Led discussion

[Keeno]

LED is something ive played with over the years, from the old basic 3w boards to cob, to the the new generation specially designed diodes. I want LED to work, dealing with heat is noisy any costs a fair bit.

One of my best grows in smaller spaces was under a old style 5w diode board, but i wouldn't go back to them, they suffer with issues that are not easy to fix given most manufactures are in china.

The things i want from LED:
low heat
quiet running
resonantly priced
good coverage
good penetration

LED can do all of the above you just need to know what your looking at:

Low heat;
The older boards as do a few of the new ones bang out some heat, not compared to hps, so why the issue? most led hobby growers are looking a light to go into smaller tent spaces, more stealth if you get me, no point trying to fit a small 60x60cm tent in a corner somewhere id you still need a 5 inch rvk on full whack.

Quiet running:
This is something seldom seen, some makers use very quiet cooling fans, but you can still hear the buggers.

resonantly priced:
This isnt the case, im constantly getting questions on our social media, you can see the excitment in the way they are typing "ive found a 1000w led light, my grow will be under $400" ect. You get what yoy pat for with led lighting. most are not running at the advertised wattage, normally a quarter of it. This also applies to the diodes and drivers used, cheap price means cheap parts, leading to break downs and issues.

Good coverage:
This is led main failing. Ive owned a few top end boards, i had a 90w bud master light that directly under the light was banging out the same amount of lumens as a 600w hps at 2ft. the issues is you move 1ft from the center.....massive drop off. That light was very expensive and the power is put out over a very small area was astonishing, but not for a full sized grow tent.

Good penetration:

This is something that has plagued led lights, you need intensity to push through the canopy, while some have this is directly under the light, its not as wide spread as hps.

So after all that....am a led fan lol. Yes!!!!

An led out of the box you will struggle to cope with a larger grow space, so the answer is more than one, but as ive said above you get what you pay for. A very good light out of the box, one ive seen do very close to hps are cob lights by prakasa. These are mid range in price but top quality. For a 1.2 x 1.2 grow tent you would want 2 x 300w version, this will set you back £600, bringing us back to the the price, even these lights are brilliant outp[ut directly under the light, but wont be on the far edges of your grow area.

So whats the answer. If you are serious about led build a custom cob. thee can be made to cover the size of your grow area, evenly spaced cob lights will stop led biggest failing, coverage. they are not as expensive as you might thing, Buster on here built a 500/600 true watt cob for around £500, the frame he used covered his grow area as did the lights. He rated this light against any 600w hps set up.

So yes it cost money, but you get what you pay for, considering the price of some led building a custom is much much cheaper, you can choose the spectrum you want, the space, the coverage, the wattage, you can use fan less heat sinks should you need utter silence. Ill be getting one of these built myself this year. Less heat, less ans, less noise, less leccy, all while getting everything led promised to be all along.

[GMO]

Hello guys.
When I done my first grow it was with MARS II 900w which was drawing bout 450 w from the wall. I was happy with the panel, but it was noisy and a bit of heat output. Then it died :D
Since then I moved to HPS and must say penetration is way better. Especially when you grow a leafy strain.
I bought 2 COB panels from Prakasa, one 200w and 300w. They are both true watts. I am very happy with them, use them either for vegging, full grow, mixed spectrum growing with the HPS and results are really good. They are using 3w Bridgelux and Epistar leds. Nearly no heat output on them so I am happy to run them through the summer in the loft :) I find best results using both HPS and LED together. Covered in trichomes and good size buds.

That's what I like to hear mate!

The fan noise seems to be everyone main issue with leds and it's why I'm really hopeful for qb ans cob/cree led.

I stealth veg and flower in a loft. low noise is a massive benefit to me as the low heat means I don't have any fans running at all in veg and will be adding my old panels to the flower tent as I finish up with em to reduce heat over the summer months

Have you found the led use more mag than hid and do you find your watering less often too?

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk

[ohlordyeah_420]

This is in the same tent, the buds at the front were under the led and at the back were under the hps, the buds in the middle are 50/50: denser than the back but bigger than the front. I have 5x plants of the same strain and was going to post findings of the weights after drying. However one of the plants under the led also had a fan above it which I think might have made it a little 'uncomfortable' and the wind stress might have added to the potential lack of weight.

Just finished my first grow. For flowering I used a viparspectra 600w led and a 600w hps (dimmed to 400 with the correct bulb) and I can tell you the buds under the led were smaller than the hps buds but so so rock hard. Solid and dense buds.

I'm not a fan of the vipraspectra simply as the fan is pretty noisy. I'd like to get a quantum board in the future I think. But as always the prices keep dropping on this new technology so it's a balance of how long do you wait.

'free your mind and your ass will follow'

Have you considered using both together?

Tbh that how I think these earlier gen of led are to be used

They all do well enough on their own but the potential of all that light together makes my mouth water lol

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk

'free your mind and your ass will follow'

[GMO]

LED is something ive played with over the years, from the old basic 3w boards to cob, to the the new generation specially designed diodes. I want LED to work, dealing with heat is noisy any costs a fair bit.

One of my best grows in smaller spaces was under a old style 5w diode board, but i wouldn't go back to them, they suffer with issues that are not easy to fix given most manufactures are in china.

The things i want from LED:
low heat
quiet running
resonantly priced
good coverage
good penetration

LED can do all of the above you just need to know what your looking at:

Low heat;
The older boards as do a few of the new ones bang out some heat, not compared to hps, so why the issue? most led hobby growers are looking a light to go into smaller tent spaces, more stealth if you get me, no point trying to fit a small 60x60cm tent in a corner somewhere id you still need a 5 inch rvk on full whack.

Quiet running:
This is something seldom seen, some makers use very quiet cooling fans, but you can still hear the buggers.

resonantly priced:
This isnt the case, im constantly getting questions on our social media, you can see the excitment in the way they are typing "ive found a 1000w led light, my grow will be under $400" ect. You get what yoy pat for with led lighting. most are not running at the advertised wattage, normally a quarter of it. This also applies to the diodes and drivers used, cheap price means cheap parts, leading to break downs and issues.

Good coverage:
This is led main failing. Ive owned a few top end boards, i had a 90w bud master light that directly under the light was banging out the same amount of lumens as a 600w hps at 2ft. the issues is you move 1ft from the center.....massive drop off. That light was very expensive and the power is put out over a very small area was astonishing, but not for a full sized grow tent.

Good penetration:

This is something that has plagued led lights, you need intensity to push through the canopy, while some have this is directly under the light, its not as wide spread as hps.

So after all that....am a led fan lol. Yes!!!!

An led out of the box you will struggle to cope with a larger grow space, so the answer is more than one, but as ive said above you get what you pay for. A very good light out of the box, one ive seen do very close to hps are cob lights by prakasa. These are mid range in price but top quality. For a 1.2 x 1.2 grow tent you would want 2 x 300w version, this will set you back £600, bringing us back to the the price, even these lights are brilliant outp[ut directly under the light, but wont be on the far edges of your grow area.

So whats the answer. If you are serious about led build a custom cob. thee can be made to cover the size of your grow area, evenly spaced cob lights will stop led biggest failing, coverage. they are not as expensive as you might thing, Buster on here built a 500/600 true watt cob for around £500, the frame he used covered his grow area as did the lights. He rated this light against any 600w hps set up.

So yes it cost money, but you get what you pay for, considering the price of some led building a custom is much much cheaper, you can choose the spectrum you want, the space, the coverage, the wattage, you can use fan less heat sinks should you need utter silence. Ill be getting one of these built myself this year. Less heat, less ans, less noise, less leccy, all while getting everything led promised to be all along.

We gonna need to have a good talk before we jump into our builds I reckon mate!!!

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk

[GMO]

This is in the same tent, the buds at the front were under the led and at the back were under the hps, the buds in the middle are 50/50: denser than the back but bigger than the front. I have 5x plants of the same strain and was going to post findings of the weights after drying. However one of the plants under the led also had a fan above it which I think might have made it a little 'uncomfortable' and the wind stress might have added to the potential lack of weight.

Just finished my first grow. For flowering I used a viparspectra 600w led and a 600w hps (dimmed to 400 with the correct bulb) and I can tell you the buds under the led were smaller than the hps buds but so so rock hard. Solid and dense buds.

I'm not a fan of the vipraspectra simply as the fan is pretty noisy. I'd like to get a quantum board in the future I think. But as always the prices keep dropping on this new technology so it's a balance of how long do you wait.

'free your mind and your ass will follow'

Have you considered using both together?

Tbh that how I think these earlier gen of led are to be used

They all do well enough on their own but the potential of all that light together makes my mouth water lol

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk

'free your mind and your ass will follow'

Sounds like I missed a nice grow from ya mate. And would be very interesting in the results

I bet them middle buds are bursting with resin

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk

[Keeno]

LED is something ive played with over the years, from the old basic 3w boards to cob, to the the new generation specially designed diodes. I want LED to work, dealing with heat is noisy any costs a fair bit.

One of my best grows in smaller spaces was under a old style 5w diode board, but i wouldn't go back to them, they suffer with issues that are not easy to fix given most manufactures are in china.

The things i want from LED:
low heat
quiet running
resonantly priced
good coverage
good penetration

LED can do all of the above you just need to know what your looking at:

Low heat;
The older boards as do a few of the new ones bang out some heat, not compared to hps, so why the issue? most led hobby growers are looking a light to go into smaller tent spaces, more stealth if you get me, no point trying to fit a small 60x60cm tent in a corner somewhere id you still need a 5 inch rvk on full whack.

Quiet running:
This is something seldom seen, some makers use very quiet cooling fans, but you can still hear the buggers.

resonantly priced:
This isnt the case, im constantly getting questions on our social media, you can see the excitment in the way they are typing "ive found a 1000w led light, my grow will be under $400" ect. You get what yoy pat for with led lighting. most are not running at the advertised wattage, normally a quarter of it. This also applies to the diodes and drivers used, cheap price means cheap parts, leading to break downs and issues.

Good coverage:
This is led main failing. Ive owned a few top end boards, i had a 90w bud master light that directly under the light was banging out the same amount of lumens as a 600w hps at 2ft. the issues is you move 1ft from the center.....massive drop off. That light was very expensive and the power is put out over a very small area was astonishing, but not for a full sized grow tent.

Good penetration:

This is something that has plagued led lights, you need intensity to push through the canopy, while some have this is directly under the light, its not as wide spread as hps.

So after all that....am a led fan lol. Yes!!!!

An led out of the box you will struggle to cope with a larger grow space, so the answer is more than one, but as ive said above you get what you pay for. A very good light out of the box, one ive seen do very close to hps are cob lights by prakasa. These are mid range in price but top quality. For a 1.2 x 1.2 grow tent you would want 2 x 300w version, this will set you back £600, bringing us back to the the price, even these lights are brilliant outp[ut directly under the light, but wont be on the far edges of your grow area.

So whats the answer. If you are serious about led build a custom cob. thee can be made to cover the size of your grow area, evenly spaced cob lights will stop led biggest failing, coverage. they are not as expensive as you might thing, Buster on here built a 500/600 true watt cob for around £500, the frame he used covered his grow area as did the lights. He rated this light against any 600w hps set up.

So yes it cost money, but you get what you pay for, considering the price of some led building a custom is much much cheaper, you can choose the spectrum you want, the space, the coverage, the wattage, you can use fan less heat sinks should you need utter silence. Ill be getting one of these built myself this year. Less heat, less ans, less noise, less leccy, all while getting everything led promised to be all along.

We gonna need to have a good talk before we jump into our builds I reckon mate!!!

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk

Sounds like a plan, Buster also used a dimmer on his, im not sure on the numbers but when run at 30% for example the cobs were close to 100% efficient to. I personally cant wait for plasma lighting to get where it needs to be but due to the price atm the field testing isnt being done.

[Bulls]

That's what I like to hear mate!

The fan noise seems to be everyone main issue with leds and it's why I'm really hopeful for qb ans cob/cree led.

I stealth veg and flower in a loft. low noise is a massive benefit to me as the low heat means I don't have any fans running at all in veg and will be adding my old panels to the flower tent as I finish up with em to reduce heat over the summer months

Have you found the led use more mag than hid and do you find your watering less often too?

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk

Yeah mate.. I do veg in my cupboard but flower in the loft in my tent. I am only running a small 4 inch fan with CF to get rid of the smell in veg...but it's not extracting anything, just rotating the air in the cupboard. I water every day as I grow in coco buddy. But had a few plants vegging in soil not long ago and they needed watering every 4/5 days.

[ohlordyeah_420]

You haven't missed anything mate. I've just turned the lights off last night for 48 hours darkness. Hanging them up tomorrow. I'll keep you up to date afyer drying. It's my first grow with many mistakes but I'd say thr yield looks 'ok'.

This is in the same tent, the buds at the front were under the led and at the back were under the hps, the buds in the middle are 50/50: denser than the back but bigger than the front. I have 5x plants of the same strain and was going to post findings of the weights after drying. However one of the plants under the led also had a fan above it which I think might have made it a little 'uncomfortable' and the wind stress might have added to the potential lack of weight.

Have you considered using both together?

Tbh that how I think these earlier gen of led are to be used

They all do well enough on their own but the potential of all that light together makes my mouth water lol

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk

'free your mind and your ass will follow'

Sounds like I missed a nice grow from ya mate. And would be very interesting in the results

I bet them middle buds are bursting with resin

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk

'free your mind and your ass will follow'

[GMO]

LED is something ive played with over the years, from the old basic 3w boards to cob, to the the new generation specially designed diodes. I want LED to work, dealing with heat is noisy any costs a fair bit.

One of my best grows in smaller spaces was under a old style 5w diode board, but i wouldn't go back to them, they suffer with issues that are not easy to fix given most manufactures are in china.

The things i want from LED:
low heat
quiet running
resonantly priced
good coverage
good penetration

LED can do all of the above you just need to know what your looking at:

Low heat;
The older boards as do a few of the new ones bang out some heat, not compared to hps, so why the issue? most led hobby growers are looking a light to go into smaller tent spaces, more stealth if you get me, no point trying to fit a small 60x60cm tent in a corner somewhere id you still need a 5 inch rvk on full whack.

Quiet running:
This is something seldom seen, some makers use very quiet cooling fans, but you can still hear the buggers.

resonantly priced:
This isnt the case, im constantly getting questions on our social media, you can see the excitment in the way they are typing "ive found a 1000w led light, my grow will be under $400" ect. You get what yoy pat for with led lighting. most are not running at the advertised wattage, normally a quarter of it. This also applies to the diodes and drivers used, cheap price means cheap parts, leading to break downs and issues.

Good coverage:
This is led main failing. Ive owned a few top end boards, i had a 90w bud master light that directly under the light was banging out the same amount of lumens as a 600w hps at 2ft. the issues is you move 1ft from the center.....massive drop off. That light was very expensive and the power is put out over a very small area was astonishing, but not for a full sized grow tent.

Good penetration:

This is something that has plagued led lights, you need intensity to push through the canopy, while some have this is directly under the light, its not as wide spread as hps.

So after all that....am a led fan lol. Yes!!!!

An led out of the box you will struggle to cope with a larger grow space, so the answer is more than one, but as ive said above you get what you pay for. A very good light out of the box, one ive seen do very close to hps are cob lights by prakasa. These are mid range in price but top quality. For a 1.2 x 1.2 grow tent you would want 2 x 300w version, this will set you back £600, bringing us back to the the price, even these lights are brilliant outp[ut directly under the light, but wont be on the far edges of your grow area.

So whats the answer. If you are serious about led build a custom cob. thee can be made to cover the size of your grow area, evenly spaced cob lights will stop led biggest failing, coverage. they are not as expensive as you might thing, Buster on here built a 500/600 true watt cob for around £500, the frame he used covered his grow area as did the lights. He rated this light against any 600w hps set up.

So yes it cost money, but you get what you pay for, considering the price of some led building a custom is much much cheaper, you can choose the spectrum you want, the space, the coverage, the wattage, you can use fan less heat sinks should you need utter silence. Ill be getting one of these built myself this year. Less heat, less ans, less noise, less leccy, all while getting everything led promised to be all along.

We gonna need to have a good talk before we jump into our builds I reckon mate!!!

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk

Sounds like a plan, Buster also used a dimmer on his, im not sure on the numbers but when run at 30% for example the cobs were close to 100% efficient to. I personally cant wait for plasma lighting to get where it needs to be but due to the price atm the field testing isnt being done.

I've never heard of plasma light

I like the meanwell driver that have the dimmers already installed

Also I thing they good for cob/cree and qb

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk

[GMO]

Yeah I don't find I get any light evaporation at all just what the plant drinks. That's why I ask

I'll get to coco when I can work out how to deal with run off in a rented loft

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk