some LED strip light info. strip types, wiring, adapters,etc. 5630-specific

I was expecting much better efficiency but not twice ! Exactly, that's what I thought, not the best solution for trash can grows. Even having a CXB running with half of maximum current I believe it would burn the top leaves.
Before these leds strips I had CFLs in my trash can, so far I'm very pleased with leds strips as they put much less heat and don't take any space contrary to bulky CLFs. Plus, I can easily have lateral light, with CFL that's simply impossible in this kind of grow.
Even being inferior to most leds, leds strips are very handy to micro/small grows in my opinion.

Metacanna said:

I was expecting much better efficiency but not twice ! Exactly, that's what I thought, not the best solution for trash can grows. Even having a CXB running with half of maximum current I believe it would burn the top leaves.
Before these leds strips I had CFLs in my trash can, so far I'm very pleased with leds strips as they put much less heat and don't take any space contrary to bulky CLFs. Plus, I can easily have lateral light, with CFL that's simply impossible in this kind of grow.
Even being inferior to most leds, leds strips are very handy to micro/small grows in my opinion.

Click to expand...

any pics of your trash can? If you don't want to post pics, curious about size, yield, etc.

Metacanna said:

Even being inferior to most leds, leds strips are very handy to micro/small grows in my opinion.

Click to expand...

If I were you I'd wind a lot of 5630 around the inside of your trashcan (or, arrange a lot of vertical strips) and use dimmers (or variable voltage) to vary the spectrum. I'd drop the blue. I'd go 30% cool white, 50% warm white and 20% red. Use a dimmer (or separate variable power supply) to control each color.

This would allow you to do 1:1 cool and warm white in veg which is a sane balance. You don't need as much light in veg either, so leaving 40% un-untilized would be ok. In flower, start dialing up the warm and red to finish at 100% utilized. (I'm talking relative %. If it's too bright, obviously you can reduce all the dimmers proportionally.).

No science behind percentages, but the dimmers would let you vary the color balance. I dropped blue because I don't see blue used much. You could add a few on their own dimmer to experiment with. But, cool white should be enough.

BTW: I've seen my seedlings leaning toward the cool white Cree "lightbulbs" when I use 1:1 cool and warm. (EDIT: that may not be due to the spectrum, but that blue light produces more umoles than warm. The plant may be be growing toward what it perceives to be more light. If I used a dimmer to reduce the intensity of the cool white maybe it wouldn't happen?).

caretak3r said:

any pics of your trash can? If you don't want to post pics, curious about size, yield, etc.

Click to expand...

No prob, have a look.



It's messy right now, I'm waiting some things from ebay to rebuild it. Basically I will cover the walls with a few layers of aluminium tape as heat sink, double the quantity of LEDs and build a "fake roof" below the fan so I can have more leds on the top. As I knew sooner or later I would be doing changes I didn't use the adhesive on the bottom of the strips, instead just used regular tape to fix them as temporary solution, whenever I want to adjust things around it's much easier.
This is a 6 US gallon bucket, this is my first grow with these lights so I don't know how much it will yield. Anyway, to keep things simple I use auto strains so I can put the bucket anywhere and not be worried with the photoperiod, otherwise I would risk to have light getting inside the bucket during the dark period ruining the flowering. This said, I will be happy with 30g.

I have cut my led strips in many parts, so I ordered some connectors to make my life easier whenever I need to connect different parts:




az2000, that would be cool to play with different spectrum and understand how the plants respond. Right now I don't have lights enough to be able to dim anything, I need them full power, but your suggestion is registered for a future bucket project. This time I won't be dumb and buy a plastic bucket, instead I will spend some extra 10$ to buy an aluminium/steel bucket

az2000 said:

If I were you I'd wind a lot of 5630 around the inside of your trashcan (or, arrange a lot of vertical strips) and use dimmers (or variable voltage) to vary the spectrum. I'd drop the blue. I'd go 30% cool white, 50% warm white and 20% red. Use a dimmer (or separate variable power supply) to control each color.

This would allow you to do 1:1 cool and warm white in veg which is a sane balance. You don't need as much light in veg either, so leaving 40% un-untilized would be ok. In flower, start dialing up the warm and red to finish at 100% utilized. (I'm talking relative %. If it's too bright, obviously you can reduce all the dimmers proportionally.).

No science behind percentages, but the dimmers would let you vary the color balance. I dropped blue because I don't see blue used much. You could add a few on their own dimmer to experiment with. But, cool white should be enough.

BTW: I've seen my seedlings leaning toward the cool white Cree "lightbulbs" when I use 1:1 cool and warm. (EDIT: that may not be due to the spectrum, but that blue light produces more umoles than warm. The plant may be be growing toward what it perceives to be more light. If I used a dimmer to reduce the intensity of the cool white maybe it wouldn't happen?).

Click to expand...

Has anyone successfully used led strip lights in place of fluorescent tubes for germinating and raising seedlings in their initial state of growth?

Me. Have a look on my bucket, on the bottom you will see 2 seedlings. So far they are growing at the same speed comparing to the previous CFLs I had installed.

I think a single vero 18 driven rather soft would work very well. Maybe 500ma, would probably work well. think sidelighting is a bit over rated.

I think 30g yield is a bit optimistic. But you can always run a few of them.

I didn't gave up yet on the idea of a COB, but since I already have the leds strips I will play with it for now. After checking the captainmorgan grow with the CXA3070 I felt tempted to order one and run it at 700ma (25w) but it would be a waste of money to run it so low, and if I run it with more current my plants would toast.
To unsure a yield close to 30g I have two plants in my bucket, have a look closer

Sidelighting might be overrated but makes sense in a bucket in my opinion, if you don't use it, once the plant gets bushy the whole lower part of the plants gets no light at all. It's not like in a tent where the plants gets reflected light from the surrounding walls.

I got the idea from this guy: https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=92259
688 grams wet in a bucket grow, only with sidelighting. I want to do something similar but with led strips instead of fluros and in smaller scale. Have a quick look at the thread, the plant ended like this:



Maybe is just me, but I found it amazing.

Ups... off-topic

A Vero18new/3k costs 12$ and can deliver 3.800lm warmwhite while using 30w. An APC35-700 costs 13$ and will give out ø20w with a Vero18 or something about 2.600lm. Thats not too much and would not burn your plants untill a distance from 10cm/4". A simple round stock Intel star heatsink with copper core for 6$ can handle 20w passiv, especially if you have a fan in the lid! Thats 31$, really not too expensive!
But what do you think of this 12w DLR COB Lights?



They running with 12v like the stripes and they are short enough for your trash can.
I have a pair of them(4$/Ebay) and they needs only 8w(9w warmed up), 4,5w each and delivers p.pcs. 550lm in coolwhite. Use it for rooting steckies, but since they are self-adhesive, completely passive cooled and only 17cm long, they would fit perfectly for you. And because its 12v it can even be operated in parallel with smd stripes and is also dimmable. And probably the best, they are also available in red and blue as fog lights.

Randomblame said:

But what do you think of this 12w DLR COB Lights?
.... 4,5w each and delivers p.pcs. 550lm in coolwhite. Use it for rooting steckies, but since they are self-adhesive, completely passive cooled and only 17cm long, they would fit perfectly for you.

Click to expand...

Good info, but I'm having trouble understanding the lm/w. (12w or 4.5w?). And, if you're using the lumens from the ebay listing, I think that gets to the heart of the problem comparing strip LED with Vero COB. We can't trust these inexpensive lights to be honestly depicted by the sellers.

I really like more distributed light compared to single-point COBs. But, the lack of reliable information makes it almost impossible to discuss them. It's like we need our own relative comparison. A baseline (such as the mouser strip mentioned earlier) and then compare lumens (of the same color temperature) . A methodology of distance and grid (12" distance and measure center, 4" and 8" off center.). A way to say with fair certainty "I have this, and when I compare it to that, it is n% brighter/dimmer."

If the info were in a wiki, cross comparisons would make sense (compared to a multi-page conversation). For example, if you had a foot of the mouser strip and compared to this product. I might buy this product and some cheap 5630 from Amazon and make a similar comparison. I could update the wiki to say that Amazon brand LED compares. Someone else could compare the mouser strip to something. There would always be a way to speak relatively.

But, I guess that idea is flawed because these inexpensive products are likely to vary by lot, sourced from different manufacturers. But, at least that could be tracked as others could make the same measurements over time.

I guess I'm thinking about two problems. One is the lack of verifiable performance info for any particular strip light (except mouser or digikey). The other is the lack of easy-to-find user experiences with a particular source of unverifiable strip. (I.e., a wiki would make that better.). That's something COB has going for it. This thread will eventually be 30 pages long. If someone contemplates strip lighting they're going to see this thread and feel like a Vero is a better choice because they don't have to spend a couple hours tying dozens of thoughts together, pondering whether lm/w comments are verified or just repeating something from an eBay page, etc.

I wish there were a way to make this better because I think strip lights are the way to go for sidelighting and smaller (2x4x4' tall) grows.

Having in mind what you just said, I wonder if the luxmeters are of any use for testing purposes? They cost less than 12$ on ebay. If reliable we could do our testing and not be so dependent on manufacturers product sheets.

Metacanna said:

Having in mind what you just said, I wonder if the luxmeters are of any use for testing purposes? They cost less than 12$ on ebay. If reliable we could do our testing and not be so dependent on manufacturers product sheets.

Click to expand...

There are free lux-meter apps for cell phones. I've noticed mine has directional sensitivities, measures more to the sides than straight. So, one with a more diffuse measure like the one you posted would be easier. A remote sensor would be easier to read too. But, it shouldn't matter much because I'm talking about relative measurements. If we all measured from the same distance, and at the same grid points, our comparisons between two lights should be meaningful if they could be tracked back to a single light.

Maybe I'm overcomplicating it. I'm just thinking more about what makes easy adoption of these lights a hindrance.

Metacanna said:

I didn't gave up yet on the idea of a COB, but since I already have the leds strips I will play with it for now. After checking the captainmorgan grow with the CXA3070 I felt tempted to order one and run it at 700ma (25w) but it would be a waste of money to run it so low, and if I run it with more current my plants would toast.

Maybe is just me, but I found it amazing.

Ups... off-topic

Click to expand...

How would that be a waste of money? A3070 driven @ 700ma would be over 50% effecient iirc. That would be the best option imo.

az2000 said:

I wish there were a way to make this better because I think strip lights are the way to go for sidelighting and smaller (2x4x4' tall) grows.

Click to expand...

I don't agree with this. Some one with such large space should really be using cobs. Smd chips are better suited to micro grows and pc cases.

bicit said:

I don't agree with this. Some one with such large space should really be using cobs. Smd chips are better suited to micro grows and pc cases.

Click to expand...

I can't comment because I haven't used SMD chips. However, my experience is that sidelighting and supplying light from more (closer) sources for greater coverage/diffusion works better than condensing that energy into fewer points.

All I can speak to is my experience. I agree that it becomes less feasible based upon the number and size of plants. 4x4 is about as far as I'd go before economies of scale would become more of a priority. But, if I had less time on my hands, I probably wouldn't go that far. Up to 2x4 seems reasonable based upon my views on the topic.

Everyone has their own biases and style.

bicit said:

How would that be a waste of money? A3070 driven @ 700ma would be over 50% effecient iirc. That would be the best option imo.

Click to expand...

I wouldn't buy a new brand super efficient Mercedez if I wasn't allowed to drive over 30mph. The same way I don't think it makes sense to spend so much money on light to take so little potential from it. With a tenth of that money (3070+driver+heatsink+fan), I could buy 50w CFL and achieve the same results.

az2000 said:

I can't comment because I haven't used SMD chips. However, my experience is that sidelighting and supplying light from more (closer) sources for greater coverage/diffusion works better than condensing that energy into fewer points.

All I can speak to is my experience. I agree that it becomes less feasible based upon the number and size of plants. 4x4 is about as far as I'd go before economies of scale would become more of a priority. But, if I had less time on my hands, I probably wouldn't go that far. Up to 2x4 seems reasonable based upon my views on the topic.

Everyone has their own biases and style.

Click to expand...

Well to put it into perspective, I've used a 600w HID in a 2x4 without bleaching. So, with 8 square feet, it would be best to go with HID or COB in order to keep ambient temps low. Trying to cram enough SMD strips into that space to grow a flowering plant would be a wiring and logistics nightmare. Compared to the relative ease of fitting 4-8 emitters from the vero line. I just don't see any advantages in a tent environment to warrant their use. I think SMD strips are only really suited to places where you CAN'T fit an HID or cob. Like the bucket grow.

I'm also not entirely convinced about the distribution argument either. My own experience with HID's and cobs inside of a reflective environment indicates it's easy to hit the point of diminishing returns. Though I plan to test that once the CXB2530's become available in 4000k CCT.

Metacanna said:

I wouldn't buy a new brand super efficient Mercedez if I wasn't allowed to drive over 30mph. The same way I don't think it makes sense to spend so much money on light to take so little potential from it. With a tenth of that money (3070+driver+heatsink+fan), I could buy 50w CFL and achieve the same results.

Click to expand...

Choosing Mercedez over hyundai is not an investment decision. Spending more up front on cxa3070 at 700mA vs 1050mA or 1.4A may or may not pay itself back in the long run. The lamps are an investment meant for production purposes, not purely consumptive.

Metacanna said:

I wouldn't buy a new brand super efficient Mercedez if I wasn't allowed to drive over 30mph. The same way I don't think it makes sense to spend so much money on light to take so little potential from it. With a tenth of that money (3070+driver+heatsink+fan), I could buy 50w CFL and achieve the same results.

Click to expand...

So little potential? Your not making sense to me. Car analogies don't really work well =/

Driven so low it's actually getting more out of it(light emitted vs power consumed) than you would if you were to drive it hard. I mean, by the same logic why not use incandescent since it's even cheaper.... Why pay so much for a specialty CFL?

Also aside from the fact a 50w CFL wouldn't fit inside your bucket.... I have a few 68watt cfls. They're giant.

Agree, it is very difficult to obtain comparable values, since differences in quality varies from manufacturer to manufacturer. Probably the best way is to test it by yourself.
I have good vedding results using fake5630, but never used them for flowering mj. But I'm sure they will work.
I have a table to convert lux into μMol/m/s (see below) for fluoro and ndl/hpi and if you have a smartphone with automatic brightness control, there are some good lux measurement apps like Physics Toolbox in play/appstore. Although to obtain comparable results is an actual calibration required, but they work better as intended. +/-10%?

I am of your opinion, at a close range, many small light sources are better for light distribution and side lightning. As far as I learned here on riu, outer and upper young leaves absorbs more blue and red, while lower and low-lying areas absorbs more green. A good mix of white and colored stripes will supply all areas and under 500 light sources, there are virtually no shadows, what is a big plus.(comparing difuse and direct light)

These "12w DLR daylight"(foglight) is the ebay name and 8,5-9w is the real power, the description says 12w/1200lm each for the coolwhites, I would think its maybe 400-500lm/real 4,5w each. They have 6 "1w cob LED's" under a thick layer each with 4 rows of muliple LED's. Not known there are so small cobs, Lol!
But they work at really low temperatures, maybe 40°C after 6h of continous operation. Not more as a T8 fluorescent. And they are waterproof.
Maybe if I have time I will buy a few more whites and reds and build something similar to this what in ICMag was shown. I have a 120l trash-can too, but its a black one;-(