Stealth Micro LED PC grow

Hi everyone!
 
Starting my second grow, a lot of lessons were learnt from the first one. Even though it was successful, I would like to make the process a lot smoother, get better yields this time and hopefully provide some interesting reading.
 
PC case: 50x50cm, 40x30cm grow space
 
Lighting: 90 watts of high power LED lighting. 50 watts 6400-6500k 40 watts 3000-3100k 
 
Plant: 1 White Widow
 
Grow medium: 2/3 Potting Soil and 1/3 vermiculite mixture 
 
Nutrients: Nitrosol and Multifeed (Closest equivalents I can find to Foxfarm in South Africa)
 
Any questions/advice is welcome
 
Here are some pics of the case and lights. Seed is busy soaking will start posting more pics when she sprouts.
 
Cheers for now 

 

Hi weedle.
 
The 50 watt 6400-6500k LED came with its own driver, so it was a simple as soldering red to positive and black to negative.
 
For the 4 x 10 watt 3000-3100k it was a little more complicated. Each LED requires 9v and 1000mA to run. So I sourced a 9-12v 4200mA constant current LED driver from RS components and wired them in parallel (spliting the current and not the voltage).
 

 

They do a bit, but nothing compared to CFL's. I can still touch these lights without burning my skin off. Attached below is a photo of the heart of my case. It is an aluminium rectangular tube that I mounted the lights to with thermal paste, and attached to the tube on the right is a high torque AC Cabinet fan. The fan is on a shelf inside my case, pushing air through the Aluminium and out the case. So in essence the aluminium tube acts as my exhaust, light trap, heat sink (for the lights) and carbon filter. The exhaust fan is constantly blowing over the area where the lights are mounted keeping it cool. Mounting your LED to aluminium is a must, but if you don't have good air flow over your lights I would recommend using an actual heat sink. I used to use CFL's and in summer there was heat issues, but now my case is running cool in the middle of summer. Thank you LED technology!
 

 

Thanks man! I'm with weedle would be cool to see your design
 
And I mounted my drivers to the back of my PC since they also produce a bit of heat thought it would be best to keep them on the outside.

 

Hey everyone.
 
Sorry for no updates. looks like my seeds were a bit old. Took forever for the root to sprout on this seed. but it finally did and its now in the pot.
 
Did some calculations and found that when my seedling sprouts,the light from my LED could potentially kill it, since the 50w puts out as many lumens as 200 watts of CFL , so i put in a temporary 20w CFL for the initial stages of the plants development.

 

Day 1
 
So the seedling has pushed through and is looking healthy.

 
Going to keep the cfl there until the first true leaves have developed properly ^_^

 

 

 
Yeah! I wish more of the seeds had germinated. Was the only one to pull through. Seeds are really old 
 
and yes flipped it over to LED already . Will update tomorrow for day 5. Just had to keep in mind my PC is rather small, so couldn't keep it at a safe distance while it was fragile.

 

Day 6.
 
Wanted to update yesterday but the power was out so had to postpone to today 
 
My White Widow is doing really well. Starting to grow really fast. Watered for the first time today.

 
Looking to update every 5 days or if something interesting happens.
 
Any questions and advice is more than welcome
 

 

Thanks! I'm hoping its a she  :lol: making a box from whatever I can find so I can force sex from the top i'm going to take, so i don't waste my time completely.
 
For the costs involved i was lucky because I had a lot that I could use from my first grow, but here is what its cost so far:
50watt 6400-6500k LED and driver $10
10watt 3000-3100k LED $2 x 4 = $8
Driver for 4 10watt LED's $70
High torque AC fan $5
5l container $3
Total $96
 
China has the best prices on LED's, you just have to be patient to get them  . I was unable to find a driver that matched my requirements that I could get from china, why that driver is the most expensive item i had to buy.

 

Day 10
 
Hasn't rained here for ages so the humidity has dropped really low, RH is 27%. I have been misting the inside of my pc case as much as possible, but still the leaves have curled up a little. Despite that she is still growing nice and fast and is about halfway to being big enough for me to start mainlining
 

 

Hey Weedle.
 
Yeah I'm fairly happy now. What I've learnt is that even though the temperatures are lower with LED, the intensity is still really high, which can stress a plant if it gets to close to the light. From that 50watt HIGH power LED, (which is equivalent to 100watts of HID lamp) I need to keep my plant a minimum of six inches away from the light, and when it was a young seedling 14 inches, (which i definitely don't have). So in the limited grow space 50 watts is a bit impractical. Would have rather 4 10watt high power LED's spaced out evenly so i can control the intensity by lighting each one up as i want to increase the intensity and also have a more even spread of light. SO in the minimal space we normally have in micro grows I'd recommend not going higher than 10watt high power LED's and get more of them   ( you still need to keep your young plants at least 3inches away from the 10watts)