreciated. Here's some pics of the unit:


Also, here's a picture of my fish attacking my bird as I took this apart, for your viewing pleasure:

 

[BigSm0]

Nothing is more efficient at higher wattages as far as I know. Efficiency is basically how much light you get per watt. What you have is close to 20% efficient and when adding cobs in place of the leds you will be upwards of 50%. 30% more light per watt means you should be a noticeable increase in light. Price wise I'd go with the 1812's which are just under the 1818's but a little cheaper.

 

[Royalroacho]

Thanks. Yeah, I did some more reading about what efficiency means. Playing with the spreadsheet calculators helped alot. I've been looking at the 1812s. Also, is kingbrite on alibaba legit? Ive been burned too many times ordering from China to trust that price... 1 to 2 usd per chip? I'll see if I can find some reviews on here...

 

[BigSm0]

Thanks. Yeah, I did some more reading about what efficiency means. Playing with the spreadsheet calculators helped alot. I've been looking at the 1812s. Also, is kingbrite on alibaba legit? Ive been burned too many times ordering from China to trust that price... 1 to 2 usd per chip? I'll see if I can find some reviews on here...

Heck no. 1812's are 17 dollars each. It's pennies in the big picture.

 

[Royalroacho]

Right, I must be misinterpreting what they mean by "per piece", or its yet another scam. I priced out the holders, chips, and some thermal paste for $175 with shipping on cobkits, with the 1818s. That's nothing, even on a stupid tight budget, especially considering I got the viparspectra as a gift. My plan is to do a run with this, and in the meantime put together enough to upgrade to a better driver/frame/heatsink/more/better/more...at least it's better to have the light building bug rather than the light buying bug...

 

[BigSm0]

Your absolutely right. Good thing about these is you can always tear em apart and upgrade.

 

[thetreeman]

I popped the viparspectra open today, and found it has six 50-70v 650-700mA drivers. I was thinking this would work with six 1818s, although the description on cobkits.com says it runs more efficiently over 90w? (Auto correct demanded that I must have meant "ovary" right there. Stop thinking about efficient ovaries, Samsung.) Also, it looks like all the drivers donate some voltage to 3 12v fans. Those are the wires with black terminals. Maybe someone could help me deciding what to do here. To me, It looks like my best option is to run the 1818 at 35 watts each? I don't understand enough about efficiency to know if that's worth it over dropping more on better drivers, Which I could dooo...but I'd like to work with this if possible, and upgrade when I have more dollars. Any input is greatly appreciated. Here's some pics of the unit:
View attachment 702586 View attachment 702587 View attachment 702588

Also, here's a picture of my fish attacking my bird as I took this apart, for your viewing pleasure:
View attachment 702589

Do you fertilize your aquarium plants? I have some live plants in my aquarium and they dont grow much at all..

 

[Royalroacho]

Do you fertilize your aquarium plants? I have some live plants in my aquarium and they dont grow much at all

Yeah, I bought this $25 pack of dry salts, which has lasted me about 2 years:
http://greenleafaquariums.com/produ...age-with-2-x-500ml-fertilizer-dispensers.html

My interest has shifted to another plant, but I was pretty obsessed with planted tanks for a while. A really easy way to get improved plant growth is to get some organic potting soil, freeze it in an ice cube tray as mud, and quickly insert it in the root ball. You can use a pvc pipe with one end above the water line, then put some sand in after it to hold the dirt down. You can buy premade root tabs, but theyre expensive, aND in my experience the soil worked better. Usually theres some plant matter in tge soil, which will be broken down into ammonia, so i dont put in too much at once. They do best in the 6500k spectrum. Putting some source of Co2 in dramatically increases their growth. It was fun, with the Co2 and everything balanced, I traded enough plants into the shop every other week to fund a pretty absurd amount of tanks I had going. And the property management knows I'm using alot of juice cuz I have all those damn fish tanks in there. Anyway, if you have decent light, just see how they respond to a small amount if you end up trying it.

 

[thetreeman]

I dont really wanna bother with co2 and I have decent lights but still seems like they dont grow much, but I get plenty of hair algae to grow! I havent been fertilizing but I made some gel caps out of osmocote plus and stuck them in the root area just 2 days ago, thought that might work. Im thinking maybe I dont change the water enough, I usually do half tank once a month or so. I have a 75 gal tank with guppies mostly and sword plants. I have led lights (5000k), just took one of my old ones apart today and converted it to cob, 4000k 90cri clu038's using about 50 watts between the 3 chips.

 

[Royalroacho]

Oh yeah, I forgot about osmocote, I've seen people get good results with it. If you've heard of flourish excel, it's an alternative source of carbon. It's actually a rebranded industrial strength disinfectant. It's rediculously expensive. You can buy the chemical, Glutaraldehyde, at 2x concentration for like 1/8th of the price, it's called metricide 14. It also wipes out any kind of algae.
I Really would like to try aquaponics and combine my hobbies, but I have to keep things stealth for now.
Back to cobs, I saw them in action last night for the first time on a car with aftermarket headlights. Jesus they're obnoxiously bright. The dude was riding my ass trying to push me to speed, I had to pull my rear view down or go blind. I'd usually get pretty angry, but I was mostly curious about the specs on the lights lol.
Still debating what to do as far as spectrum. I dunno if I should run 2 5000k and 4 3500k, or some other combo. Ill have to keep looking at other posts. I saw Bigsm0's veg results with 6500k, which were pretty damn impressive. Sigh. I need more money.