Buds quality LEDs VS HPS

jonsnow399

Well-Known Member
Out here in the woods we have a video store. Well it's mostly dvd's but there is some VHS still.

And it also sells pool supplies and is a small head shop and Grow store.

I travelled back in time when I moved here.
Weird, we have a video store and they opened a second location, building their own building! They must be doing great! Don't understand it myself, been meaning to go in to find out WTF is going on.
 

CobKits

Well-Known Member
a local grow shop owner told me that cannabis growers support his shop. cannabis grower are the only ones who think HPS lights are great stand alone grow lights. LED makers target the cannabis growers market and it sounds like hortilux is just trying to cash in on this trend.cannabis is a very high value crop and commercial growers are not the best educated people. poor education and a lot of cash after harvest makes these growers an attractive market for high priced, high tech toys.growers of other crops have very tight margins and need to use the most cost effective way of growing.and most greenhouses and garden centers have people trained in horticulture on their payroll.in my state it looks like large growers backed by wall street investors will take over the legal market and drive small growers out of business unless they can find a place in the market and that will require better quality than the large factory farms deliver.
in reality, margins will tighten until the pros (who understand ROI and operating cost) overtake the grow bros

its inevitable. evolve or die
 

Shawndeadhead

Well-Known Member
IMG_20171120_190702.jpg
Ran some math on your numbers. Estimating 46% efficiency if using an equal mix of 3000/4000K 80CRI Vero18D (?) at nominal.

486.4 watts output
Average yield is 2.1 lbs. = 952 grams
1.95 grams per watt.
PAR watts = 224
4.25 grams per par watt. First time I know of someone has mentioned passing 4 GPPW. Nice.

Meanwell current can run a little high but either way it would still be over 4. My best has been about 3.5 in hydro.

When it comes to grams per par watt, it has little (or nothing) to do with the lights and everything to do with cultural practices.
Actually mine pulls 500w even with a killawatt . 940 gram harvest divided by 500w is only 1.88 gpw I've seen several claims of 2+ grams per watt so that really puts me on the low end of what we know Cobs can do. I use Vero 18s is probably why I'm not pushing 2+ gpw like Vero 29s and cree 3590s are reporting.
Unless I'm misunderstanding your math I did just have some of this Pakistan kush lol
 
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Rahz

Well-Known Member
The killawatt gives you cobs plus driver inefficiency. I was calculating based on just the cob output, but that's not the most accurate way, yours is better. I haven't read reports of over 2 yet. 1.88 is fantastic.

Regarding grams per par watt, it's just what it says, yield per radiant watt of 400-700nm. It doesn't figure in optic losses so it's not perfect but it does take the waste heat out of the equation. Most grows I've analyzed yield 2-3 gppw, up to around 3.5. Never saw 4 gppw before, so regardless of how efficient the light is you're doing a damn good job, especially considering the media.
 

Shawndeadhead

Well-Known Member
1.5 GPW is getting pretty common these days... but 92 grams per square foot is rocking it.
I'm running Nectar for the God's been playing with it awhile now. Calcium based organic nutes. All absorbed and digested by BioAg so it's all readily available to plants directly at feeding Time.
Amazing products. Scott the owner was doing
a teach and talk at Oregon's constant Gardner , their YouTube video is up for proof.
He was saying (I verified claims myself on independent NFTG grower forums)
”There are guys running very heavy the Bloom kahos (calium uptake inhibitor) and Herculean harvest coming back to us and saying man my light that gets me a 1lb well it's now getting me 2lb some guys 2.5 - 3 lb . That would be pushing the 90+ grams per square ft arena !!!!
Thinking about pushing those 2 harder on my next run and seeing what happens. I know with it being a calcium based nute I have some of the hardest nugs serious thud when droppe lol !!!!?
Colors really exploded, aromas, Crystal production can see positive increases.
 

Shawndeadhead

Well-Known Member
The killawatt gives you cobs plus driver inefficiency. I was calculating based on just the cob output, but that's not the most accurate way, yours is better. I haven't read reports of over 2 yet. 1.88 is fantastic.

Regarding grams per par watt, it's just what it says, yield per radiant watt of 400-700nm. It doesn't figure in optic losses so it's not perfect but it does take the waste heat out of the equation. Most grows I've analyzed yield 2-3 gppw, up to around 3.5. Never saw 4 gppw before, so regardless of how efficient the light is you're doing a damn good job, especially considering the media.
Ahhh I see yeah I was way way stoned you weren't even talking about gpw lol egg on muh face!!!!!
I have a DIY mindset, I understand just a little bit of a lot of things, just a solider and worker, once I step away from the simple conversion of how many watts I pull to what I got out of it. Any math past that would take me a whole day to wrap my head around lol.
Plus I know where my extra watts are going, even though I'm using passive heatsinks, I used the left over voltage to put a couple small fans above my fixtures pulling the air away from the unit, that's why I'm maxing out 500w on 2 of the Meanwell HLG-240s.
 

Buba Blend

Well-Known Member
in reality, margins will tighten until the pros (who understand ROI and operating cost) overtake the grow bros

its inevitable. evolve or die
It is already happening. Large LED commercial grows in Vegas are doing well from what I can tell.
IMO more LED grows probably would have been built except most of the growers have years of hps experience and a company is not going to gamble on LED unless they know they have access to experienced LED growers.
In no time led will surpass hps in vegas if it hasn't already. I know some of the larger 100,000 sq ft places are already investing.
But as a group you have to separate talking about ROI growers and those who only care about quality. They are two different conversations and I can see LED advocates saying see LED is taking over, just look what the big boys are doing and that would be misinformation to a grower who is only thinking about quality.
LED quality vs quantity conversations should not be blurred together. I'm sure people will say but look what the big boys are using, but that is heavily related to ROI. Those big boys grow crap weed compared to mine. I have thrown away some samples I tried. Nobody disputes that dispensary weed is not the same as a quality home grow in a 4x4 area. Then again there may be some people chatting here that think dispensary growers are putting out great weed comparable to the home grower IDK.
I sure can see the twist LED advocates are going to use in the future to win there arguments using commercial grows as an example.
 

lukio

Well-Known Member
Who said anything about pgrs? Take a look at the thread I posted and you'll see how much they stretched after the flip, if I used a pgr it didn't work lol.
am i being stupid? i cant find any pics?

cant get my head around those numbers, man!

edit. theres a link right there ahahah!

- great looking thread, great growin!

So 2.7kg from a 4x8 is pretty ridiculous. im still struggling with it...much larf? like a kilos worth (:
 
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lukio

Well-Known Member
Wouldn't 6lbs 9oz be just about 3kg? Anyway to answer your question about larf, typically I strip all of the lower bud sites so that i don't have popcorn or larf. But this time I added 20x 4' strip leds to supplement below the canopy and purposely left all budsites in tact. That's not the only reason for the increase in yield from the harvest in that thread. That grow was also from seed and 3 different strains and they got a little to big on me. The grow that yielded 6.5+lbs were clones of just one strain but still 6-8 different pheno's (it was before I had selected the keeper).
im a big stripper too. only 15 plant but rammed and under 1300w quantum in a 4x8 - no where near your numbers. yeah that is about 3 kilos! i need more pics man (:

most ive pulled is 72 ish ounces...so 2 ish kilos.

Fair play if you have pulled 3, maybe some side lighting is in order - that extra 600w...and plant numbers...got me thinking!!
 
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