Lighting questions.. Considering LED over hps/mh combo

[Where am I]

im gonna use my smallest plant from upcoming harvest to try it. i know i have done 2 days when i grew outside but that was chopping it down and hanging upside down in the dark it helped make a little more sticky. i have not done a plant in dark yet, ive read several posts here and on other sights saying it does same thing makes it stickier and such. so ill put all in for 2 days pull all out but 1 and let it go and see the diff. ill have gree light so if it starts going funny ill pull it.

I have done both a dark period and no dark period. It is a toss up... You are trying to measure something that is objective.... You could check out Mr. Paka on the tube . He actually shot a couple of videos with different periods of darkness....

 

[Where am I]

Here are a couple of pics of a current grow and light box on the screen vent.

 

[DCobeen]

okay cool thank you both. yeah i might jsut stay with what i got 172 actual led watt's i can grow under i wanted more but need to wait till they all get a little better. or buy a tent package which saves a ton of money buying a package. im not using my 180 watt (112 actual) till flower. and i have to make my blueberry's stretch again so much inside tight growth gonna be hard to get light in them if i dont.

 

[monkeychief]

QUOTE=PaxEtBonum;10187229]Yo. I've been watching discussions on here where people champion panels that are like the Buick of panels (hey, it's not too expensive and gets you to work). Look, I spent two decades growing, before law was on my side, and before I ever considered LED as a possibility. Then I watched the shit panels disappoint people, and people applaud mediocre panels, rather than investing in great panels. You find a panel with 10W Crees, UVB, and all the spectrums, you marry that girl, son.

My family ran a 100=hectare sugar plantation in the early 70's and I grew up working on a orchard/vineyard, I've been growing these girls for over 20yrs. before going leds like u. I wouldn't call sticking a handful of inefficient 10w chips to only run half and by the time u add the extra heat and overhead, there's not much left of that gal to marry. It's got the industry standard 11+ band spec. along with the 4 and 5 bands rounding out most of the red spec. It's got most of the par peaks but can't be full spectrum without the use of whites which their spec. lacks. Not to say this spec. will not work fine because it's a tried and trued spec. as I've use it and it works very well. My intention is not to doubt what's legit just question ones that doesn't sound logical. Advance is a great company and has been around for a long time. I'm just giving people other alternatives since this is the intention of the thread in the first place. After this girl took it all off, there's much left to marry.

I did, and I won't look back or listen to arguments about which 600 panel is better than which 300 panel. Drop the money on a quality panel. No switching between spectrums, no heat (four fans and four heatsinks per panel) and a warranty to beat hell that I've never had to use. 4 fans and heat sinks.

I would hope the car has 4 wheels and tires otherwise it wouldn't run very well. Guess that's why the Hans don't run very well. So u wouldn't be concern if a 600w 10w panel that pulled only half it's capacity due to extra heat and overhead vs. a 300w 3w panel pulling 220w being more efficient for half the price. For the same money u can have 2 300w for a combined actual 440w vs. 300w for the same price and get better coverage. There's nothing wrong with spending money as long as there's value-added. The switching between spectrum and no heat got me. It's a physical impossibility to have running electrical current with generating heat. All reputable companies will have at least 3yrs. as competition also sets industry standards one must follow to survive in a very competitive reality.



It'll cost you a penny. But two of my plants paid for all three panels. First go round. No circus shit.

Yes, this light will probably serve it's owner purpose with flying colors. The point is there's other more cost-effective alternatives. Not all of us are in this for the money so cost is a factor. You can get it right the first time and save a lot of time and resources if u invest the time to be better informed. Never like the circus. Don't like clowns.



Advanced LED (US company, sent me three free bulbs and continue to check in on my happiness with the panels and ask if they are functioning well and if I'm cleaning the dust guards and etc). Here you go. Again, the LED discussion, the world of it, is filled with people who pray to the ones they bought and celebrate them profusely. Funny thing is, I bought mine to cut down on consumption and embrace organic sustainability and maintain yields. These lights beat my 1000w and 600w HPS into dirt. I gave my HPS digs to a friend's kid after one run with these, but I told him to get into LED after his first run. It's smarter, better, provided you avoid snake oil salesman.

Sounds like you're doing the same type of praising yourself. Besides, what's wrong with celebrating and praising something you bought that has bring u enough satisfaction for u to make the effort of praising. Can u please tell me the exact model and growing discipline to beat the 600 and 1k HPS?

You can expect it to be a five or so years until the other companies get on board with CREE technology; unless they have since I first grabbed my gear, but they weren't at the time and I haven't checked up on companies that were underperforming when I bought this (but they were, in many ways). Don't give me that HANS panel bullshit, because they are shit compared to these; a buddy owns two and my shit blue his mind. Do you want a swedish motorbike or a harley? Listen, you've got X hours and months per grow and X grows per year. You want to piss that away saving a few bucks upfront. The plants know what they want. They want it good. So treat them good . View attachment 2992001

Well that 5 yrs. gone by quick cause u can get CREE chips for an extra $1 per 3w chip from a lot of these factories direct. Besides, Cree and other high-end chips are like money in a swiss account. You don't really need it but it's nice to know that it's there. The difference in efficiency is more less academic cause I don't think the girls are going to be able to tell the difference.

This is early on in flowering. Let the negative nancies commence bitching about how these lights cost twice what their lights cost. Yeah, that happens. It's called cost per performance value. A Lamborghini costs more than a Buick. Vroom.[/QUOTE]

Not all of us are as fortunate as you paying half as much as your lights but we can save up and buy Blackdogs, HGL, GLH, and many others as well. I don't think paying twice as much for something will improve it's cost-effectiveness, I mean cost per performance value. A Lambo costs more than a Buick? OOOOOOO.....KKKKK....... As long as it's not a Grand National GNX. lol.

 

[DCobeen]

i like your lights. Price is out their. i can say this if i can harvest and make money all money goes towards lights first with tent. I thought i was sold on a light but you all opened my eyes allot. right now i just added 9 more bands to my 6 bands. so with the lights i have 12 diff light spectums at 172 actual led. okay these are baby leds' i will get a big boy led in may/june. i will grow same dank smoke, i grew way too many years outside not too. this is a new world for me. So if i have not let me say hi all. i will question you say what i think is right. if i am wrong say so dont hold back. really indoor growing is so much and yet so simple. i have to learn the balance of indoor growing. i can look at a plant and know what is missing or not usually. Learning the lights/ new air injection system is an adventure i might say. But once ive done it it gets better. You all have showed me so much and i thank you all. Ty RIU family. IM gonna sit back relax and learn my system.

 

[monkeychief]

i like your lights. Price is out their. i can say this if i can harvest and make money all money goes towards lights first with tent. I thought i was sold on a light but you all opened my eyes allot. right now i just added 9 more bands to my 6 bands. so with the lights i have 12 diff light spectums at 172 actual led. okay these are baby leds' i will get a big boy led in may/june. i will grow same dank smoke, i grew way too many years outside not too. this is a new world for me. So if i have not let me say hi all. i will question you say what i think is right. if i am wrong say so dont hold back. really indoor growing is so much and yet so simple. i have to learn the balance of indoor growing. i can look at a plant and know what is missing or not usually. Learning the lights/ new air injection system is an adventure i might say. But once ive done it it gets better. You all have showed me so much and i thank you all. Ty RIU family. IM gonna sit back relax and learn my system.

Just remember if you can try to include some cool-whites in there to provide the full in full-spectrum. Otherwise you will not be able to hit all of the bands in between. Remember the plant has evolved and specifically designed to sunlight standards. Sunlight is the true full spectrum including all bands in between. You should also try not to buy one single high-power unit and try to split the wattage into mulitple units to increase the coverage and footprint in order to offset the inverse square law which will dramatically affect the intensity level on the outer edge of your footprint. Like I said, there's a lot of reputable companies with good products but the price is up to your budget and interests. I've been thru almost 30 panels of different makes and models from the states and direct china factories so I've learned the hard way at the expense of time and resources. I just thought I'd pass on some of my experience in hopes of helping people avoid the same mistakes and save them a lot of time, resource, and frustration later. After almost 6 yrs. of playing with these things it's hard for me to see new people being misguided by biased opinions that sometimes makes no logical sense. Because of this reason it bothers me to see new people being misguided by so-called experts that makes no logical sense at all if you have had some practical experience under your belt. As with anything, they will come in all different sizes and shapes, it's up to you to determine which best suits your application. The other thing is some will always work better than others so the only thing you can do is "caveat emptor!".

You might want to do some further research into the usage of different shades of whites, especially the bright whites that peak in the green and blue band which promotes lateral and foliage growth. You also have the extra canopy penetration of the green band, which incidentally is widely considered not used by the plant and reason for leaves being green because it's being deflected. The white leds are also more efficient than the reds by as much as 60% depending on the exact temp. you're running. If you're running leds, I believe this multi-level high density sog-type system is the best application for this technology. Just remember not to buy into the snake oil marketing by investing a little time informing yourself and be logical about it. You have access to a wealth of info. a keystroke away.
Good luck with your led endeavor.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVNxNVnkBPE

 

[Where am I]

i like your lights. Price is out their. i can say this if i can harvest and make money all money goes towards lights first with tent. I thought i was sold on a light but you all opened my eyes allot. right now i just added 9 more bands to my 6 bands. so with the lights i have 12 diff light spectums at 172 actual led. okay these are baby leds' i will get a big boy led in may/june. i will grow same dank smoke, i grew way too many years outside not too. this is a new world for me. So if i have not let me say hi all. i will question you say what i think is right. if i am wrong say so dont hold back. really indoor growing is so much and yet so simple. i have to learn the balance of indoor growing. i can look at a plant and know what is missing or not usually. Learning the lights/ new air injection system is an adventure i might say. But once ive done it it gets better. You all have showed me so much and i thank you all. Ty RIU family. IM gonna sit back relax and learn my system.

Yes, I been using LED's for about 3 years now and I found that you need intensity and spectrum. If you get outside of the core footprint you will get airy popcorn buds. If you grow SOG SCOG short plants you can get good density. If you grow larger plants your going to need more intensity. I also lean more towards full spectrum lights. In my HPS days I always supplemented my tent with 6500 K cfl's during the flowering cycle and 2100 K during veg. Outdoor plants get a full spectrum and great intensity. There are a lot of variables to consider on a indoor grow which can affect quality and quantity. Just like the difference with using a HID lighting system vs an LED lighting system. It takes some time put once you learn what your plants need they will reward you in the end...

 

[Don Styln]

Hey MonkeyChief - glad to see you here, Thanks for the invite.
Output

 

[Where am I]

Just remember if you can try to include some cool-whites in there to provide the full in full-spectrum. Otherwise you will not be able to hit all of the bands in between. Remember the plant has evolved and specifically designed to sunlight standards. Sunlight is the true full spectrum including all bands in between. You should also try not to buy one single high-power unit and try to split the wattage into mulitple units to increase the coverage and footprint in order to offset the inverse square law which will dramatically affect the intensity level on the outer edge of your footprint. Like I said, there's a lot of reputable companies with good products but the price is up to your budget and interests. I've been thru almost 30 panels of different makes and models from the states and direct china factories so I've learned the hard way at the expense of time and resources. I just thought I'd pass on some of my experience in hopes of helping people avoid the same mistakes and save them a lot of time, resource, and frustration later. After almost 6 yrs. of playing with these things it's hard for me to see new people being misguided by biased opinions that sometimes makes no logical sense. Because of this reason it bothers me to see new people being misguided by so-called experts that makes no logical sense at all if you have had some practical experience under your belt. As with anything, they will come in all different sizes and shapes, it's up to you to determine which best suits your application. The other thing is some will always work better than others so the only thing you can do is "caveat emptor!".

You might want to do some further research into the usage of different shades of whites, especially the bright whites that peak in the green and blue band which promotes lateral and foliage growth. You also have the extra canopy penetration of the green band, which incidentally is widely considered not used by the plant and reason for leaves being green because it's being deflected. The white leds are also more efficient than the reds by as much as 60% depending on the exact temp. you're running. If you're running leds, I believe this multi-level high density sog-type system is the best application for this technology. Just remember not to buy into the snake oil marketing by investing a little time informing yourself and be logical about it. You have access to a wealth of info. a keystroke away.
Good luck with your led endeavor.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVNxNVnkBPE

Hi Fellow Resin Thumbers,

I found this vid on the Tube... If the Inverse Square Law has you scratching your head..... It gives a real good example... Basically the farther away your light is less intensity your plant gets....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYMKERZ4sZo


WAI

 

[Don Styln]

yes the china based contact center worries me greatly.. Just when I think I found someone to buy from!! back to the drawing board

Nonsense - most all LED lights are made in China.

I have two Mars ll 1200's, one Mars ll 900 and a small blue UFO from them and they are working just fine. LG_LED is a very good company. I have received 3 orders from them and each time they have done exactly as they said they would.

 

[DCobeen]

Don i want to knwo about the marsII lights. I was suggesting them and was shunned. I want to buy a led and dont want to spend allot. is your lights growing great plants/nugs? if so pm me please i want to grow great weed with low costs.

 

[Don Styln]

Yo. I've been watching discussions on here where people champion panels that are like the Buick of panels (hey, it's not too expensive and gets you to work). Look, I spent two decades growing, before law was on my side, and before I ever considered LED as a possibility. Then I watched the shit panels disappoint people, and people applaud mediocre panels, rather than investing in great panels. You find a panel with 10W Crees, UVB, and all the spectrums, you marry that girl, son.

I did, and I won't look back or listen to arguments about which 600 panel is better than which 300 panel. Drop the money on a quality panel. No switching between spectrums, no heat (four fans and four heatsinks per panel) and a warranty to beat hell that I've never had to use.

It'll cost you a penny. But two of my plants paid for all three panels. First go round. No circus shit.

Advanced LED (US company, sent me three free bulbs and continue to check in on my happiness with the panels and ask if they are functioning well and if I'm cleaning the dust guards and etc). Here you go. Again, the LED discussion, the world of it, is filled with people who pray to the ones they bought and celebrate them profusely. Funny thing is, I bought mine to cut down on consumption and embrace organic sustainability and maintain yields. These lights beat my 1000w and 600w HPS into dirt. I gave my HPS digs to a friend's kid after one run with these, but I told him to get into LED after his first run. It's smarter, better, provided you avoid snake oil salesman.

You can expect it to be a five or so years until the other companies get on board with CREE technology; unless they have since I first grabbed my gear, but they weren't at the time and I haven't checked up on companies that were underperforming when I bought this (but they were, in many ways). Don't give me that HANS panel bullshit, because they are shit compared to these; a buddy owns two and my shit blue his mind. Do you want a swedish motorbike or a harley? Listen, you've got X hours and months per grow and X grows per year. You want to piss that away saving a few bucks upfront. The plants know what they want. They want it good. So treat them good . View attachment 2992001

This is early on in flowering. Let the negative nancies commence bitching about how these lights cost twice what their lights cost. Yeah, that happens. It's called cost per performance value. A Lamborghini costs more than a Buick. Vroom.

Pax - what lights are you using?

 

[Don Styln]

Don i want to knwo about the marsII lights. I was suggesting them and was shunned. I want to buy a led and dont want to spend allot. is your lights growing great plants/nugs? if so pm me please i want to grow great weed with low costs.

Listen, people will talk crap all the time. You got to do the research yourself and make your own mind up.

I looked into LEDs for quite some time until I finally made the decision to go with LGLED. I'm not saying they are the best lights out there by any stretch of imagination. In fact, I would like to test them against one of the LUSH lights. I suspect a LUSH light would kick the Mars ll lights to the curb. But at somewhere around four times the cost, I don't know. I would still like to do a test.

Here's what I have done so far… I started three different strains of plants. Veged them until they were mature and I could take clones. About two thirds of my clones have been transplanted. My intention is to give them two weeks, transplant them to 5 gallon pots and flip to 12/12.

Since I have not completed a full grow with them I can't tell you how they will do nug wise. But since I will not be selling anything, And it is only for my personal use I'm not too worried about popcorn buds. For me, the worst that will happen is I will use those to make oil or put them into my bubble bags.

I made my choice primarily on price. I do not believe they will equal the yield of HPS. But they are perfectly good for what I want to do for now.

What I really don't understand is why the high-end or high-priced companies don't do a direct comparison with for example the Mars ll 1200 lights. If they are really that much better, you would think they would want to show the world. If I could get 30% or 40% greater yield it might justify the additional price. So far I have not been able to find such comparisons. If anybody knows of any, I would appreciate being pointed in the direction.

Up to the point in the process that I am at, the Mars ll are working really well.

My strains are all primarily sativa so I've got another 12 weeks or so to wait after I go to 12/12 lighting. So we will see.

MonkeyChief really knows his lights. Pay attention to what he says and you will learn enough to make a good decision about what works.

 

[DCobeen]

So far the ones who own these light stand up for them.
Cali strom
A-51
Advanced LED
So now you say you like yours but dont have a grow yet so please start one in led section.
Ive seen your light MarII grow some great weed at 420mag. I'll be buying around the time you are close to harvest or already harvested. That way i know which one to buy. Im also wondering if you changed the Led driver/drivers to a bigger one and pushed your watts to 4 watts per diode what a diff that would make. or is that not possible?

 

[Don Styln]

So far the ones who own these light stand up for them.
Cali strom
A-51
Advanced LED
So now you say you like yours but dont have a grow yet so please start one in led section.
Ive seen your light MarII grow some great weed at 420mag. I'll be buying around the time you are close to harvest or already harvested. That way i know which one to buy. Im also wondering if you changed the Led driver/drivers to a bigger one and pushed your watts to 4 watts per diode what a diff that would make. or is that not possible?

Not sure who you are speaking to. I will most likely not be starting a journal. But we'll see.

As you said, you have seen people do journals with these lights and they work fine. They are working for me. There are probably much better lights out there. But for the cost and the way they perform, they are plenty good enough for me at this point. I will be working on my strategies, soil etc.

And as I said, I will be testing others down the road as well - as we all should be at this point, probably. I think this next year will see even more breakthroughs. But it's kind of like computers, if you wait for the one that's coming just down the road you will never buy.

Pick which one you can afford and that suits your needs at this point. Starting is half the battle.

All the above said, if I were going to buy something that costs a lot of money, I would probably buy LUSH lights. The big growers are all turning to these lights for the most part. That says something. You can look them up on YouTube and see some pretty incredible results. When the time comes for me to buy more and expand my space a bit, I will probably buy one and test it.

If you are going to go with the Mars ll - the 1200's have a maximum useable footprint of 4x4, in my opinion.

In addition, I see little reason to go with a 5 W light when they can only be powered to about the level of a 3 W. But that is simply a minor point to me. The lights work fine and the price is right.

 

[DCobeen]

yeah they run that at 3 watt so they will last allot longer. most of the light makers do this some higher to around 4 watt. i just fim'ed 2 plants yesterday i already see each one is starting 4 new tops. the plants love the led lights. i also drop in cfl on the ends so when i rotate them they get more diff light exposure.

 

[Don Styln]

Ummm, maybe that's the reason. But frankly, if my lights only worked for three years (instead of the claimed 5 years) until I had to buy new ones and had a third more power, I would be happier.

3 W are running just about as powerfully as the 5 W. 3 W are more efficient by far.

And really, what would be the advantage of having 5 W lights if you have to run them at the same power as 3 W? I think companies that are using 5 W lights (and running them with low-power similar to 3 W lights), for the most part, are doing so to have a unique selling proposition. But from all I have seen so far, it's more the lenses than anything that controls the amount of light that actually reaches the floor.

I think excuses shouldn't have to be made as to why lights are run with less power than they should be able to be run.

Even the LUSH lights are running 3 W CREE's. And their big light has 300 diodes and has a real draw of 650 W.

Anyway, it's kind of a nonstarter for me as the lights work well and like I said, they have a good price point.

As far as I'm concerned, for the price, the MARS ll hit a homerun.

 

[monkeychief]

Hey MonkeyChief - glad to see you here, Thanks for the invite.
Output

Glad u can join us, Sir Don Stylin.

 

[SnapsProvolone]

yeah they run that at 3 watt so they will last allot longer. most of the light makers do this some higher to around 4 watt. i just fim'ed 2 plants yesterday i already see each one is starting 4 new tops. the plants love the led lights. i also drop in cfl on the ends so when i rotate them they get more diff light exposure.

They underdrive due to efficiency being at peak when underdriven. Why push into territory of diminishing returns, just use more led's.

 

[monkeychief]

yes the china based contact center worries me greatly.. Just when I think I found someone to buy from!!

back to the drawing board

The of the matter is only 4 main US companies I'm aware of that's actually made stateside, but please correct me if i"m wrong. Apache, A51, CLW, and Kessil. The rest are all made in china by oem manufacturers that u can go direct in most cases and get the exact counterpart for half or more less compared to brand-names which are simply resellers. Yes, some of these US resellers do invest time and resource into the development and application of this technology to be canna-specific.

Your reservations for "chinese" panels is a direct result of the spin campaign perpetrated by the industry to protect their ridiculous margins. This is a tremendous disservice to the end-users and canna cause since it would put a lot of potential users out due to the high initial costs. This is especially true to the people who are new to the technology who are relying on threads like these to gain their buying decision knowledge. For this, I feel it's extremely irresponsible for people who have just had limited or no experience with other makes and yet put their 2cents in ignorance or ill-intentions and put down other makes and models in total disregard to the expense of people's time and resources. Besides, the chinese are now the world's manufacturer for all producsts, including low to ultra high-tech. Without them, your Iphone might be twice as much along with practically everything we use in our everyday life. Like I said, I've own HGL, GLH, Blackdogs and chinese manufacturers LG, CT, E-Shine, and GEHL. I can personally attest to you there is absolute no difference in fit and finish along with performance and reliability between them. In most cases, you can get the same exact panel for at least half off the so-called brand-names. Don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with paying for brand-names but for me it's pointless cause the girls will not be able to tell the difference from a generic and a re-branded copy from the same production line. Also, from my past dealing with these different vendors, I've found on average the chinese companies seem to have better customer before and after support. I can tell u this, they answer your emails much quicker than their US counterparts. The idea is to invest the time to learn the spectrum and most important is to always keep in mind of the inverse square law when designing an effective lighting system. I see no point in paying someone for their knowledge when u can obtain the same with a little effort. If you can stay away, from a single high-power unit and spread the wattage into smaller panels in order to increase coverage and intensity loss due to the inverse square. For example, you can get good results from a single high-power 600w unit, but you can get excellent results from better coverage and intensity from relying on primary core footprint rather the side lighting of the other edges . This will cause the similar effect prone to any hooded of having an uneven canopy with the center being taller and more develop often causing shading shorter weaker growth that will result in poor quality airy buds. This problem will be eliminated and intensity will dramatically increase due less loss from the inverse square thing. The other thing u might want to consider is the use of white spec. vs. traditional red spec. The whites offer some real advantages including better canopy penetration from it's green/blue peaks and more efficient use of power resulting up to 27% gain vs comparable red spec. For example, a 3w 660nm will draw only 1.6w vs. a similar 3w 6000k will actually draw upt to 2.2w. This in fact is like getting an additional 1/3 more wattage for free along with the better penetration and intensity. There's no getting around intensity in my experience unless airy popcorn buds are of no concern, and intensity means power, as this is why I think these panels of 200w or less claiming 3x3 coverage needs to back off the meds a little unless u want your grow ending up like being flowered with floro's. Actual number are more like at least doubled that just to even get excited over the density and more like tripled that at 600w to have quality that will even impress the HID thumbers.