LED Lights - Whats YOUR Yield?

There are many aspects to compare when talking about lighting (footprint, power draw etc)

Overall the main concern (excluding quality) would be overall yield.

I have tried searching riu, but have only found a few threads documenting grows with overall yields for LED.

Use this thread and post your LED light set up & overall yield if you got a story to tell.

first led grow in my journal in signature was a learning experience. Was growing autos, got a tad over an oz from the black briar pictured, and a bit over a half oz from the onyx. If you read the journal there were many factors that screwed up the first grow, none of them relating to the led lights I'm using. Growing smurfberry, santa, sweet caramel cream, and MI-5 right now. They are kicking ass. I will be sorely disappointed if I don't pull about 1-1.5 oz off each of those. For reference I'm running 600w of led (actual led output, not just what the chipset capacity is set to, I have roughly 825w worth of chipsets in all the lights combined). Four new babies in the overview shot showing the whole set up. The two led side lights I use 90w ufo and the 100w GLH spectra aren't turned on now but will be when the plants get a bit bigger. As I said this was my first led grow and have every expectation that with a dialed in set up you can match or exceed the quality and quantity of HID, you just have to use at least 2/3 the wattage if not more than you had in your HID set up.

Dank looking buds for sure! What brand of LED's are you using?

Mostly Pro-Grows from Hydroponics Hut. I love them, but they are pricey. Every now and then you'll see the PG 180s on Ebay and you can usually pick them up for less than retail. Got mine (new on ebay) for about $250 each incl shipping - they retail for $310. I have 2 PG 180s and 1 PG 250 (2010 model) - this is my top lighting set up. When the plants get bigger I plug in a POS 90w ufo from LED Wholesalers which I would not recommend to anyone (bought before I did my research) for supplimental side lighting. I also have a GLH Spectra 100w ufo that is used for side lighting when the plants get bigger, it is a beast. Those buds were my first full led grow and I learned a lot from it. My second LED run is continued in the journal in my sig (4 babies now about 2 wks old). It will be bigger and better.

The Pro-Grows have a 3 year warranty, the Spectras a 5 year warranty, and led wholesalers no warranty. If you look at the Better Busines Bureau's website you'll see why you should avoid LED Wholesalers. Before I bought my rig I did a lot of research. I had it down to these companies (in no particular order) which, from what I have seen in my research, provide excellent led lights ...

Grow LED Hydro (GLH) - not to be confused with Hydro Grow LED which is run by a scammer and should be avoided at all costs
Hydropincs Hut
Advanced LED
Pro Source LED
Stealth LED

As I said above, I've definitely replaced if not upgraded the growing capacity I had with my two 400w hps lights + CFL side lights and saved a pant load on electricty and heat removal. The total investment was around $1,000 and I'm guarenteed to have functional, highly effective lights for the next three years which is important to me cause I grow autos and leave these lights on for 22 hours a day. That was getting super expensive with HPS, plus I was running hortilux bulbs which are freaking expensive and do need to be replaced every six months or so to maintain lumen efficacy.

From somone who has grown with hps for 3 plus years I can confidently recommend that if you make the right investment leds are worth it, just do your own research and don't listen to anyone who says one brand is the best and all others are shit. You'll find plenty of those people on this site. I would also recommend that if you do go the led route to buy several smaller pannels (about 200w or greater) and some for side lighting (50-100w units), it will cost the same or a bit more as one larger 500+ watt unit and you'll wind up with a more modular set up and ultimately a larger growing footprint to work with. There are a million people out there trying to make a quick buck off people who haven't done proper research I blame them for all the people who have jumped on the led hate wagon.

When deciding what is best for you look for at least 3w chipsets, a lamp with a 90 degree viewing lens, a lamp that has cree, epistar, or bridgelux diodes (makes sure they actually use them and don't just say they use them - ask for a spec sheet), and at least a 3 year usa based warranty. If you can't get in touch with someone who will answer all your questions to satisfaction run from the hills. Since I have pro grows and a GLH spectra I can highly recommend them from first hand experience, but from my research can also tell you that leds from Advanced, Pro Source, or Stealth will probably also work very well for you.

https://www.rollitup.org/indoor-growing/370767-art-auto-480.html#post5670703

T-shit ninja's kick ass blackstar grow in the link above. The rest of his journal is on autoflower.net I should point out that he uses 1 240w pannel per plant so his set up is very expensive. I was ready to buy all blackstars for my room but was ultimately turned away by the 12 month warranty and this link

https://www.rollitup.org/grow-room-design-setup/432283-blackstar-240w-led-dissected-upgraded.html

I use flouros with my LED's, so I do not count. I have seen 1 gram per watt and one guy in Spain does around 2 grams per watt with home made unit with top bin 1 watt LED's in it. Most are doing less than a gram per watt as are HID guys.

I have seen a lot of people supplementing with CFL lights for LEDs. I bought 2 90W ufo's off ebay, and as hoss said, I would NOT recommend purchasing the cheap UFO's! They do reduce the light footprint, however, the growth under the LEDs is nowhere near as good as under the Blackstar LED lighting. I used a 240w high output with the 2 90s for veg and am using the 500w with the 2 90s for flower.

My plan is to get rid of the UFO's in the next few weeks and possibly purchase a 240w flower.

I'm only 2 weeks into flower as of today so I will post my yield come harvest time.

I'm still researching what panels i need for my plan, I want to replicate "stinkbuds 1 Lbs every 3 weeks" but using LEDs

I think part of the reason LEDs dont have the best rep is lack of knowledge from growers myself.

LEDs are a new a emerging technology that seems to catch the eye of many new growers.. so right off the bat you have a product which will be more used by newbs without any grow equipment or experience.
There are the select few growers that have been doing this for years and are willing to make the switch to see how LEDs work, and from those few I have gathered that their perspective of LEDs being garbage is blown out of the water.

There are definitely junk companies out there trying to take advantage of the market and make lights that look cool and don't grow crap, but these can be discovered quite easily with research and reading reviews.
3w bulb/diodes or 2w bulbs with 3w chips are the way to go IMO... 1 watts dont have the full potential penetration that can be used by the plants.

As PetFlora said, your plants will still likely grow even due to lack of experience, yet this is the case with not only LED, but HPS/MH/HID as well. I think the main thing I am trying to say is don't let your lack of knowledge or word of mouth turn you into another "the world is flat" type about LEDs. If you have nothing to base your claim off of, just admit you don't know what you are talking about. If you want to learn, experience a grow with LEDs for yourself.. or at minimum do some research!

Bump for another LED yield report

i dont know alot of info on LED i like growing with my 1000 watters and love my yields 1160 dry grams per 1000 watt area
i here alot of people talkin the talk about leds and im not trashing them but would also like to see gram per watt thingy on them for the price it better be double or its a waste of time in my books heres some pics of old school growing lol

even my lower bud sites are huge

DrFever said:

i dont know alot of info on LED i like growing with my 1000 watters and love my yields 1160 dry grams per 1000 watt area
i here alot of people talkin the talk about leds and im not trashing them but would also like to see gram per watt thingy on them

Click to expand...

Nice looking grow! My goal is to be able to yield a gram a watt, but I think its going to require about 1000w in leds to get sufficient lighting footprint.

How many plants do you usually have in your 1000 watt area? What kind of nutes?

i use a wide varity of nutrients from advanced to GH i try to aim for no more then 12 - 14 per 1000 watt area 10,000 total watts of lighting i feed every watering also i might add if i veg for more then 3 weeks i like to flush prior to hitting them with flowering food in veg i hit them anywheres from 450 ppm in ealry stage to 1160 ppm just before flowering my final ppm is in the range of 1400 in flower

Very nice.

Any LED users with an comparable yields to DrFevers 1160 grams per 1000w?