Not enough heat in my Bloom Room Since replacing HPS with LED. Had to switch back.

Sif1

Well-Known Member
Contrary to popular belief you should be running higher nutrient concentrations in winter than in summer. The reason is simple: less evaporation. Plants will take up what they can via three pathways: transpiration, ATP (active transport) and reverse osmosis at the root level. You are growing in what looks to be a coco/perlite mix and I assume hand-watering. If I'm wrong, then sorry I missed it.

So you'll have less evaporation in the pot and less water loss through transpiration. Less transpiration will affect mainly magnesium uptake, followed by calcium. Increasing nitrogen levels can help uptake magnesium and calcium, but can also result in raising pH at the root zone which will start to lock out iron and zinc. A good chelated micronutrient mix that includes magnesium, iron, zinc and other micronutrients can help when temperatures drop, but your first line of defence is to actually increase balanced nutrient concentrations. Also, don't forget to flush regularly to prevent excess salt build-up, but take into account the reduced evaporation at the root zone. You shouldn't have too many problems with a perlite mix that drains well, even in winter.

Studies have shown the ideal difference between dark and light temperatures is 15C, so in many cases it may be preferable to have your lights on during the day in winter if it gets cold in your area.

In addition to reduced transpiration lower temperatures will obviously affect metabolic rate. Pretty much everything on earth slows growth when it gets cold for this reason. You can offset the loss of temperature transpiration somewhat with a fan blowing on the leaves (more wind evaporation, not cooling).

Another tip, if you are hand-watering into coco-perlite, you will see much faster growth with an automatic watering regime. If you're already doing that, try increasing the number of times you water but reducing the amount you water each time. A bit like drip feed. And if you autowater, you can then add an aquarium heater to your reservoir and that will make a big difference to plant metabolism in winter.

One final trick: vent your room/tent out the bottom so that the extractor fan pulls hot air rising off the heatsink down through the canopy and out the bottom of the grow area.

That's all I've got because frankly, I live in Australia and it doesn't get that cold.
"One final trick: vent your room/tent out the bottom so that the extractor fan pulls hot air rising off the heatsink down through the canopy and out the bottom of the grow area."

That's a great tip..cheers.
 

jimihendrix1

Well-Known Member
Comparing Single Ended bulbs

Wasnt comparing DE bulbs.

If I was to get a DE Id get a Gavita. I have a DE Gavita.

Also have a Gavita 1700e LED
 

Sif1

Well-Known Member
Comparing Single Ended bulbs

Wasnt comparing DE bulbs.

If I was to get a DE Id get a Gavita. I have a DE Gavita.

Also have a Gavita 1700e LED
These are as good as Gavita and half the price.

 

Sif1

Well-Known Member
Nanolux have released a new product. never used Nanolux, but are looking at them.

Feature Display:

• The unique full digital technology is applied for the ballast with accurate performance via HID lamp.
• Compatibility design: it can be compatible with HPS, CMH and MH lamps: (HPS1000W/600W, MH1000W/600W, CMH1000W/630W/315Wx2).
• The low frequency of output is friendly for lamps, with longer lamp lifespan.
• The unique warranty Key is applied to save return cost.
• NCCS & SLC 0-10V dimming function is applied to simulate sunlight.
• Available for voltage of AC 208V/220V/230V/240V/277V


Compa�ble all DE lamps between 600W-1000W (HPS, MH, CMH) 7 types of lamps are compa�ble HPS 1000W HPS 600W MH 1000W MH 600W CMH 1000W CMH 630W CMH 315Wx2
 

Airwalker16

Well-Known Member
Nanolux have released a new product. never used Nanolux, but are looking at them.

Feature Display:

• The unique full digital technology is applied for the ballast with accurate performance via HID lamp.
• Compatibility design: it can be compatible with HPS, CMH and MH lamps: (HPS1000W/600W, MH1000W/600W, CMH1000W/630W/315Wx2).
• The low frequency of output is friendly for lamps, with longer lamp lifespan.
• The unique warranty Key is applied to save return cost.
• NCCS & SLC 0-10V dimming function is applied to simulate sunlight.
• Available for voltage of AC 208V/220V/230V/240V/277V


Compa�ble all DE lamps between 600W-1000W (HPS, MH, CMH) 7 types of lamps are compa�ble HPS 1000W HPS 600W MH 1000W MH 600W CMH 1000W CMH 630W CMH 315Wx2
How's this thing built? I'm confused how it can support 315CMHx2? It got 2 bulb spots?
 

hybridway2

Amare Shill
"One final trick: vent your room/tent out the bottom so that the extractor fan pulls hot air rising off the heatsink down through the canopy and out the bottom of the grow area."

That's a great tip..cheers.
That's a great idea for a vented grow room!(:
Some of the cased, actively cooled led units have the fans facing down with the bottom of the case vented. Heat from the leds, drivers & heatsinks all blew down to the canopy. My shitty Hydroponics Slut does that. Unfortunately it also blows down to the led but idk how that effected it. Doubt it shortens the lifespan.
 

Sif1

Well-Known Member
These are as good as Gavita and half the price.

I've got 10 of these running. Being used to the normal hot HPS its very surprising how much cooler they run. the only issue I had was due to voltage drop and they would cut out. That was my fault. Once sorted they're great.
 

Strudelheim

Well-Known Member
OK, so don't get me wrong – the plants on the first page look good – but in these photos they do look a little hungry. Perhaps you underfed going into the stretch when the pants need a lot of nutrient – especially nitrogen and magnesium – or possibly it was being locked out by the drop in temperature, or probably a combination of both, but they need a bit more. Growers who have typically been growing under HIDs tend to underestimate the nutrient requirements of LED – I see that a lot in new LED grows. First the new growth starts to go lime green and maybe yellow a little from the base of the leaves outwards, then the lime green colour starts to progress a bit further down the plant. Growth is stunted and pots take longer to dry out. This is indicative of an immobile nutrient lockout, which will be Calcium (due to reduced transpiration) and other micronutrients including iron and sulphur. As it progresses further you'll see the middle leaves start to yellow (magnesium) which will progress between the veins and then rust patches from more serious calcium deficiency. The lockout can be partly pH related (too high) and/or temperature related (chelates fall out of suspension, reduced transpiration does not uptake calcium), or sometimes a lockout caused by too much potassium (especially in coco and peat moss). At 70% peat moss and 30% perlite, you're effectively running a run-to-waste hydro system like coco anyway, so nutrient demands may be higher than you think. I would bring the pH down to 5.7-5.8 too and let it naturally up drift – that's the sign of a healthy system. In any case, a chelated micronutrient solution (Mg, S, Fe, B, Cu, Mb, Mn etc) at 1ml per litre might be your friend. And regular run-off, too – I need to stress that. Don't let runoff sit in the catch trays and be reabsorbed back into the pot.
That picture was from before, maybe it was the angle and lighting and corresponding phone camera behaviour that makes it look different then the newer picture?

I did make 2 groups of 600ppm, and 700ppm, to see differences in higher nutrient feeding. My tap water is 210, then maybe 10ppm for ph down, and 10 ppm for potassium silicate, so = 230. So the 2 groups get 370ppm of nutrients, and 470ppm, so that is a 27% increase between the 2. Between the 2 groups I have seen no difference of growth in veg or flower. No yellowing from the bottom, or anything that you mentioned. But I have gotten a potassium deficiency in almost all groups but mainly throughout veg. Maybe you can help me with that, It was confusing, as it was showing in all groups, and plants were healthy but bottom leaves were getting eaten up pretty bad. It has stopped since flowering. But I have noticed my plants currently vegging did the same thing. It almost seemed to happened more in the the higher fed plants, so I'm thinking maybe a lock out ?
Again this has not been happening in flowering, so it is unrelated to what this post was mainly concerned about.

I do get about 200ml of run off each watering which I measure the ppm and log for each plant. I have ea plant labeled with a number so track it that way on my phone notes. Its a lot of work, but I wanted to see what is going with all the variables so I can learn as much as possible.
I was watering every 2-3 days when temps were lower. Now with temps being 77F I am watering every 1-3 Days. Some plants are bigger and hungrier than others.

700ppm is what you get with 8ml ea of micro and grow by REMO nutrients. This is considered full strength, and I have previously always done 600ppm with pure blend pro. When I feed at perfect levels or slightly underfunded, my run off is 800-1000. Currently run off is 1000-1500, so Im I don't think I need to up nutrients, especially since I don't see the 27% higher nutrient group doing any better, and both groups run off is above 1000.
 

Strudelheim

Well-Known Member
Hey guys!! I just saw all the post on reflectors and bulbs, lets keep things on track here LOL ;P

I will give an update and post a picture tonight, but we are now on 4 days of of HPS, and I can notice a proper growth rate for those 4 days. Today is D38, and you will see in the pictures they look about D28. I always break flowering down like this

2 Weeks D14 Pistils Start
3 Weeks D21 Stretch Complete / THC production / little pistil buds forming
4 Weeks D28 The structure is complete and all the bud sites and future colas have been filled out with pistols, You can now see the shape and size of plant will take and the flowers.
6 Weeks D42 All budsites have now developed and been filled out with calyxes and taken on full volume and shape. The remaining 3 weeks these will just dense, mature, and resin up, and then fade.

So this is the overall timeline, So I can say that even though Im at 5 Weeks, they look like 3 Weeks. So im 2 weeks behind, I can handle that delay, as long as Quality and yield will be on track I really hope. Its warming up in my area so temps will only get higher, I will let it go to 80F with HPS, then increase exhaust fan to keep it at 80, and then when full summer temps hit, Replace the HPS with CMH, and lower the exhaust fan again, and then I should be able to achieve temps of 80-85F. For 3 months before summer is over ;(
 
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Prawn Connery

Well-Known Member
That picture was from before, maybe it was the angle and lighting and corresponding phone camera behaviour that makes it look different then the newer picture?

I did make 2 groups of 600ppm, and 700ppm, to see differences in higher nutrient feeding. My tap water is 210, then maybe 10ppm for ph down, and 10 ppm for potassium silicate, so = 230. So the 2 groups get 370ppm of nutrients, and 470ppm, so that is a 27% increase between the 2. Between the 2 groups I have seen no difference of growth in veg or flower. No yellowing from the bottom, or anything that you mentioned. But I have gotten a potassium deficiency in almost all groups but mainly throughout veg. Maybe you can help me with that, It was confusing, as it was showing in all groups, and plants were healthy but bottom leaves were getting eaten up pretty bad. It has stopped since flowering. But I have noticed my plants currently vegging did the same thing. It almost seemed to happened more in the the higher fed plants, so I'm thinking maybe a lock out ?
Again this has not been happening in flowering, so it is unrelated to what this post was mainly concerned about.

I do get about 200ml of run off each watering which I measure the ppm and log for each plant. I have ea plant labeled with a number so track it that way on my phone notes. Its a lot of work, but I wanted to see what is going with all the variables so I can learn as much as possible.
I was watering every 2-3 days when temps were lower. Now with temps being 77F I am watering every 1-3 Days. Some plants are bigger and hungrier than others.

700ppm is what you get with 8ml ea of micro and grow by REMO nutrients. This is considered full strength, and I have previously always done 600ppm with pure blend pro. When I feed at perfect levels or slightly underfunded, my run off is 800-1000. Currently run off is 1000-1500, so Im I don't think I need to up nutrients, especially since I don't see the 27% higher nutrient group doing any better, and both groups run off is above 1000.
EDIT: Stoner moment – scrub that

If you have a water analysis you will know if most of that is due to calcium and magnesium carbonates (common in limestone or ground water sources) or sodium salts. If it is sodium, then it can build up in your substrate and lock out other nutrients without regular flushing.

Conversely, 370-470ppm on the nutrient side is very low.

My tap water is normally 150ppm, but gets up to 300-400ppm in summer when they turn the desalination plant on for our scheme water. The extra ppm is all sea salt leftover from the desalination process, which requires adding slightly more NPK and flushing more regularly. Every now and then I will flush with plain warm water to absorb and remove excess salts in the pots.

In veg I run around 900ppm. In flower I run around 1100ppm. Both in coco. Veg is hand-watered ever second day and waste water is drained off and never allowed to sit in a tray to be re-absorbed back into the pot – a sure recipe for excess salt build-up. Flower is auto-watered 4-5 times every 12-hour lights-on period and is a self-flushing system.

Peat moss is pretty low in nutrient and perlite has none, so you have to provide almost all your nutrient to the root zone as it won't be getting much from the substrate. I don't know anything about your nutrient other than what I read on their website where they recommend using coco coir. Coco cation exchanges potassium for calcium and magnesium and as it degrades (gives off potassium, absorbs calcium and magnesium). If you are seeing a potassium deficiency, that may be the reason why. Based on the NPK numbers on the label I don't see it, but who knows what's in the bottle? They provide very little information about their nutrient make-up, so I'm a little skeptical. At least with Canna they list all the ingredients on each bottle so you have a fair idea of what's in there.

You didn't mention your pH, but if your run-off is a lot higher than you nutrient going in, then that is telling you the EC inside your pot is a lot higher than what you're feeding. And if that's the case, then there is a salt build-up inside the pot and that is being caused by one of a number reasons.

The most obvious is the pots are not being flushed enough. They are being left to dry out too much and all the water is evaporating leaving salts behind.

The second is you are letting the pots sit in their trays after watering and are not removing the runoff immediately.

The third is your nutrients are imbalanced and the plants are feeding and leaving large amounts of unused salts in the pots.

The fourth is you have high salt (NaCl) levels in your tap water, which will exacerbate any of the points above.

Potassium silicate can make plants more resilient to drought and salinity by increasing the integrity of the cell structure in the plant and reducing water loss through the cell membranes, so is always a good addition with tap water, and especially in water culture. Tap water usually contains a small amount of silica, but not a much as your plants will get from a soil grow.

You say that 8ml (per gallon?) of Micro and Grow is full strength, but I note it is only full strength if you are also adding 8ml each of VeloKelp and MagNifiCal: https://www.remonutrients.com/calculator/

Each of the above have significant amounts of nitrogen, calcium and magnesium (MagNifiCal), as well as balanced NPK (VeloKelp). Indeed, the MagNifiCal has more Nitrogen in it than the Grow, so it appears to me that most of your nitrogen should be coming from an additive you are not using. Unless I am wrong.

Regardless, that's what I see in the photo of your plants early on: the beginning of a nitrogen and magnesium deficiency. The reason you don't see it as much in flower is because your plants don't need as much nitrogen in flower. But they do need a lot of it in the first two weeks of flower, during the stretch, and nitrogen also helps with magnesium uptake.

So the TLDR version of this post is you probably need to feel more and you should probably use a Cal-Mag additive. I have already explained why Cal-Mag is important when growing under LED. Especially calcium. It appears your plants probably need the added nitrogen, too.
 
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Airwalker16

Well-Known Member
Now that right there, I have never heard of anyone doin before. Seems easy enough and probably works half way decent too.
 

Strudelheim

Well-Known Member
210ppm for tap water is on the high side and unless you have a water analysis you won't know if most of that is due to calcium and magnesium carbonates (common in limestone or ground water sources) or sodium salts. If it is sodium, then it can build up in your substrate and lock out other nutrients without regular flushing.

Conversely, 370-470ppm on the nutrient side is very low.

My tap water is normally 50-100ppm, but gets up to 150-200ppm in summer when they turn the desalination plant on for our scheme water. The extra ppm is all sea salt leftover from the desalination process, which requires adding slightly more NPK and flushing more regularly. Every now and then I will flush with plain warm water to absorb and remove excess salts in the pots.

In veg I run around 900ppm. In flower I run around 1100ppm. Both in coco. Veg is hand-watered ever second day and waste water is drained off and never allowed to sit in a tray to be re-absorbed back into the pot – a sure recipe for excess salt build-up. Flower is auto-watered 4-5 times every 12-hour lights-on period and is a self-flushing system.

Peat moss is pretty low in nutrient and perlite has none, so you have to provide almost all your nutrient to the root zone as it won't be getting much from the substrate. I don't know anything about your nutrient other than what I read on their website where they recommend using coco coir. Coco cation exchanges potassium for calcium and magnesium and as it degrades (gives off potassium, absorbs calcium and magnesium). If you are seeing a potassium deficiency, that may be the reason why. Based on the NPK numbers on the label I don't see it, but who knows what's in the bottle? They provide very little information about their nutrient make-up, so I'm a little skeptical. At least with Canna they list all the ingredients on each bottle so you have a fair idea of what's in there.

You didn't mention your pH, but if your run-off is a lot higher than you nutrient going in, then that is telling you the EC inside your pot is a lot higher than what you're feeding. And if that's the case, then there is a salt build-up inside the pot and that is being caused by one of a number reasons.

The most obvious is the pots are not being flushed enough. They are being left to dry out too much and all the water is evaporating leaving salts behind.

The second is you are letting the pots sit in their trays after watering and are not removing the runoff immediately.

The third is your nutrients are imbalanced and the plants are feeding and leaving large amounts of unused salts in the pots.

The fourth is you have high salt (NaCl) levels in your tap water, which will exacerbate any of the points above.

Potassium silicate can make plants more resilient to drought and salinity by increasing the integrity of the cell structure in the plant and reducing water loss through the cell membranes, so is always a good addition with tap water, and especially in water culture. Tap water usually contains a small amount of silica, but not a much as your plants will get from a soil grow.

You say that 8ml (per gallon?) of Micro and Grow is full strength, but I note it is only full strength if you are also adding 8ml each of VeloKelp and MagNifiCal: https://www.remonutrients.com/calculator/

Each of the above have significant amounts of nitrogen, calcium and magnesium (MagNifiCal), as well as balanced NPK (VeloKelp). Indeed, the MagNifiCal has more Nitrogen in it than the Grow, so it appears to me that most of your nitrogen should be coming from an additive you are not using. Unless I am wrong.

Regardless, that's what I see in the photo of your plants early on: the beginning of a nitrogen and magnesium deficiency. The reason you don't see it as much in flower is because your plants don't need as much nitrogen in flower. But they do need a lot of it in the first two weeks of flower, during the stretch, and nitrogen also helps with magnesium uptake.

So the TLDR version of this post is you probably need to feel more and you should probably use a Cal-Mag additive. I have already explained why Cal-Mag is important when growing under LED. Especially calcium. It appears your plants probably need the added nitrogen, too.
Just to clarify, when your talking about what the plants look like in the picture, your not looking at 3 plants that are in front of the canopy that I told everyone to ignore? Those 3 are on day 60, and have been getting flushed for awhile, so those are supposed to look faded....

Also are you trying to help me with my potassium deficiency that I had in VEG, or are you saying all my issues that this thread are about are because of nutrient issues? Because thats not the case since all plants are doing it, and they all have very different media, and nutrients. B) Im measuring run off each on and tracking it, so I can confirm, that run off levels correspond with those variables. If your saying nutrients are too low, then I can say that I have had great results at 600ppm, so now Im at 700ppm so 27% higher so if more was better than I would have amazing results. But most importantly, the reason it isn't nutrient related, is that Its been less then a week under HPS, with temps up, and everything has done well during that one week, so it seems to have solved the problem.

I always thought tap at 200ppm is almost perfect, and that those people that have 600-800, truly have hard water and DEF NEED RO. I have the water report from the city showing whats in it.
 

Strudelheim

Well-Known Member
So that was yesterday, D38, and I would say they look like D28 at best, So basically 10-14 days behind from that whole LED/70F Fiasco.

They have filled out, and gotten some resin and stink on em. So I think I can salvage this run. Lesson learned.

Also I have one plant that has been fed at 700ppm, and is building up nutrients with run off coming in at 1800 yesterday! I tend to see big problems as soon as it hits 1500. And have found most plants are happy with run off coming in at 1000. This is when feeding at 600ppm. And this 700ppm plant does not look any better than the lower fed ones, infact showing some browning on the serrated edges. Will monitor it.

the NPK of remo works out to 5-3-6 for VEG, and 4-4-8 for bloom, using just the grow/micro and bloom/micro for each. Seems to be more N than the pure blend pro, so thats why I don't see any fading with lower feedings, Which I liked because you can tell when they are underfed, and since it starts on lower leaves its not that bad, esp in flower.

20200418_174409.jpg20200418_174143.jpg
 

Prawn Connery

Well-Known Member
So that was yesterday, D38, and I would say they look like D28 at best, So basically 10-14 days behind from that whole LED/70F Fiasco.

They have filled out, and gotten some resin and stink on em. So I think I can salvage this run. Lesson learned.

Also I have one plant that has been fed at 700ppm, and is building up nutrients with run off coming in at 1800 yesterday! I tend to see big problems as soon as it hits 1500. And have found most plants are happy with run off coming in at 1000. This is when feeding at 600ppm. And this 700ppm plant does not look any better than the lower fed ones, infact showing some browning on the serrated edges. Will monitor it.

the NPK of remo works out to 5-3-6 for VEG, and 4-4-8 for bloom, using just the grow/micro and bloom/micro for each. Seems to be more N than the pure blend pro, so thats why I don't see any fading with lower feedings, Which I liked because you can tell when they are underfed, and since it starts on lower leaves its not that bad, esp in flower.

View attachment 4538847View attachment 4538849
I'm talking about this photo.
Strudel.jpg

Forget what I said about your tap water – I was working in halves (EC) instead of wholes (TDS) and I made a mistake calculating EC to TDS.

What I'm doing is trying to give you the big picture about growing under LED. For example, your leaf margins in the photo above are curled along the edges. Stomata are on the underside of the leaves, so they only curl like that for one reason: to increase transpiration. But there are mainly two reasons for a plant to try to force transpiration: leaf temps (cooling due to heat stress), or uptake of calcium, which is reliant on transpiration.

I don't now whether you really had a potassium deficiency or not. You said you did, but at those NPK levels I find it hard it to believe. What wouldn't surprise me is the complete opposite: high K levels locking out calcium and magnesium that stunted them during the stretch. Now that your plants are starting to flower, they're likely using up some of that excess K. But I've already explained that.

And I'm not saying there's anything vastly wrong with your plants. I'm trying to explain why you seem to be having slower than normal growth and what the likely causes are, so please don't take it personally.

So let's look at what's happening now: you're watering at 700ppm but consistently getting 1000+ (up to 1800) ppm coming out the bottom of your pots. What's that telling you? It's not necessarily telling you your nutrient solution is too strong: it's telling you that something is causing salts to build up in your medium (if they weren't there already in your substrate) and that this could be an issue.

I'm sure you will figure it out. I went through all this myself when switching over from HIDs to LEDs.

Here are mine. It's 15C in there right now. That's 59F. No issues growing under LED. Petioles are slightly red, but that's genetic (the plant behind is green). If anything, these are also showing a hint of deficiency as I maintain the same reservoir for different strains and have to balance between heavy-feeding indicas and lighter feed sativas (see below).
IMG_2824.JPG

Here are some sativas growing on the other side. Sativas are notoriously finicky and do not like the cold and nor do they like high nutrient levels. But again, the only issues are a hint of leaf-margin curling and the onset of tip burn as I push the nutrients. These are being fed EC2.2 (1100ppm).
IMG_2823.JPG

What I'm really trying to say is, you can blame the LEDs or you can adjust your growing style.
 

Strudelheim

Well-Known Member
Here is a D35 upate. With the HPS I was getting temps around 75F, and they have developed according to schedule during that time. I started feeding water a week after this so day 42, which gives me 3 weeks before chop on June 1st.

Also I had a timer that had a rogue program that turned on for half an hour after lights off, I think this is what was stalling flip, hence they ended up way taller than planned and were delayed by roughly 2 weeks. Ofcourse the low temps are still a concern, so will use lights in combination with what gives me the ideal temps. So probably just use LEDS with CMH in peak summer for 3 months, then rest of the year CMH/HPS ;(

Managed to save this crop somehow thank god. Nice massive sticky stinky colas (not this pic, but as of now about 10 days since this pic). pfewwh.

20200502_132001.jpg
 
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