Led side light supplement grow

Not sure if this is the right place.

Cheap build made with corrugated polycarb sheet and timber stakes.
A single plant in a 4x4 tent
4 side light panels 110w each. Each has 16 560mm strips
450w led overhead
chem og type of cross
Coco with biochar and frass top dress. 15 litre pot
Used a local a+b nutrients and some additives. High ppm used
Introduced side lights at day 21
Ppfd overhead 1000-500. Ppfd sidelight 550-150
A bit over 1.6g per watt of great herb

I'm using LED side lights on all 4 of my tent poles. They have made a huge improvement. I'm using AC Infinity's IONBEAM S16.

Blue_Focus said:

I'm using LED side lights on all 4 of my tent poles. They have made a huge improvement. I'm using AC Infinity's IONBEAM S16.

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Nice they look like they would get into the canopy well

Fix for thumbnails. I cant edit. If a mod sees this could you remove the posts with thumbnails please

I have used the sidelight panels to do 4 plant runs also with good success. 2 panels back to back in the middle. I havent reached the same overall yield but some plants have had a higher yield per square foot. My yields have never been so good

Here comes a photo dump of some other runs in the 4x4. These are grown in soil instead of coco its my medium of choice

what strips did you use for sides and top?
interested in copying this

The Bodgeineers said:

what strips did you use for sides and top?
interested in copying this

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That would be great i want to see what others can do with similar designs.
For overhead light i mostly use bridgelux Bxeb gen2 3500k and sometimes i will use half cree jb3030 3500k from cutter led.

The strips used in the sidelights are Samsung Lt-m562a.
Each strip has 24 lm561b diodes.
2 panels are gen1 4000k (SI-B8T111560WW)
The other 2 panels are gen2 3000k (SI-B8V113560WW) lm561b+

At the time they were cheap clearance items at arrow.com you might still find something similar or maybe better?
Arrow can be tricky to search iirc. Search “Si-b8” for starters or maybe just “Si-“ will do. One tip is to use the samsung engine calculator to find model numbers to search.

The sidelight dimensions: Roughly 120cm x 60cm x 3.5cm
The distance between centre of strips is 7.6cm

Meanmonsoon said:

That would be great i want to see what others can do with similar designs.
For overhead light i mostly use bridgelux Bxeb gen2 3500k and sometimes i will use half cree jb3030 3500k from cutter led.

The strips used in the sidelights are Samsung Lt-m562a.
Each strip has 24 lm561b diodes.
2 panels are gen1 4000k (SI-B8T111560WW)
The other 2 panels are gen2 3000k (SI-B8V113560WW) lm561b+

At the time they were cheap clearance items at arrow.com you might still find something similar or maybe better?
Arrow can be tricky to search iirc. Search “Si-b8” for starters or maybe just “Si-“ will do. One tip is to use the samsung engine calculator to find model numbers to search.

The sidelight dimensions: Roughly 120cm x 60cm x 3.5cm
The distance between centre of strips is 7.6cm

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cool, thanks
So you mounted them behind the plastic? how much of a an air gap?

The Bodgeineers said:

cool, thanks
So you mounted them behind the plastic? how much of a an air gap?

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First i screwed both ends of the strips onto 2 bits of timber and then screwed the timber to the back of the polycarb. Here is the polycarb profile i used

Meanmonsoon said:

First i screwed both ends of the strips onto 2 bits of timber and then screwed the timber to the back of the polycarb. Here is the polycarb profile i used View attachment 5370992

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did you use a heat sync for those side strips or just go direct to the wood?

The Bodgeineers said:

did you use a heat sync for those side strips or just go direct to the wood?

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It’s built without heatsink and yes they are attached directly on the wood. The lights are 2 years old and seem to produce the same amount of light

The Bodgeineers said:

did you use a heat sync for those side strips or just go direct to the wood?

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Here, Bod hopefully these photos will help you see

The Bodgeineers said:

did you use a heat sync for those side strips or just go direct to the wood?

Click to expand...

I built some fixtures using some similar M-series strips, same as above but with 32 diodes each, ran them 2Sx8P 3.2A/150W with no sinks and they barely get warm.

I like the use of the polycarbonate corrugate, got me considering side-lighting now, maybe using it vertically it could support itself..

MedicinalMyA$$ said:

I built some fixtures using some similar M-series strips, same as above but with 32 diodes each, ran them 2Sx8P 3.2A/150W with no sinks and they barely get warm.

I like the use of the polycarbonate corrugate, got me considering side-lighting now, maybe using it vertically it could support itself..

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I think i remember you giving details on one of your builds at the time i was shopping it helped me decide. For the price and application they are great imo. You could repurpose those strips and do a micro sidelight only grow like Jammal over at the mag, his grow was big inspiration for this build.

The heat that the sidelights disperse is something that is worth keeping in consideration.
I had an unfortunate run during the hotter months in a 3x3.
I had sidelights rotated vertically(is this how you mean?) with all the strips going and it sent all its heat into the upper canopy. That harvest was poor quality except for some of the lower buds. I should have turned off half the strips much earlier then i did then maybe it would have stood a chance.

Meanmonsoon said:

I think i remember you giving details on one of your builds at the time i was shopping it helped me decide. For the price and application they are great imo. You could repurpose those strips and do a micro sidelight only grow like Jammal over at the mag, his grow was big inspiration for this build.

The heat that the sidelights disperse is something that is worth keeping in consideration.
I had an unfortunate run during the hotter months in a 3x3.
I had sidelights rotated vertically(is this how you mean?) with all the strips going and it sent all its heat into the upper canopy. That harvest was poor quality except for some of the lower buds. I should have turned off half the strips much earlier then i did then maybe it would have stood a chance.

View attachment 5371028View attachment 5371029

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Yep that's it. I had planned something similar using perspex sheets, but really it was going to be an expensive and cumbersome experiment so I flagged it. I scrog nowadays but feel like growing a tree again now lol

Curious to see if this works on several different strains. I've tried some side lighting and wasn't sure if it made any difference because some strains are more "larfy" than others no matter what I did to get more light to that area. But maybe I just didn't hit the side lighting hard enough. Cool idea, though!

tstick said:

Curious to see if this works on several different strains. I've tried some side lighting and wasn't sure if it made any difference because some strains are more "larfy" than others no matter what I did to get more light to that area. But maybe I just didn't hit the side lighting hard enough. Cool idea, though!

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Thanks, You can post pics here if you like. Yeh some strains do better then others. The lower buds arent the size of uppers but i wouldnt call it larf either they are almost as solid as the big upper buds on most strains. I am yet to push sides much harder then 550ppfd but the coverage is substantial its almost like growing outdoor plants inside. The shorter plants stunt easier with the side lights its like they get too saturated and grow smaller buds if care is not taken