thatsmessedup
Well-Known Member
Thanks for the rep. The grow can be found here: https://www.rollitup.org/newbie-central/505968-first-grow-blackstar-500-32x32x60.html
"Home made" LED grow lights...
- Thread starter MajorCoco
- Start date
MajorCoco
Well-Known Member
Cheers TMU. Yours turned out great, so I hope I can do something similar....although I came home to some bad news 2 days ago. Signs of nute deficiency!
I've steadily been losing the odd lower leaf the past 2 weeks. I'd assumed that was just because they weren't getting enough light, so I'd been ignoring the slow but steady number of yellowing and falling leaves.
But when I came back today I found a few leaves had also started turning purple. Clearly a sign of phosphorus deficiency...and by the looks of the yellow on the plant today, I might be running a bit low on all the others too.
Looks like I was being too careful with my feeding, which is pretty stupid because I already knew that my pots were barely big enough, so I needed to keep them well fed with tea
So I've given them a bit of a chemical cocktail. Not too hot, and I've kept it fairly balanced with only a little bit extra PK than N. Means I'm no longer organic, but it seems to have stopped the purple spreading, and the yellowing seems to be slowing too. I might add more N if I see any problems on newer growth though.
So, that bit of unfortunate news is definitely going to hit my yield. I've no idea by how much...the deficiency is only visible on about 5-10% of the leaves, so hopefully not to much.
Not much change in bud size really, although I can see some lighter green calyxes forming at the sides of some of the colas (not as many as I'd like), so at least there's some change.
I've steadily been losing the odd lower leaf the past 2 weeks. I'd assumed that was just because they weren't getting enough light, so I'd been ignoring the slow but steady number of yellowing and falling leaves.
But when I came back today I found a few leaves had also started turning purple. Clearly a sign of phosphorus deficiency...and by the looks of the yellow on the plant today, I might be running a bit low on all the others too.
Looks like I was being too careful with my feeding, which is pretty stupid because I already knew that my pots were barely big enough, so I needed to keep them well fed with tea
So I've given them a bit of a chemical cocktail. Not too hot, and I've kept it fairly balanced with only a little bit extra PK than N. Means I'm no longer organic, but it seems to have stopped the purple spreading, and the yellowing seems to be slowing too. I might add more N if I see any problems on newer growth though.
So, that bit of unfortunate news is definitely going to hit my yield. I've no idea by how much...the deficiency is only visible on about 5-10% of the leaves, so hopefully not to much.
Not much change in bud size really, although I can see some lighter green calyxes forming at the sides of some of the colas (not as many as I'd like), so at least there's some change.
MajorCoco
Well-Known Member
Just what I wanted to hear
Cheers PSU.I can't believe I'm quite as stressed as I am about the slightest problem, but I'm just so proud of 'em so far. This must be what it feels like to be a parent hehe.
I'm not too worried about it not being organic if I'm honest. Much better to have some halfway-decent non-organic than crap 100% organic stuff. I've tasted plenty of really sweet hydro over the years too. I think it's kind of like the Digital vs Analogue music debate...most people wouldn't know the difference even when directly comparing them.
IlovePlants
Well-Known Member
Digital versus Analog is the best analogy I've heard so far. If you know how high of nutrients to give your plants then you wont over do it. That is what makes shitty weed, in my opinion, versus beautiful cannabis. It's people who are trying to push it to the limit. Some times the weed just tastes like what it was grown with if you don't properly monitor nutrient levels, for the most part, it's the strain, and the stress that determine which traits express themselves, and in turn dictate how your plant turns out. Genetic inheritance goes well beyond "phenotypes" to "sub phenotypes", it's a deep ongoing process that changes the way the plant reacts to its environment, as the environment its self changes. Action and reaction. Digital is a simple process and cuts out the middle man of processing multiple sound signals through multiple pots multiple times, this would result in delay and signal decay common in analog, but this process can also result in digital clipping, pieces of sound just disappearing because the board couldn't process the full input signal in time.
Anyway if you know any thing about sound engineering or sound production this is by all accounts my favorite analogy made between hydro and organic. Thanks for the grow Major and keep up the good work!
Sincerely,
ILovePlants
Anyway if you know any thing about sound engineering or sound production this is by all accounts my favorite analogy made between hydro and organic. Thanks for the grow Major and keep up the good work!
Sincerely,
ILovePlants
foreverflyhi
Well-Known Member
DAMN HOMIE!!! this is what ive been wating for A REAL DIY LED TEST!!!
a while back i purchased a 360 watt led from cidly led and it broke within two months, i was about to return it, but then i just decided to keep it and maybe use the case to build my own??? what would u reccomened on how i should start?
great grow!
a while back i purchased a 360 watt led from cidly led and it broke within two months, i was about to return it, but then i just decided to keep it and maybe use the case to build my own??? what would u reccomened on how i should start?
great grow!
MajorCoco
Well-Known Member
Cheers mate. I had to check out Cidly first, as I'd never heard of them, and their website is hilarious. The very first thing I read....."45*3W LED Grow Light be of high power，with mental housing"
So I'm guessing its that "mental" housing you want to recycle eh. hehe.
The best first place to start for any DIY is Newark online. If you go cheap on your LEDs then you'll just be wasting your money. Trust me that with LEDs you absolutely get what you pay for. I studied physics at uni, and once helped grow some Gallium Arsenide substrates (the starting point for some LEDs) and basically the more money your company can spend on clean rooms, vacuum equipment etc the better quality and efficiency the end product will be. That's why big companies like Cree tend to make the best chips. They can afford the equipment to make near-perfect crystals. You can trust Newark to only offer LEDs from reputable manufacturers.
So, look at the high power optoelectronic section online and you'll find lots of chunky white LEDs to choose from, 1W right up to ~85W each. I'm not going to recommend anything but white LEDs...I'm sure many people will hate me for saying it, but I just think that red-blue LED mixes are more hassle than they are worth. In any case because each of my individual LEDs is a standalone light they have to be wide-spectrum anyway...
Don't forget, an 85W LED will get as hot as hell. (though not really much hotter than 85 *1W LEDs of course)
My 20cm tall aluminium heatsinks run at a constant 40C, even with the fan on them. Hopefully that gives you an idea of how careful you need to be not to put too many LEDs in your box!! In fact I wouldn't recommend going much over whatever wattage the box was originally running at.
Anyway, have a little look at what LEDs are available, so you have an idea of how many you want of what wattage. Once know what LEDs you would want in the system then I can try to help with powering them up.
davemedinis
Member
Sad to hear that, bro, but which model is the 360w from cidly please, just visited their website but havent seen any lamps like that....
FranJan
Well-Known Member
Hey Major loving this thread. Have you read "Applications of Nitride Phosphors in White LEDs"? It's got some amazing info on all types of white LEDs in it for anyone who hasn't had a chance to grab it, including some emission spectra graphs of different types of phosphor blends that show some white LEDs are definitely better than others for growing. With that being said how important to you is color rendering in your selection of white LEDs? Did it come into your decision on what LEDs to choose? Good Luck with the rest of your grow Major!
MajorCoco
Well-Known Member
Cheers Fran!! I'm enjoying my first grow in a decade a lot too
Big grin everytime I open the door and the smell hits me!! And it's great to have everyone onboard for the ride!I did actually look into the detail quite a bit before I went for LEDs, though I didn't read that exact info. I've always had a hunch that broad-band was the way to go, so before I bought my LEDs I wanted to make sure that the phosphor really did smooth out the spectrum, which it does. And it's only going to get better as they find new mixtures to cover different frequencies...the future of LEDs looks bright to me! I can't remember what my phosphor is, but the spectra in the spec sheets matched a common YAG variant I found in some PhD papers I read (I can't remember what variant is was now though). I also found out that the size of the "phosphor" particles, and the way they are deposited onto the diode affects the spectrum!
I wasn't really looking too much at the CRI of the lights, because they were all above what you would get from HID anyway...I thought it was also pretty difficult to interpret exactly what the CRI means in reality anyway. Because CRI measurement is based on human eyes, and human eyes work best in the green spectrum...which is totally the opposite of plants.
It's basically a pretty complicated subject from the little I read into it. What about you? Got any ideas you want to share?
What's with the "secret" message in your comment by the way... you getting paid to advertise a certain bit of software we all know and love or something?
hehe
Slixxor
Well-Known Member
I have been quietly following your grow and I love the work you have done. I do however have to disagree with a few things though... red + blue panels are NOT a waste of time they provide concentrated pure PAR for your plants at the precise spectrum to achieve maximum chlorophyll A & B production. I do however agree that plants need the full spectrum hence a small amount of supplemental white light is needed.
Wattage plays an enormous part in the end result of any grow. I see ALOT of posts where people are asking if they should add more side lighting or CFLs etc. of course we all know that more light = more production. I had looked at these bridgelux modules myself a couple of months ago along with citizen LEDs from Japan and I am glad someone gave it a go. I quite like your pics, very frosty so I'm happy to say your bridgelux high power range works a treat!
- slix
Wattage plays an enormous part in the end result of any grow. I see ALOT of posts where people are asking if they should add more side lighting or CFLs etc. of course we all know that more light = more production. I had looked at these bridgelux modules myself a couple of months ago along with citizen LEDs from Japan and I am glad someone gave it a go. I quite like your pics, very frosty
so I'm happy to say your bridgelux high power range works a treat!- slix
MajorCoco
Well-Known Member
Ha. Apologies if that's how it came across Slix. I need to be more careful how I word stuff!!I have been quietly following your grow and I love the work you have done. I do however have to disagree with a few things though... red + blue panels are NOT a waste of time they provide concentrated pure PAR for your plants at the precise spectrum to achieve maximum chlorophyll A & B production. I do however agree that plants need the full spectrum hence a small amount of supplemental white light is needed.
Wattage plays an enormous part in the end result of any grow. I see ALOT of posts where people are asking if they should add more side lighting or CFLs etc. of course we all know that more light = more production. I had looked at these bridgelux modules myself a couple of months ago along with citizen LEDs from Japan and I am glad someone gave it a go. I quite like your pics, very frosty
- slix
Just to reassure you...I wouldn't never ever say that Red/Blue LED panels are a waste of time, mainly because I've seen plenty of proof they work a treat, and I do understand PAR, and how they work to that etc....
What I meant was that if I wanted to make a home-made Red/Blue panel then I'd need to wire-up 28 individual 3W LEDs to match the power I'm getting out of a single 85W LED. It's basically quicker, and less effort wiring up and fixing one LED rather than 28....which is why I said that I personally wouldn't go down the blue/red route. I don't reckon I'll ever buy a panel now either....DIY all the way from here
I'm not on here to start talking down anyone else's way of growing, so don't worry about that. My view is that there are a hundred different ways to get almost exactly the same result when it comes to growing.
Plus I'm usually stoned when I'm on here, so my writing ain't always pretty...or entirely sensible!
MajorCoco
Well-Known Member
Cool white is 5600K, and the warm one is 3500K. I just checked the receipt!
FranJan
Well-Known Member
Well my feelings are while lm/W are important and expresses efficiacy and output very well, I would think color reproduction is paramount to a grower. For example a lower CRI could indicate you have a one-phosphor-converted white LED and that would mean the LED has little to no red spectrum and all the lm/W and heat color aren't changing that when it's flowering time and you need 630-680nm. From what I'm learning you need at least a two-phosphor-converted LED (RGB) which can have a higher CRI but not necessarily a higher lm/W ratio. So what I'm trying to figure out is what are the best phosphors for growing cannabis when one is using white diodes. I think growers would be better off with a multi LED chip that allows specific tuning of each output spectrum, though I'm pretty sure the cost of those is bordering the ridiculous right now.To me getting the best spectrums out of your white diodes is so important for growing with LEDs, but at the same time I realize it is cannabis and it does need energy to grow, as Slixx pointed out. I don't want to grow bonsais!Cheers Fran!! I'm enjoying my first grow in a decade a lot too
I did actually look into the detail quite a bit before I went for LEDs, though I didn't read that exact info. I've always had a hunch that broad-band was the way to go, so before I bought my LEDs I wanted to make sure that the phosphor really did smooth out the spectrum, which it does. And it's only going to get better as they find new mixtures to cover different frequencies...the future of LEDs looks bright to me! I can't remember what my phosphor is, but the spectra in the spec sheets matched a common YAG variant I found in some PhD papers I read (I can't remember what variant is was now though). I also found out that the size of the "phosphor" particles, and the way they are deposited onto the diode affects the spectrum!
I wasn't really looking too much at the CRI of the lights, because they were all above what you would get from HID anyway...I thought it was also pretty difficult to interpret exactly what the CRI means in reality anyway. Because CRI measurement is based on human eyes, and human eyes work best in the green spectrum...which is totally the opposite of plants.
It's basically a pretty complicated subject from the little I read into it. What about you? Got any ideas you want to share?
What's with the "secret" message in your comment by the way... you getting paid to advertise a certain bit of software we all know and love or something?
And it is a really good book. They sell it on Amazon. Maybe there's a place you could go and borrow it from.
Slixxor
Well-Known Member
Thanks for the correction! Haha quite right.
MajorCoco
Well-Known Member
I'll have a look for that book. I am about to post some photos which will give an idea of the small scale of my plants (and buds), so it'll be interesting to see whether people think they are looking under-done (and I don't mean by comparison to someone growing under 1000W! I mean a comparison against 250W HID of course) or not. I know for a fact that my spectrum isn't perfect, but I think it more likely to be the raw power that's lacking rather than the spectrum.Well my feelings are while lm/W are important and expresses efficiacy and output very well, I would think color reproduction is paramount to a grower. For example a lower CRI could indicate you have a one-phosphor-converted white LED and that would mean the LED has little to no red spectrum and all the lm/W and heat color aren't changing that when it's flowering time and you need 630-680nm. From what I'm learning you need at least a two-phosphor-converted LED (RGB) which can have a higher CRI but not necessarily a higher lm/W ratio. So what I'm trying to figure out is what are the best phosphors for growing cannabis when one is using white diodes. I think growers would be better off with a multi LED chip that allows specific tuning of each output spectrum, though I'm pretty sure the cost of those is bordering the ridiculous right now.To me getting the best spectrums out of your white diodes is so important for growing with LEDs, but at the same time I realize it is cannabis and it does need energy to grow, as Slixx pointed out. I don't want to grow bonsais!
And it is a really good book. They sell it on Amazon. Maybe there's a place you could go and borrow it from.
Don't forget that for many, many years, the best growing results were had with very low CRI HID sources. Their raw intensity is what made them good for growing, despite the shortcomings in spectra. As you rightly point out though, we ARE supposed to be doing this as efficiently as possible...
The only problem I have with CRI really is the way it's measured. I can't find my original info, but have a look at this:
http://cool.conservation-us.org/byorg/us-doe/color_rendering_index.pdf
The set of colours used to measure CRI is not tuned to the active photosynthetic spectrum, which will mean that CRI is only ever an approximate general indicator of the spectral make-up of the light as "seen" by the plant.
Ideally, a new colour test palette, specific to cannabis would be set-up which uses the key spikes in photosynthetic response, and a light could then accurately be tested for CCRI (Cannabis colour rendering index
). [EDIT: I'm just reading a little bit more now, and this last bit might be wrong...but I'm just chatting here, so don't take anything I say too seriously!! I'm happy to be corrected...][Second edit: Here is one of the criticisms of CRI from wiki that I think may be relevant to growing:
Calculating the arithmetic mean of the errors diminishes the contribution of any single large deviation. Two light sources with similar CRI may perform significantly differently if one has a particularly low special CRI in a spectral band that is important for the application. Use the root mean square deviation instead.
]
I mentioned a while ago that I might try to build a home-made spectrometer. Eventually I will, and I will report back on what I find. I had actually assumed that my spectrum was good based on the spec sheets, but I agree that it would be better if I wasn't relying on what basically amounts to informed guesswork!
MajorCoco
Well-Known Member
Very nice home-made panels by the way Slix. Mine are definitely a little more rough around the edges than yours. How did you make your chassis? I need to put my heatsinks into chassis eventually to fix the cooling airflow...
MajorCoco
Well-Known Member
I've added a lighter to give a proper scale. I know small plants means smaller buds, but I really expected more fatness by this stage. Whatever the final yield though I know for sure that this is going to be some really great smoke when done. Smell is pretty mild compared to some strains, but I certainly wouldn't want to be running without the carbon. When you smell the oil it smells pretty heavy. There's definitely a heavy diesel fuel smell at first, which softens into a more hashy smell with a hint of lemon and pine in the background.
One thing I will not do again is to use such small pots. Not only is this the reason why I've got a little P deficiency showing on the leaves, but it could well be severely limiting yield too. Too late to do anything now...but the lesson has been learned!!
One thing I will not do again is to use such small pots. Not only is this the reason why I've got a little P deficiency showing on the leaves, but it could well be severely limiting yield too. Too late to do anything now...but the lesson has been learned!!
