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Thread: Which style air cooled reflector works best?

  1. #1

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    Default Which style air cooled reflector works best?

    There are two kinds. One like this where the air is taken away from above.

    See attachments
    And the other where the air is pushed sideways and out through ducting.
    See attachments

    Which one works better? Both are a similar price on eBay

    I'll be using a 120mm Slip Stream PC fan that can push or pull about 100cfm


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  2. #2

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    what size light are you using ? what are the temps like at the min ?

    the reason i ask is the one that takes hot air up through the top does not have glass covering the front thats what put me off buying it ,,, imo i cant see it making much difference !!

    cooltubes are good but the only thing is the spread of light is not the best !!!

    so i went with cool star reflector from greens witch i found to be good with my 600watt light and 5" ruck fan i could get my light about 1ft away from the plant tops without it being to hot !!! now im using a 8" ruck extractor with cool star and you can get it about 2" away from the tops with no problems at all !! only thing is you need to clean the glass once a week because with a extractor sucking the air through the reflector it collects dust !!

    safe oneeye

  3. #3

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    Ive got the cool tube, its very cool with my ruck 125, i can touch the glass with no fear of burning.
    But, its not a fantastic reflector...It does the job though as i can get it really close to the plants...
    Six of one and half a dozen of the other...

  4. #4

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    Thanks guys - My wardrobe is small and gets hot quick - For my seedlings at the mo they're under a 300w CFL grow light but come flowering time I will be using my 250w HPS light which does get hot and quickly ups the temp up to about 34c and thats with the normal extractors and intake on.

    So, I think this cool tube might give me more heat protection from the plants. -
    My main concern is heat not lumens for this reflector.

  5. #5

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    I think I'm going to go with this one from Greens as it is bigger (50cm) than the ebay one (38cm)

  6. #6

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    Default Cool Tube worked for me.

    I can vouch for the Cool Tube style. My origional DIY grow room reached 36C and over when just using my 400W HPS and my fan on max. I bought a 5" Cool Tube on Ebay for £35 and some 5" flexible ducting from the same guy. The 5" ducting fitted my 4" fan no problem as its quite soft and can be clamped. I now have to use a small heater to compensate and the dual speed fan is set on the lower of the two speeds. After 18 hours lamp time the glass is only luke warm, I can easly hold the back of my hand against it.

    Your right though when you point out that the reflector is crap, the wings on mine were not much more than 3". After a bit of smoking one night I realised that I'd bought a 250W CFL on Ebay too and it came with a free euro style reflector. I hacksawed the wings away from the top flat part of the reflector and then drilled a mounting hole in the two top corners. Then just replaced the origional wings for my new ones. I had to bend them a bit to get them right but they bend easy. Now my Cool Tube has massive wings and light output is first class - the top of my room is visably much darker. I think I've lost some light compared to my normal reflector but the heat reduction more than makes up for that small loss. I'll take a photo if I get a chance in a dark period.

  7. #7

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    Thanks for that - I recieved the Cool tube from Greens in only a couple of days, and I was so pleased I didn't cheap out with the eBay one as this cool tube is so professional. My ambient temp with the 250HPS going and the cool tube on is now about 28˚c which I'm very happy with. I have 2 PC fans moving air through it.
    1x 120mm an pushing air past bulb and another 92mm PC fan mounted on a exhaust hole near the top of the wardrobe. These easily and quietly mve away the hot air so I can touch the cool tube glass although it is hot but you can hold your hand there.

    I now have 2 cheap relectos and one pro one. - I may well get chopping as the wings that came with mine were only about 2 or 3 inches like yours. I may just try and buy a piece of that thin cheap metal though as then I can at least sell the basic reflector on eBay.

  8. #8
    paul333 Guest

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    Quote Originally Posted by Tripples View Post
    Thanks for that - I recieved the Cool tube from Greens in only a couple of days, and I was so pleased I didn't cheap out with the eBay one as this cool tube is so professional. My ambient temp with the 250HPS going and the cool tube on is now about 28˚c which I'm very happy with. I have 2 PC fans moving air through it.
    1x 120mm an pushing air past bulb and another 92mm PC fan mounted on a exhaust hole near the top of the wardrobe. These easily and quietly mve away the hot air so I can touch the cool tube glass although it is hot but you can hold your hand there.

    I now have 2 cheap relectos and one pro one. - I may well get chopping as the wings that came with mine were only about 2 or 3 inches like yours. I may just try and buy a piece of that thin cheap metal though as then I can at least sell the basic reflector on eBay.
    Sounds like you've got it all sorted mate...good effort.

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