13 watt led panels on EBAY

Does anyone have any experience with these. It says 13 watts, what does that equate to in equivalent incandescent watts? I have already been told they arent worth the money, but a seller on EBAY messed up and sent me one for free. I had ordered one, but cancelled it and got credit, so I got a free one. I may try it out for grins. I understand that isnt big enough for a grow... Maybe one plant?
If I read this chart right they are about like a 75 watt incandescent
http://www.designrecycleinc.com/led comp chart.html
 
It wont work. It can be used to clone tho. I got The same one your talking about on ebay and just set it on top of my clone dome. These clones are LOVNG LIFE! But I warn you again you cannot bloom with them. Your buds will be thinner than hair on a chinese mans chin
 
Well maybe I can use it for a disco light or something.. All those red/blue lights.... Oh well it didnt cost anything. I would like to try LEDs, guess I will have to do it some other way. Do those LED screw in bulbs in the store work? How do you know what wattage to use and its color spectrum?
 

hoss12781

Well-Known Member
That's a big no on that front too man. You're going to have to spend at least 200 bucks to find a led panel/ufo that will work. Look at the watt per diode ratio - on those 13w panels they have 225 diodes, the screw ins are in the same category. I'm too lazy to do the math right now but the panels I and most other people who have used leds with success are using produce in the neighborhood of 2.1w per diode (actual output, 3w chipsets). If you want to grow with leds the best advice I can give you as someone who has grown with a lot of different brands is start doing some independent research before you buy anything. There are a ton of shit leds on the market.
 

hoss12781

Well-Known Member
yeah I still have my old HTG screw in leds. I use them to make my front porch look scary on Halloween. That is all they're good for.
 

Jogro

Well-Known Member
I put up a whole thread on just this topic. See here for much more discussion:
https://www.rollitup.org/led-other-lighting/489381-cheapo-14-watt-225-diode-2.html

Consensus seems to be that these are worthless for actually growing cannabis, but might be OK for sprouting seedlings or maintaining clones. I think something like this would probably work well for maintaining a houseplant that doesn't really need intense sunlight, and that's really all these small panels are intended for, anyway.

Comparing these low-end 13-14 watt panels to incandescent bulbs doesn't make sense, since incandescent bulbs put out a relatively poor light spectrum that isn't useful for growing plants.

As a very rough rule of thumb, you can figure a high quality (that's key) LED can put out light equivalent to 2 - 2.5x its wattage in HPS lighting, or maybe 3x its wattage in fluorescent.

So a good 13 watt LED might work as well as say 25-30 watts of HPS, or maybe 35 watts of fluorescent. In other words, at best a small LED panel like this might be adequate to light one really tiny plant.

Realistically, though the spectrum put out by one of these cheap panels probably isn't nearly as good as an HPS or even a CFL, and you're probably not really going to see 2-3x the per-watt efficacy. An ordinary $5 26 watt CFL with a good reflector will probably do as well as this LED panel.
 

hoss12781

Well-Known Member
I put up a whole thread on just this topic. See here for much more discussion:
https://www.rollitup.org/led-other-lighting/489381-cheapo-14-watt-225-diode-2.html

Consensus seems to be that these are worthless for actually growing cannabis, but might be OK for sprouting seedlings or maintaining clones. I think something like this would probably work well for maintaining a houseplant that doesn't really need intense sunlight, and that's really all these small panels are intended for, anyway.

Comparing these low-end 13-14 watt panels to incandescent bulbs doesn't make sense, since incandescent bulbs put out a relatively poor light spectrum that isn't useful for growing plants.

As a very rough rule of thumb, you can figure a high quality (that's key) LED can put out light equivalent to 2 - 2.5x its wattage in HPS lighting, or maybe 3x its wattage in fluorescent.

So a good 13 watt LED might work as well as say 25-30 watts of HPS, or maybe 35 watts of fluorescent. In other words, at best a small LED panel like this might be adequate to light one really tiny plant.

Realistically, though the spectrum put out by one of these cheap panels probably isn't nearly as good as an HPS or even a CFL, and you're probably not really going to see 2-3x the per-watt efficacy. An ordinary $5 26 watt CFL with a good reflector will probably do as well as this LED panel.
True to a certain extent. You're correct if you're talking about quality 3w chipset or better panels. You could fill a room with 30 of those 13w panels and you still wouldn't be able to grow anything worth smoking.
 

RockCreekRanger

Well-Known Member
Yeah, mine I bought one on ebay, one from another company. Seems maybe side lighting would be ok. I didn't start seeing any type of fast growth until CFL's were put in.
 

Jogro

Well-Known Member
True to a certain extent. You're correct if you're talking about quality 3w chipset or better panels. You could fill a room with 30 of those 13w panels and you still wouldn't be able to grow anything worth smoking.
I did specify that these teeny 13-14 watt panels are worthless for growing cannabis, and that high quality panels are key.

But just to be Devil's advocate here, each of these 14 watt panels is roughly 12x12". So if you wanted to try something, you could use 28 of them to completely line the walls of a 3x2x2 grow chamber.

With 6300 separate LEDs going in a variety of spectra, together putting out just shy of 400 nominal watts, and with almost every diode closer than 12" to leaf, I'd hope "something" would grow.

That something, of course, probably wouldn't be anywhere near as good as what you could grow with even 1/2 (or less) the wattage of CFLs at a small fraction of the price, but I bet it would be more than zero.
 
Hey mate, i use a 13w led from ebay they are good for clones in an aeroponics system takes two weeks to have enough roots to put in ebb n flow .
 

Swiftowl11

Active Member
Yeah all the guys that tried 1st generation led fell into this trap. I bought 2 of these lights for 32 shipped. I felt proud getting it for so cheap. After realizing they are only good for cloning and maintaining a mother plant, i moved on to the ufos. Still use the 13w led ontop of my cloning dome, works great for me. Same as a 26w cfl. Im saving a whole 13 watts using led yay me.
 
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