First time grower experimenting with cheap LEDs

[pedrovski]

Hi there i had joined the forum to ask for advice with which of the 1w chips was going to need and was directed here by NugHunter, i really never would have thought of using these smd strips myself so im glad my attention was directed to this thread. I have 1 question though, is there any specific wavelenths you looked for on ebay or was it just simply red and blue 5050 strips?
keep up the good work & hope your grow goes well.
thanks

 

[Panelata]

Hi there i had joined the forum to ask for advice with which of the 1w chips was going to need and was directed here by NugHunter, i really never would have thought of using these smd strips myself so im glad my attention was directed to this thread. I have 1 question though, is there any specific wavelenths you looked for on ebay or was it just simply red and blue 5050 strips?
keep up the good work & hope your grow goes well.
thanks

Hi pedrovski Its the cheapest of the cheapest Chinese strips, I dont think they care too much for specific wavelenghts when manufacturing these, and furthermore , I think that every strip is different from one another, doubt very much there is any consistency here.
I found this spec sheet on them http://www.wayjun.com/Datasheet/Led/5050 SMD LED.pdf
and there is also this which looks a little more serious http://www.superbrightleds.com/cat/surface-mount-smd/

But in my personal opinion from the current results I have so far, I dont think the wavelenghts are too far off the required PAR wavelenghts , the red may be a little off since they claim it to be in the lower 600s but the blues seem to be spot on, hence why I have a slightly higher ratio of blues

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Par_action_spectrum.gif

Perhaps hold back and see just how successful my experiment works out, if this does not work out , I would not want people blowing money needlessly, but I am very confident so far.

 

[pedrovski]

thanks for the reply on that,was just looking for cheapest option for the lighting overall (electricity used) being one of the variables as moving into my own house within the next couple of months so wanted to invest in something like this for after i move so will wait and see how it goes for you but i'm sure if there was going to be issues you would have seen them already so all will hopefully go well for you and maybe it would be worth using warm white strips aswell as red if its low 600's, cant hurt for me to try. I shall have to document it all when i finally grow it so others know if it works well or not and 1 quick question,which seller did you buy the strips of?
thanks

 

[Bumping Spheda]

I seriously hope these smd strips make his plants explode with nug, but good veg results are relatively easy compared to good flower results. I think it's a little too early to start up the band. Huuuuge thanks to Panelata for taking this one for the team, but I'd hold off on your purchase, pedrovski, until we get some final weights and a smoke report.

As for the wavelength of these LED's I've wondered this, too, but then I keep imagining the light absorption graphs in my head and think, "Plant's eat everything in the visible range... How could these not hit something?" And of course they do, look at his plants. Then again, we'll want to hit as close to the absorption peaks as we can (along with everything else in the right ratio), and in high quantity, but at the very least these could quite possibly be the killest supplemental lights ever. Who knows?

 

[Panelata]

thanks for the reply on that,was just looking for cheapest option for the lighting overall (electricity used) being one of the variables as moving into my own house within the next couple of months so wanted to invest in something like this for after i move so will wait and see how it goes for you but i'm sure if there was going to be issues you would have seen them already so all will hopefully go well for you and maybe it would be worth using warm white strips aswell as red if its low 600's, cant hurt for me to try. I shall have to document it all when i finally grow it so others know if it works well or not and 1 quick question,which seller did you buy the strips of?
thanks

Ped dont take this the wrong way but I can not tell you where I bought them as this would be pretty much giving my identity with address away as I could easily be traced through the seller.So you will have to do your own bit of homework on this one.But a hint would be to look at suppliers on alibaba or even ebay and get in touch with them.
Also as Bumping Spheda suggests below probs best I complete the grow to be absolutely certain this works,I imagine the autoflowers should be ready in about 5 weeks or so, but yeah if you do want to go ahead now all you got to do is find smd 5050 sellers and talk to them,I'm sure you'll find a good deal out there possibly even better than mine as I settled with the first guy I spoke with.

 

[firsttimegrow1]

Yeah thanks mate , my intention for documenting this grow here, is to get all the help and suggestions I can get but only from those that truly do want to help a fellow grower succeed , but I really am not fond of bulls***s, especially those who target new growers and attempt to discourage them with misinformation and writing up absolute poop,I mean who in the hell would pay 1400 dollars for a 250 watt led light. Funny thing is on one of his other posts he is promoting some dodgy never heard of before LED light, even has a broken link to it.So I think he's just not happy that I might be onto something and has issues with me sharing it. Hence my sarcastic reply.

I am also beginning to think that the topped plant will do well (just hoping its a female), I dont know if its the new light or just the time of vegetation and the nutes starting to have an effect but I have noticed a lot faster growth over the last 2 days they are really starting to take off and I am having to water every 3-4 days now as opposed to every 6-7 days.Cant wait till they show preflowers so I can take out the males , I really need to make space, getting very crowded in there.

i cant wait for these top starty the flower cycle im curious to weight per watt if your pulling 400 watt in flower theoreticly should get 200 grams time will tell i seen on some other site that you could get 0.75 of a gram per watt with leds how big r they now any new pics

 

[Panelata]

i cant wait for these top starty the flower cycle im curious to weight per watt if your pulling 400 watt in flower theoreticly should get 200 grams time will tell i seen on some other site that you could get 0.75 of a gram per watt with leds how big r they now any new pics

Well I don't have both panels in there, only the new one I built which is drawing 204 watts only , also bear in mind that the 4 photo-period plants have not been sexed yet and could turn out to be all males, however a good comparison I imagine would be to see what I can get out of the auto flowers compared to what the breeder says is to be expected .This is Barneys description of the autos I am growing:

[h=2]Barneys Pineapple Express Autoflowering Feminised Seeds Specs[/h]

type	Auto-Flowering / Feminized / Indica
Genetics	Ruderalis X Skunk #1 X Cheese
yield	15 to 20 gr
Height	40 to 50 cm
flowering time	Auto-Flowering
Harvest time	Auto-Flowering
THC	12 to 15%
CBD	High

So I am aiming for at least 15g from each or 45g from the 3 any less and I would think something about my setup is shite

Yeah I do have a couple of recent pics on my phone, will try to upload them a little later, but be warned, I been getting a little too overconfident here, and been going full on experimental , I saw a few of the Sleestack x skunk grows and seems the plant develops only one main cola and the few side branches really aren't that great, so being tight for space , I lollipoped them trimed all the side branches so it can focus on one main stem, I dont have a problem with height but I do with width so if they stretch I will just raise the other plants to the light .
Also the THC which got topped, I am going full on on it, I saw some guys thread where he has this method of getting only 8 colas of even canopy height, and I am trying to do that now.
I even used the trimmings and had a go at cloning , now I dont have any cloning gear, no domes, rooting compounds etc, so all I did is dip the cuttings into ordinary tap water and left them in very low lighting , built my own dome out of a water bottle lol, thing is I expected them to die right away , and 2 days later, the leaves aren't even droopy they look really healthy, I will upload some pics, but I hope people don't tell me off for my experiments , I hope to learn and this is my way of doing it .
Peace.

 

[caretak3r]

they look really healthy, I will upload some pics, but I hope people don't tell me off for my experiments , I hope to learn and this is my way of doing it .
Peace.

I've only been at this stuff for about 8 months, but almost everything I've done was against convention. From my experience people seem to over complicate cloning. I've had 99% success rate just using a Folgers coffee container and a bubbler. From what I've read, you can simply do as you are - drop them in water in low light. I think he only difference in time-to-root is a few days.

One thing I have learned is you really do need two grow chambers if you are cloning. I tried very hard to get away with a single flowering cabinet and it just didn't quite work. It would be fine if you were always growing from seed, but that's too expensive for my tastes. I'm about to do some tests to compare 1)wicking system, 2)top fed flood/drain 100% perlite with contained roots, 3) top fed 100% hydroton with roots in res (contained via nylon stockings). All three will share the same aerated res of straight water and will be fed OC+ CRF nutes. Most people wouldn't do any of these things, but it's more fun to experiment. The point is, experimenters are those that become pioneers (assuming they find success )

 

[Panelata]

Ok guys its update time.

Be Warned I been going a little nuts on these plants and decided to experiment to the max
on them, and some of the things I am doing or considering doing might be offensive to some viewers lol,
so you been warned, this is not for the faint hearted .

So I am lollipoping both Sleestacks for one single cola, going against the general opinion
of topping for several colas,but I do have a good reason... space, I can handle 6ft growth
upwards but am very limited for sideways growth, besides I wanted to have a go at cloning
and used the cuttings to have a go at it.

here are the 2 Sleestack x skunks after getting a side trim:


And this is what I did with the trimmings :

I am really surprised they have not wilted at all, because all I got in there is plain tap water , and the PH aint that good either , I got very hard water where I live and PH is at about 7.5-8.5


With the THC bombs I am also lollipoping one of them to get single upwards growth ,but the
one that has been topped, I am hoping to follow this method I found on this forum

https://www.rollitup.org/subcools-old-school-organics/542308-main-lining-thread.html

now I am running a risk here that this plant may be male , but nonetheless, I do
want to practice the technique and will do so until sex is determined.I have trimmed the
lower branches as they were playing catchup and I want even height on this one on all colas.


The autoflowers are all showing pistills now throughout the plants and we can see a really huge
difference between the 2 that are in Air-Pots and the other one that is not.
I think we can conclude that the Air-Pots are much better.



So far ,I been avoiding doing anything to these plants as I do not want to stress them and lose grow time
considering they have a very short life cycle determined by time and not environmental conditions...
However and yes you may have a go at me for this crime I am attempting, I am now trying to stress one
into going hermie, I sprayed it with colloidal Silver .
I really think these are beautiful plants and so easy to grow, plus I have sampled a smoke of them from a friend, and
I would like to have seeds of them at my disposal without having to pay 10 bucks each time,
I am aware of the hermie trait being passed on ,but having low standards and not really bothered
with seeded bud, I can live with it.I picked one that had some leaf damage already from rubbing against
the fan, as the candidate.
Here they are in their little enclosure that they have come to love:



As for ferts or nutes that some people been asking these are the goodies I have at my disposal ,which I am dead sure have got to be the real deal seeing it as my plants are now exactly into their 4th week (28 days) and have not packed it in yet after all the abuse.

The soil I use is the Biobizz allmix ,and I also save the water from boiled vegetables (as long as I do not add any salt ) to add to the tap water I use thats left for at least 24hrs sitting on a dish to evaporate the Chlorine.

Ok folks I think I have covered all , so hope you enjoy the pics and may the green force be with you.

 

[Panelata]

I've only been at this stuff for about 8 months, but almost everything I've done was against convention. From my experience people seem to over complicate cloning. I've had 99% success rate just using a Folgers coffee container and a bubbler. From what I've read, you can simply do as you are - drop them in water in low light. I think he only difference in time-to-root is a few days.

One thing I have learned is you really do need two grow chambers if you are cloning. I tried very hard to get away with a single flowering cabinet and it just didn't quite work. It would be fine if you were always growing from seed, but that's too expensive for my tastes. I'm about to do some tests to compare 1)wicking system, 2)top fed flood/drain 100% perlite with contained roots, 3) top fed 100% hydroton with roots in res (contained via nylon stockings). All three will share the same aerated res of straight water and will be fed OC+ CRF nutes. Most people wouldn't do any of these things, but it's more fun to experiment. The point is, experimenters are those that become pioneers (assuming they find success )

That's so true people do over complicate things and even put some newbies off at times.
I don't know if I will be getting into the cloning business I was kind of hoping to take the lazy way out and just get a load of seeds from a decent autoflowering strain, and just germ 1-2 every week or so so that I can have a perpetual small harvest every week, should be more than enough to keep me flying , which is all that I intend to do really, not really into the commercial side of things but want to avoid having to buy a surprise in a bag everytime I run out.

However, I have 3 fem seeds which will be my next grow , they are Delicious Northern lights blue, Reserva Privada Kandy Kush and seedsman White widow (which I am really looking forward to, and any input on these 3 strains from previous growers is most welcome), and I might have a go at selecting a mother if I am happy with the growth, and thus substitute the auto seed idea for the cloning instead, but I will just build a box to house the mother and the clones will be going into the flowering area.
Your methods that you are attempting is a little too adventurous for me so I think I will stick to soil , but I am hoping to follow your research and see if I can learn a thing or 2 so do keep some updates bro and I hope you do have success, which I am sure you will.

Be Green

 

[Bumping Spheda]

Goddamn, those are pretty shades of Green. So compact! Fuckin' ...

Seriously, if nothing else this is the cheapest, most baddest veg/mother light anybody could ask for, it's silly good. Cheers to it turning out to be more than just that.

No one else "liked" that post? Shenanigans.

 

[xmobotx]

great show! be interesting to see how flowering goes 4 sure

 

[Panelata]

Goddamn, those are pretty shades of Green. So compact! Fuckin' ...

Seriously, if nothing else this is the cheapest, most baddest veg/mother light anybody could ask for, it's silly good. Cheers to it turning out to be more than just that.

No one else "liked" that post? Shenanigans.

Yep we can safely conclude it does the job as far as vegging goes, and I am sure that a a panel thats a 5th the size should be enough to keep a bonsai mother going nicely for as little as US$20 worth of lights drawing under 5 dollars a month of electricity or thereabouts. I am just hoping this thing does go the full mile and deals with flowering just as well,speaking of which , I have noticed some tiny specs of growth on the 5th node of both my sleestacks which I assume to be preflowers ,but way too small to make out any detail, so a couple more days I guess and we will know what is what.

Wish my growth would be one solid rosy experience, but sooner or later my noobishness was bound to take its toll on these ever forgiving plants, I think I might have gone overboard on the nutes or maybe the watering (i.e. did not wait for it to fully dry out), but the tips on the autoflowers (all 3 of them) is showing some slight burn, I am dead sure its too much nitrogen , but if anyone things otherwise please advise.

 

[FranJan]

Yep we can safely conclude it does the job as far as vegging goes, and I am sure that a a panel thats a 5th the size should be enough to keep a bonsai mother going nicely for as little as US$20 worth of lights drawing under 5 dollars a month of electricity or thereabouts.

Hey Pan, I'm just catching up here. You're a busy little beaver, ain't ya ? Anyway I keep some bonsai moms under some 10 watt 5500K SMD LED spotlights. Clone under them too. This keeps them healthy, but growth is slow. But since I only take 2 or 4 clones a month it's perfect for me. It's only drawing 6 to 8 watts and once the efficiency gets better on these, and therefore less heat generated, I have a feeling people will be using these SMD/COB lights to keep their genetics going for years, perhaps decades. Much cheaper and easier than tissue sampling, though I guess tissue is better in the long run.
Looking forward to your adventure here. I am interested into finally dumping my CFLs that I still use to veg with and your grow is very interesting in that regard. I have my doubts about some things you're doing, but I love to be wrong about some things too! Good Luck and Happy Growing!

 

[Panelata]

Hey Pan, I'm just catching up here. You're a busy little beaver, ain't ya ? Anyway I keep some bonsai moms under some 10 watt 5500K SMD LED spotlights. Clone under them too. This keeps them healthy, but growth is slow. But since I only take 2 or 4 clones a month it's perfect for me. It's only drawing 6 to 8 watts and once the efficiency gets better on these, and therefore less heat generated, I have a feeling people will be using these SMD/COB lights to keep their genetics going for years, perhaps decades. Much cheaper and easier than tissue sampling, though I guess tissue is better in the long run.
Looking forward to your adventure here. I am interested into finally dumping my CFLs that I still use to veg with and your grow is very interesting in that regard. I have my doubts about some things you're doing, but I love to be wrong about some things too! Good Luck and Happy Growing!

Well its only a matter of time before they double the number of diodes on an smd the 5050 has 3 , fairly sure we will be seeing 6 maybe 9 soon, so yeah I think there will be a lot to be achieved with smds, as for the heat, I find its mostly generated by the resistors and not so much the diodes, and I can easily deal with it by either blowing a fan onto them, or lowering the voltage I have a driver that allows to regulate dc voltage from 9v to 14v at 0.1 v intervals, lowering the voltage to 11v does away with most heat, however this option also means less watts.

Lol , I also have doubts about most of the stuff I am doing but so far have been surprised, I am trying to learn as much as I can off one grow, hence why I am going full on mad scientist on them.Feel free to speak out if you think I am crossing lines I shouldn't be

 

[FranJan]

Well I think you should just go for it. As long as no one gets electrocuted, I say try it, right ? Just remember the more variables you add by experimenting the harder it is to come to real conclusions. At least IMO.

You may want to use a little less water when feeding. Too much water in fresh mix frees up of nutrients and can cause burnt tips. All that water passing over fresh roots with all those fresh nutes, probably nitrogen, can cause it I believe. Plus it's good to start LED plants off with very light feedings at first. I look at it as the amount of PAR/PUR generated dictates what the plant should get, not what a label, pot size or your ambition says . I would think in your case with all the variables and questionable spectrums, you should take it easy with the feedings and let the plant tell you what it needs. Or more plainly put, don't give it more food than it needs to survive in the environment you created or it's gonna get ugly early .

And that's what sucks about resistors/Zeners, Extra resistance, plus more wattage than needed = heat and poor performance/efficacy. But those LEDs are meant to be bright and last, not really to grow weed and save money. That's why I feel Chip On Board array will really take off in micro/mini grows. Great heat control and they come in strips too!
http://www.lumitech.bnet.at/chip-on-board-cob-led-module_11.htm

 

[Panelata]

Well I think you should just go for it. As long as no one gets electrocuted, I say try it, right ? Just remember the more variables you add by experimenting the harder it is to come to real conclusions. At least IMO.

You may want to use a little less water when feeding. Too much water in fresh mix frees up of nutrients and can cause burnt tips. All that water passing over fresh roots with all those fresh nutes, probably nitrogen, can cause it I believe. Plus it's good to start LED plants off with very light feedings at first. I look at it as the amount of PAR/PUR generated dictates what the plant should get, not what a label, pot size or your ambition says . I would think in your case with all the variables and questionable spectrums, you should take it easy with the feedings and let the plant tell you what it needs. Or more plainly put, don't give it more food than it needs to survive in the environment you created or it's gonna get ugly early .

And that's what sucks about resistors/Zeners, Extra resistance, plus more wattage than needed = heat and poor performance/efficacy. But those LEDs are meant to be bright and last, not really to grow weed and save money. That's why I feel Chip On Board array will really take off in micro/mini grows. Great heat control and they come in strips too!
http://www.lumitech.bnet.at/chip-on-board-cob-led-module_11.htm

Thanks Fran ,really happy to have an experts opinion ,I always told myself from the word go that I would not be committing the one mistake most newbs are prone to ,being over watering and over feeding but the temptation is just too great , I am going to let the pots get dry and next watering will be plain ph balanced water only. I know I am adding too many variables, partly because I been getting too confident after the positive first 4 weeks, but I will bring myself back down to earth and stop fooking about so much .

I like the chip on board idea, at some point when I have the time, I will have a go at mounting smds onto a printed circuit board with all the resistors focused in one place away from the diodes, and obviously with high quality resistors and diodes, just need to work out best spectrum frequencies and the like, if anything I am quite happy with the 2R:1B at 630nm and 460nm at least for the veg phase , I imagine flowering will demand a lot more complexity , but time will tell, going to go with what I have until the autos are harvested , then tinker with it when I place the photos into flower if results of the autos are not satisfactory.

Thanks again bro.

 

[valuablevariable]

This is a grow where I am really interested to see the results. Dont disappear without a trace towards the end, Ive seen way too many journals end that way. Even a low yielding result is very important to know about so the next can learn from it.

I am no expert on LEDs, but are getting red and blue ones really the right way to go? Are they actually emmitting different light than the white or do they just have a blue or red casing or something turning the white light into colors?

And again, DO NOT DISAPPEAR!

 

[Panelata]

This is a grow where I am really interested to see the results. Dont disappear without a trace towards the end, Ive seen way too many journals end that way. Even a low yielding result is very important to know about so the next can learn from it.

I am no expert on LEDs, but are getting red and blue ones really the right way to go? Are they actually emmitting different light than the white or do they just have a blue or red casing or something turning the white light into colors?

And again, DO NOT DISAPPEAR!

Hi , and welcome , I'll do my best to keep it going, also hate getting tucked into a thread and finding out it got abandoned just as it was getting interesting.

I have zero experience growing with any other light, so best I let someone else in the LED community answer that better for you as some will have side by side grows.

And as far as I know both red and blue light is produced using their own semi-conductive materials, white leds ,however are blue diodes coated with phosphor.

You have an awesome journal going, gonna dive into it now and see what I can learn about HPS

 

[Panelata]

Ok happy people, time for one more update, its now been 33days for the Slesstack x Skunk#1 and 32 for the THC Bombs and the Pineapple expresses .Just gave them a watering this time with very mild dose of BioBizz Bio Heaven which I just added to my inventory, I had mild leaf tip burn on mainly one of the autos, so I went easy today, mixed 5 ml of BH and 5ml of Topmax in 5l mineral water bottle with a very low tds of 100 and a ph of 6.1 .

I am also finding it a little difficult now with the space and really need to cut down the population, looking to remove at least 2 of the photos and keep 2 which I will transplant to 10L air pots ,but I need to sex them and they are taking their sweet time showing preflowers, the 2 SS have them but are too small to make out yet, I attempted to take a pic so that maybe someone could pick something out of the very small detail, and will attach as well.

So here goes starting with the TBs . As I mentioned on my last update , I lollipoped one and topped the other.



Here are the SS , both of them are showing preflowers but I cant make out yet.



And here is my hopeless attempt at macro photography with a shitty camera phone, doubt anyone will make out but nonetheless here goes these are on one of the sleestacks , but both plants have similar bulbs by the 5th nodes.


And now for the autos they are growing a little differently from one another, one has really taken off and is showing a lot more pistills than the other 2 one is a runt but still showing a few pistills, the other one is the one with slightly burnt leaf tips.


Ok thats about it , I really hope I can sex the autos soon and transplant them and do away with the males, so I am seriously considering switching lights to 12/12, did not want to because of the autos, but I really need to make space, so will probably go 12/12 in the next 2-3 days if I still can not see those preflowers.

Enjoy people.