Planning to switch to LED grow lights. Your Opinions/Suggestions/Exper

[merl1n]

Double ended Hot Plant Sex? Now that is kinky lol

[my name is erl]

I had not visited oz stoners forum in a while.

I noticed a few threads where the majortity of posts were giving un-informed advice about LED lights for growing plants with very high intensity requirements.

Frankly these uninformed posts made me feel a little sorry for the growing community here and I wanted to set the record straight.

I particularly felt bad for the posters who wanted to try LEDs and were getting bad advice and being discouraged.

 

For me personally I like to save electricity for environmental reasons. I want to encourage the use of DIY LED to reduce the impact of indoor growing on the environment. Its upsetting when this tech gets bashed as it can save so much power if adopted widely which is ultimately good for the planet.

 

The thread I linked on rollitup has started somewhat of a DIY craze and for good reason as these are the 1st consistent repeatable results from LED lighting tech that are truely a step up from HID. I simply wish to share this info with the Australian growing community. I believe that there are many Australian growers have a head for science that when given the right information will be encouraged to try DIY LED (and I believe most growers that try a cxa3070 or cxa3590 DIY LED light will make the switch and get rid of all their HID).

 

I did purposefully acuse members of having their heads in the sand to get a reaction.

I'm sorry if I offended anyone.

 

That said you cannot argue with facts: The efficency of the latest generation of LED COB chips particularly the Cree CXA3070 and CXA3590 surpasses all HID lighting technology. You get more lumens and a better spectrum than any other lighting technology per watt of electricity.

 

Another reason I linked to another forum is those that claim LED tech is superiour are allways shot down for not providing photographic proof of results.

The LED and other lighting forum has all of this. There are grow journals with side by side 1000W HPS and ~600W LED that yeild very similarly.

 

To those that say LED cannot reach the intensity required. A CXA3070 driven at ~50w is so intense that It will burn a plant just like an HPS does. Must be kept at least 20cm from the canopy or the tops get crispy, with no lense and no reflector. Hold your hand a few inches from the light emmiting surface of a CXA and you feel the same heat on your hand as you woud from an HID. There are reflectors and lenses to further focus the light, I belive its possible to match and even beat the intensity of a 1000w HPS.

 

erl

nope, not a salesman

why the heck are you sending us to another canna site to read?

Edited November 13, 2014 by my name is erl

[iTiC]

I had not visited oz stoners forum in a while.

I noticed a few threads where the majortity of posts were giving un-informed advice about LED lights for growing plants with very high intensity requirements.

Frankly these uninformed posts made me feel a little sorry for the growing community here and I wanted to set the record straight.

I particularly felt bad for the posters who wanted to try LEDs and were getting bad advice and being discouraged.

 

For me personally I like to save electricity for environmental reasons. I want to encourage the use of DIY LED to reduce the impact of indoor growing on the environment. Its upsetting when this tech gets bashed as it can save so much power if adopted widely which is ultimately good for the planet.

 

The thread I linked on rollitup has started somewhat of a DIY craze and for good reason as these are the 1st consistent repeatable results from LED lighting tech that are truely a step up from HID. I simply wish to share this info with the Australian growing community. I believe that there are many Australian growers have a head for science that when given the right information will be encouraged to try DIY LED (and I believe most growers that try a cxa3070 or cxa3590 DIY LED light will make the switch and get rid of all their HID).

 

I did purposefully acuse members of having their heads in the sand to get a reaction.

I'm sorry if I offended anyone.

 

That said you cannot argue with facts: The efficency of the latest generation of LED COB chips particularly the Cree CXA3070 and CXA3590 surpasses all HID lighting technology. You get more lumens and a better spectrum than any other lighting technology per watt of electricity.

 

Another reason I linked to another forum is those that claim LED tech is superiour are allways shot down for not providing photographic proof of results.

The LED and other lighting forum has all of this. There are grow journals with side by side 1000W HPS and ~600W LED that yeild very similarly.

 

To those that say LED cannot reach the intensity required. A CXA3070 driven at ~50w is so intense that It will burn a plant just like an HPS does. Must be kept at least 20cm from the canopy or the tops get crispy, with no lense and no reflector. Hold your hand a few inches from the light emmiting surface of a CXA and you feel the same heat on your hand as you woud from an HID. There are reflectors and lenses to further focus the light, I belive its possible to match and even beat the intensity of a 1000w HPS.

Appriciated, I would like to see a full study done into this. As far as I am aware the SUN is the only perfect light source guaranteed

to yeild full spectrum of cannabanoids. HID yeild Less Plasma Yeild better than HID and as far as Im aware LED's have been developing this spectral deficiency. Probably just a matter of time before they come up with the right combo. I think cost of production and disposal also needs to be factored in; environmentally speaking.

The future is for the bright.

Edited November 13, 2014 by iTiC

[my name is erl]

Appriciated, I would like to see a full study done into this. As far as I am aware the SUN is the only perfect light source guaranteed

to yeild full spectrum of cannabanoids. HID yeild Less Plasma Yeild better than HID and as far as Im aware LED's have been developing this spectral deficiency. Probably just a matter of time before they come up with the right combo. I think cost of production and disposal also needs to be factored in; environmentally speaking.

The future looks bright.

 

You will find plenty of evidence on rollitup, as I mentioned there are detailed grow journals showing 1000w HPS and LED side by side.

NASA poineered the use of LEDs for horticulture. If you have an uderstanding of how lighting technology works then you will understand that its really all about efficency. There is nothing magic about the spectral profile of the sun, the sun simply provides enough photon flux in a broad enough spectrum to satisfy the various requirements the plants have. Because plants evolved under the suns spectrum they have evolved to grow best under similarly broad spectrum light. LEDs are now capable of producing a more balanced spectrum with superior efficency too HID technology (CMH may be more balanced but the efficency is significantly lower than LED). Simply put its a matter of more light for the same amount of electricy usage (more red, more green, more yellow, more blue ... more of everything with the exeption of far red and infrared). The lack of Far Red and IR is a disadvantage but this is made up for by getting more light at even more useful wavelengths for the plant (a debatable point .... side by side grow journals convinced me that loosing Far Red and IR is a fair trade off).

 

I dont need to prove that more light = faster growth and higher yeild .... I think that can be taken as a well established fact.

 

Something to consider: HPS does not have the best spectrum so why is it the best HID yeilder (or one of the best)? IMHO this is because HPS is the most efficent HID (highest lumens per watt) despite having a spectrum that is very different to the sun.

 

"I think cost of production and disposal also needs to be factored in; environmentally speaking.

The future looks bright."

 

I totally agree and this is an area where LED has another advantage .... no bulb replacements. Electricity is very expensive in Australia so the higher upfront cost will be offset by power savings pretty quickly. Costs roughly $1000 to replace a 1000w HPS via DIY LED lights not sure how long that would take to recover in savings .... maybe a few years. Also LEDs are mecury free. Going DIY means that at least 50% of your investment can be reused when the LED diodes wear out.

 

At the end of the day I just wanted to get my POV up on this forum. The tech has reached the point where its surpassed HID by enough that those that take a serious look at LED and other lighting forum on rollitup will find enough evidence to give it a go. Maybe one day I will be acknowaged as the dude who spread the word about this DIY LED tech via ozstoners too Australia. I will have helped out fellow growers but more importantly helped to reduce carbon emissions ... that would be really cool.

Edited November 13, 2014 by my name is erl

[Sunsetcoastreefer]

Hey Hash,

As usual with this topic, people tend to have very distinct views on LED's. 

The problem I see is that the people that don't like them lump all LED grow lights in the same basket.

That is like saying all cars are the same!

As with any product, there are shit LED's and there are good ones, so do your research.

I am having fairly good results with my LED in flower and of course they are a lot cheaper to run and don't bang out too much heat.

Good luck.

[The Stoned Jester]

See the problem with LED's are they released they WAY to early with inferior lights/chips/diodes/whatever  ..... it's like any product you need to put it though rigours testing and redesigning until you have a product that is worthy of 'street release'.

 

The people behind the idea wanted a quick buck ( cheap chinese crap) they didn't take the time required and ended up making a bad name for LED's in general.

 

How do you expect people to jump on the band wagon now it's like crying wolf no one is prepared to believe that they are better ... it's a deep hole LED's have dug them selves into and they are having trouble getting out. 

[Sixty-Eight]

im using a couple 300 watt (185 watt real power usage) LED lights i would ideally need to run 4 pieces just to cover a 3x3 area there abouts thats realistically 740watts of power im using to light up an area a 400w MH/HPS would light up and running 4 would probably produce the heat of a 600w MH/HPS i was running mine somewhere around 50cm the growth was slow i lowered them to around 20-25cm than i had some decent growth but it bleeched my plants

 

also the way they designed the LED lights i think is a shit design, the cool air is sucked down thru the top of the LED light and blown out thru the sides now with a small exhaust fan in a tent and the air blowing out the side of the lights creates a barrier of warm air which from my experience traps and circulates the hot air below the lamp around the plants now if i was to suck the ass out of my tent with a decent exhaust fan i would need to run a heater in cooler months to maintain the correct temps, if i slowed down the fans it would go back to creating the barrier again

 

an improvement would be to have channels or gullies inside of the LED lights where the cool air can be channelled thru the sides along the heatsinks than up and out the centre top of the lights

 

also seeing the 300w LED is producing a intense enough light to bleech i think they should move each individual LED chip a little further apart to cover more area, say my light is something like 21x40cm diameter they should use the same amount of chips but in a bigger light around 50x50cm than us growers would be able to run the LED lights at 25cm, cover a decent area and do without the bleeching

 

a 300w (185w) 50x50cm light would cover roughly 70x70cm and probably pushing it 90x90cm tent now realistically that would be the best bang for buck 185 watts to run a 90x90cm tent but at the moment these 21x40cm LED lights only cover about 35x50cm grow area there abouts,

 

im running 4 medium size pots around 9-13 litres the pots are huddled together with the 300w LED lights side by side and im only just covering the pots which sucks for the 370watts of true power their using

[my name is erl]

im using a couple 300 watt (185 watt real power usage) LED lights i would ideally need to run 4 pieces just to cover a 3x3 area there abouts thats realistically 740watts of power im using to light up an area a 400w MH/HPS would light up and running 4 would probably produce the heat of a 600w MH/HPS i was running mine somewhere around 50cm the growth was slow i lowered them to around 20-25cm than i had some decent growth but it bleeched my plants

 

also the way they designed the LED lights i think is a shit design, the cool air is sucked down thru the top of the LED light and blown out thru the sides now with a small exhaust fan in a tent and the air blowing out the side of the lights creates a barrier of warm air which from my experience traps and circulates the hot air below the lamp around the plants now if i was to suck the ass out of my tent with a decent exhaust fan i would need to run a heater in cooler months to maintain the correct temps, if i slowed down the fans it would go back to creating the barrier again

 

an improvement would be to have channels or gullies inside of the LED lights where the cool air can be channelled thru the sides along the heatsinks than up and out the centre top of the lights

 

also seeing the 300w LED is producing a intense enough light to bleech i think they should move each individual LED chip a little further apart to cover more area, say my light is something like 21x40cm diameter they should use the same amount of chips but in a bigger light around 50x50cm than us growers would be able to run the LED lights at 25cm, cover a decent area and do without the bleeching

 

a 300w (185w) 50x50cm light would cover roughly 70x70cm and probably pushing it 90x90cm tent now realistically that would be the best bang for buck 185 watts to run a 90x90cm tent but at the moment these 21x40cm LED lights only cover about 35x50cm grow area there abouts,

 

im running 4 medium size pots around 9-13 litres the pots are huddled together with the 300w LED lights side by side and im only just covering the pots which sucks for the 370watts of true power their using

 

Sounds like your using some pretty cheap and crappy chinese LED panels. A 600w HPS would be a better choice in terms of power used and yeild. FYI the Area51 LED panels adress the issue you mentioned about the diodes needing to be spaced further appart. IMO Area51 are probably the best value for money that you can currently get in Australia, they use a mix of white and red Cree diodes. There are a bunch of grow journals showing results with various models of Area51 LED panels. There are better panels such as ApacheTech but these are much more expensive and IMO only a little bit better. Do not expect more grams per watt than you would get with a 600w or 1000w HPS. You can expect better quality (more trichs) and also greatly reduced risk of fire. These higher end commercial panels are great for replacing 400w or less as those smaller HID arent as efficent as the big ones (so you can expect an improved GPW in that senario).

 

FYI the reason the panel is designed to ventilate the way it does is that its more efficient to push air through heatsink fins with an axial fan than to pull.

On a well designed LED panel the air comming out of the fixture would be barely warmer than the ambeint air temp.

Your LED panels probably have inadequate heatsinks, cheap inefficient diodes, poor thermal interfacing between diodes and heatsinks .... it takes quality materials and workmanship to make a quality LED light. I actually like the effect that the fan blowing down through heatisinks has on the canopy, additional air circulation. My DIYed LED light is specifically designed to exhaust into the cannopy so I dont need as many fans blowing the plants.

 

If you go DIY then you have the option of water cooling your LEDs removing all the heat they produce from the tent .... or ducting it out cool tube style.

[louise]

I just had a look at ApacheTech... I think you'll find that many people are still going to opt for HPS... regardless of the higher running costs. The outlay costs on LED are still significant and it doesn't matter how quickly you recoop the costs in saved electricity, if you can't find the ready to buy the panel in the first place. Same goes for building your own panels... this isn't an activity that everyone can undertake.

 

I use HPS with a magnetic ballast and I doubt I will change that unless the ballast fails. One of the reasons I will stay with a less efficient, somewhat outmoded set up, is in preparation for the next time I get busted... no magistrate is going to hear from the pigs that I had a "sophisticated and highly productive hydroponic grow lab" in the sewing room.

[iTiC]

You will find plenty of evidence on rollitup, as I mentioned there are detailed grow journals showing 1000w HPS and LED side by side.

NASA poineered the use of LEDs for horticulture. If you have an uderstanding of how lighting technology works then you will understand that its really all about efficency. There is nothing magic about the spectral profile of the sun, the sun simply provides enough photon flux in a broad enough spectrum to satisfy the various requirements the plants have. Because plants evolved under the suns spectrum they have evolved to grow best under similarly broad spectrum light. LEDs are now capable of producing a more balanced spectrum with superior efficency too HID technology (CMH may be more balanced but the efficency is significantly lower than LED). Simply put its a matter of more light for the same amount of electricy usage (more red, more green, more yellow, more blue ... more of everything with the exeption of far red and infrared). The lack of Far Red and IR is a disadvantage but this is made up for by getting more light at even more useful wavelengths for the plant (a debatable point .... side by side grow journals convinced me that loosing Far Red and IR is a fair trade off).

 

I dont need to prove that more light = faster growth and higher yeild .... I think that can be taken as a well established fact.

 

Something to consider: HPS does not have the best spectrum so why is it the best HID yeilder (or one of the best)? IMHO this is because HPS is the most efficent HID (highest lumens per watt) despite having a spectrum that is very different to the sun.

 

"I think cost of production and disposal also needs to be factored in; environmentally speaking.

The future looks bright."

 

I totally agree and this is an area where LED has another advantage .... no bulb replacements. Electricity is very expensive in Australia so the higher upfront cost will be offset by power savings pretty quickly. Costs roughly $1000 to replace a 1000w HPS via DIY LED lights not sure how long that would take to recover in savings .... maybe a few years. Also LEDs are mecury free. Going DIY means that at least 50% of your investment can be reused when the LED diodes wear out.

 

At the end of the day I just wanted to get my POV up on this forum. The tech has reached the point where its surpassed HID by enough that those that take a serious look at LED and other lighting forum on rollitup will find enough evidence to give it a go. Maybe one day I will be acknowaged as the dude who spread the word about this DIY LED tech via ozstoners too Australia. I will have helped out fellow growers but more importantly helped to reduce carbon emissions ... that would be really cool.

How replaceable are the bulbs. For a novice how technical would bulb replacement be. Do they come in spare pannels or individual bulbs, Cheers for the feed back.