Straight forward LED question

SuperNutz · Dec 20, 2018

So I've read a ton of threads and they either stop a month short of harvest or go completely in another direction for 40 pages lol... I've been looking at LED lights on amazon. Basically $100 for 1k watts LED. I'm not expecting it to compete fully with an HPS 1k watt but for the difference in meter wattage, I'm thinking about the LED. Says the 1k watt only uses 240 actual watts. If that's the case I'd use 2 LED for what I used one HPS. So question is I guess, would 2K watts LED be as good as 1k watts HPS? Would it be overkill? Or would I lose yield per sqft?

Big Perm · Dec 20, 2018

SuperNutz said:
So I've read a ton of threads and they either stop a month short of harvest or go completely in another direction for 40 pages lol... I've been looking at LED lights on amazon. Basically $100 for 1k watts LED. I'm not expecting it to compete fully with an HPS 1k watt but for the difference in meter wattage, I'm thinking about the LED. Says the 1k watt only uses 240 actual watts. If that's the case I'd use 2 LED for what I used one HPS. So question is I guess, would 2K watts LED be as good as 1k watts HPS? Would it be overkill? Or would I lose yield per sqft?

The price point, actual vs. claimed, and the 1k comparison smell like blurple to me.
If that's the case, then you are going to have to go watt for watt to honestly compete with a 1k hps in say a 4x4. So, it would take 4 of them.
There is your straight forward answer.

Vd22 · Dec 20, 2018

How much money do they cost, how much are you willing to spend, and are you willing to drill, bolt, and tape pieces together to make a light

SuperNutz · Dec 20, 2018

Big Perm said:
The price point, actual vs. claimed, and the 1k comparison smell like blurple to me.
If that's the case, then you are going to have to go watt for watt to honestly compete with a 1k hps in say a 4x4. So, it would take 4 of them.
There is your straight forward answer.

That was fast lol... But that's what I was afraid of honestly, getting caught up buying new lights to save money to only spend more.

SuperNutz · Dec 20, 2018

Vd22 said:
How much money do they cost, how much are you willing to spend, and are you willing to drill, bolt, and tape pieces together to make a light

The lights I was looking at are plug in and go.

Big Perm · Dec 20, 2018

SuperNutz said:
That was fast lol... But that's what I was afraid of honestly, getting caught up buying new lights to save money to only spend more.

For about the same $ it would take to do 4 lights you could DIY an LED light that would save money on energy. There is tons of info here, and people to help.

fragileassassin · Dec 20, 2018

Quality LED lighting is going to cost you at least 40-50 cents per watt on the low end unless you extreme diy
you want 30-40w of actual use of good LED per square foot of canopy but what perm said with cheap

Im about to add to my lighting. Its all DIY stuff I ordered from china mfg and put together myself.
With the additions Ill have around $2000 in the 2700w of LED lighting for my 10x10 to get it to optimal.

SuperNutz · Dec 20, 2018

Big Perm said:
For about the same $ it would take to do 4 lights you could DIY an LED light that would save money on energy. There is tons of info here, and people to help.

A home build is more efficient then store bought both long and short term is what you're saying?

Big Perm · Dec 20, 2018

SuperNutz said:
A home build is more efficient then store bought both long and short term is what you're saying?

Yes. Low quality store bought that is.
Either way, I saw someone do a write-up once, I think it was @Johnny Lawrence about how much savings over a year it is on the electric bill, and it was crazy.

SuperNutz · Dec 20, 2018

fragileassassin said:
Quality LED lighting is going to cost you at least 40-50 cents per watt on the low end unless you extreme diy
you want 30-40w of actual use of good LED per square foot of canopy but what perm said with cheap

Im about to add to my lighting. Its all DIY stuff I ordered from china mfg and put together myself.
With the additions Ill have around $2000 in the 2700w of LED lighting for my 10x10 to get it to optimal.

I could probably do the diy, I have a decent amount of electrical and electronic exp but if its gonna be like a 12 hours a day week of trimming I might stick to HPS lol..

Dirtbag4 · Dec 20, 2018

I bought a blurple at the start of my growing life. Huge waste. I shortly upgraded to quantum boards (qb288 v2). Started with 1, then bought 2 more. Still working on upgrading but for about 500 bucks I have pretty good lighting in my 4x4.

SuperNutz · Dec 20, 2018

Big Perm said:
Yes. Low quality store bought that is.
Either way, I saw someone do a write-up once, I think it was @Johnny Lawrence about how much savings over a year it is on the electric bill, and it was crazy.

The electric bill is the goal bro lol..

Big Perm · Dec 20, 2018

SuperNutz said:
The electric bill is the goal bro lol..

Then high quality store bought, or DIY. The DIY is pretty easy, and since you have electrical background, a cake walk.

SuperNutz · Dec 20, 2018

Dirtbag4 said:
I bought a blurple at the start of my growing life. Huge waste. I shortly upgraded to quantum boards (qb288 v2). Started with 1, then bought 2 more. Still working on upgrading but for about 500 bucks I have pretty good lighting in my 4x4.

I can legally have 24 plants, so that's 12 flower, 12 vegs and a phantom mom lol... That's all I really need light for and I've been using 2 1k HPS.

Big Perm · Dec 20, 2018

SuperNutz said:
I can legally have 24 plants, so that's 12 flower, 12 vegs and a phantom mom lol... That's all I really need light for and I've been using 2 1k HPS.

Holy shit.
You should be able to play with those numbers some to squeeze more out of them, and with the right light cycle on two tents you could pull more with less electricity.

SuperNutz · Dec 20, 2018

Big Perm said:
Holy shit.
You should be able to play with those numbers some to squeeze more out of them, and with the right light cycle on two tents you could pull more with less electricity.

Yup, those are the things I'm trying to iron out.

Big Perm · Dec 20, 2018

Big Perm said:
Holy shit.
You should be able to play with those numbers some to squeeze more out of them, and with the right light cycle on two tents you could pull more with less electricity.

Off topic, but wanted to put it out there.
If I had a 24 plant limit...I wouldn't run any mothers. Get really good at cloning, find a way that you like and works great for you. Then I'd run two flower tents with 4 plants in each spaced roughly 4 weeks apart. Run them both 12/12 one is on when the other is off. There is 8 plants.
I'd take clones right before the 4 plants went into flower. Clones would then be 4 weeks apart. 8 more plants for a total of 16.
Then there would be the plants in veg, 4 waiting for each tent. 8 more plants for a total of 24.
4 weeks as a clone, 4 weeks in veg, 8 weeks in flower makes it a perpetual harvest of roughly 1lb every 4 weeks.
Depending on the strain, If it is an 8 week flower.
Edit: Actually, when it played out, you would only have 4 clones at a time and 12 in flower. Same 24 plant max. You get the idea.

fragileassassin · Dec 20, 2018

check out my current discussion on my lights. I am doing a 10x10 12 plant flower tent with qbs
https://www.rollitup.org/t/need-more-light-but-how-should-i-do-it.981690/

Here's a basic idea of what assembly looks like of a typical kit
https://forum.grasscity.com/threads/tutorial-for-240w-qb304-kit-from-alibaba-canada.1501643/

it wasnt really too bad to put these together I split it up over a few days, but it was only a couple hours each day. my boards came attached to the heatsinks. I used wago connectors and romex wiring for most of it. Build my own frames out of angle aluminum.

SuperNutz · Dec 20, 2018

Big Perm said:
Off topic, but wanted to put it out there.
If I had a 24 plant limit...I wouldn't run any mothers. Get really good at cloning, find a way that you like and works great for you. Then I'd run two flower tents with 4 plants in each spaced roughly 4 weeks apart. Run them both 12/12 one is on when the other is off. There is 8 plants.
I'd take clones right before the 4 plants went into flower. Clones would then be 4 weeks apart. 8 more plants for a total of 16.
Then there would be the plants in veg, 4 waiting for each tent. 8 more plants for a total of 24.
4 weeks as a clone, 4 weeks in veg, 8 weeks in flower makes it a perpetual harvest of roughly 1lb every 4 weeks.
Depending on the strain, If it is an 8 week flower.
Edit: Actually, when it played out, you would only have 4 clones at a time and 12 in flower. Same 24 plant max. You get the idea.

Now we're like Siamese brain twins... Back to the lights though? What would you do if you were Nutz?

fragileassassin · Dec 20, 2018

Big Perm said:
Off topic, but wanted to put it out there.

I am kind of doing this with mine. taking clones at flip sit as clones 2-3 weeks then veg tent 6-7 weeks while waiting on the flower cycle to finish 8-10 week cycle.
Its not quite the same offset cycle but I should be able to do my two crops over the winter when its easier to control temps and not have to worry about dealing with growing in the heat of the summer.

Straight forward LED question

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