Let's talk about LED's!

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T.H.Cammo

Well-Known Member
I have done a good share of research on LED grow lights. Once I heard that NASA was on board, well, that was good enough for me! Well - the bottom line is "NASA doesn't grow cannibis!". And as most of you probably already know; cannabis doesn't flower worth a crap under LED's! To be completely fair - it will flower, but the results are less than might be expected (to put it charitably)! Up to this point nobody is really sure why it doesn't flower as well as it should. But I have my own little theory, as I'm sure some of you have too. What I hope is that all you "LED-heads" out there, will share your experiences and knowledge. For those of you who might not be up to speed on the idea of LED grow lights, I hope we can dispell some of the mythes and answer some of the questions that might de-mystify the subject a little.

My interest in LED growlights has gone full-circle, I started out "hot and heavy", found out they didn't flower very well, then I dropped the whole idea. Now there seems to be a new interest and more people are bringing the subject up. I have decided to order about half a dozen panels, enough for a fair experiment. Not to flower with - just for mom and clones and a trial, veg stage, SCROG. I have seen several grow journals using LED's; they seem to veg just fine, but I will be flowering with HPS. This will be my first "hands-on" experience with LED's.

I figure I can fill up a 4 square foot screen (to about 75 or 80%) using just 56 watts of LED's; then flower with 250 watts of HPS. Sounds real simple! Anybody out there have any "real world" experience with LED's? Do LED's really veg "good", but flower "bad"? There seems to be so many other benefits from using LED's that I just have to give them a try! What does anybody else have to say?
 
Sublime757

Sublime757

Well-Known Member
Sounds grand! At least you'll be saving $$ in your veg room. I haven't personally used LED's but I have seen good things. Like you said, great for veg, crappy for flower. So your plan to flower with an HPS is solid in my book.
 
T

T.H.Cammo

Well-Known Member
Okay! Not a lot of response yet. Let's start out slow, maybe I can get a few more people interested. Below, I have listed a few benefits that LED grow lights offer:

1. LED's produce little, or no, heat. If you think CFL's run cool; then LED's are like ice cubes!
2. LED's use about 1/4 the amount of electricity of an HID (based on the amount of square feet of canopy area and assuming the HID delivers about 50 watts per square foot).
3. LED's do not need to be constantly adjusted to keep them "just an inch or two" above the canopy. They really do work better at a foot, or so, away!
4. LED's don't require a typical "grow cabinet", with closed in walls, covered with mylar. All design, construction and ventilation problems are much simpler!
5. LED's are not subject to the "Inverse Square Law" of light diffusion. For those of you who have done your homework - the Inverse Square Law states: "As the distance between light and plant doubles, the actual light energy received by the plant is reduced by a factor of four". In other words, "twice the distance equals only 1/4 of the light energy". That's how much light energy you lose when using HID's - not so with LED's!!!
6. LED's have a useful service lifespan of several years (estimates vary, but fifteen years of constant "12-12" lighting is very realistic!) - so forget about the cost of replacement bulbs for a long, long, time.

If anybody is puzzeled by any of these benefits, feel free to ask questions, I would be glad to give a more detailed explaination. Any comments or questions (or experiences, for that matter) are welcome!
 
VictorVIcious

VictorVIcious

Well-Known Member
gee I wonder were you came up with the 14 watt number that you 'figured' per square foot. I bet you will put them on panel about 5" square with a 3 to 1 ratio of red and blue too. If you trust all of that , which is the best I have seen so far, why don't you trust the flowering lnformation from the independant test. Be honest, you won't have to remember what you said. VV
 
stoner_brownie_batter

stoner_brownie_batter

Well-Known Member
Why don't leds work well for flower? That fuckin' blows. If that's true, I'll just pay the same amount for a hps. COULD they work well for flower???
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purplehaze2

purplehaze2

Well-Known Member
I just bought 2 ufos for $1200 still havent recieved them yet.they have been on back order for 2 months. But I plan on running through both stages. And if I need back up ill slap A couple 1000hps on there asses.good nugg feeling pumped!
 
YungMune

YungMune

Well-Known Member
im about to import 20 led panels and sell them. im pretty sure theres a way to make them flower good.
 
S

shonuff

Active Member
Leds are far superior as far as energy consumption goes those ufos you were talking about supposidly give the same light as a 600 hps. If flowering can be done well with em there would be no reason not to use them and I would definetly use them for veg just to keep things low key with the energy company.
 
Sublime757

Sublime757

Well-Known Member
They have flowering specific spetrums, but the LED grows I've seen didn't do shit for yield. They work much better for lettuce and crap like that
 
Fake Plastic Trees

Fake Plastic Trees

New Member
There's another guy got an LED grow on here now, I think he's going to use an hps for flowering too, here's his thread https://www.rollitup.org/indoor-growing/40849-36-watts-led-grow-action.html?highlight=LEDs

Actually running a search on LEDs there's a few people giving them a try now. As for flowering with them I reckon people aren't using the proper mix of spectrums but I am not that knowlegable and its not based on fact, its just an I reckon....
 
T

T.H.Cammo

Well-Known Member
VictorVIcious said:
gee I wonder were you came up with the 14 watt number that you 'figured' per square foot. I bet you will put them on panel about 5" square with a 3 to 1 ratio of red and blue too".
Hey VV!
That's close enough. I plan on using the 14 watt kits from LED Grow Lights - HomeGrownLights.com

"If you trust all of that , which is the best I have seen so far, why don't you trust the flowering lnformation from the independant test."
Why don't I trust the flowering information from which independant test? I have seen several tests, with cannabis not Tiny Tim tomatos, and they all end up pretty much the same! I'm not saying LED's wont flower at all, they will, so will small CFL's. I'm just looking for a better way!

"Be honest, you won't have to remember what you said."
How dare you, sir? What the hell are you talking about?
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T

T.H.Cammo

Well-Known Member
stoner_brownie_batter said:
Why don't leds work well for flower? That fuckin' blows. If that's true, I'll just pay the same amount for a hps. COULD they work well for flower???​
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Nobody is really sure (at this point) why LED's wont flower cannabis too well. But I think it has to do with the following (IMHO):

1. Commercially available LED grow lights don't contain any UV-B spectrum because UV-B LED's are rather expensive (I've heard they are several $'s apiece!!! As opposed to a few cents each.).
2. Most commercially available LED grow lights just put out four wavelengths of light (some only use two) - to correspond with the four "Absortion Peaks" in Chlorophyll-A and Chlorophyll-B.
3. There are several other pigments, besides Chlorophyll's-A&B, that are also very important in the flowering process of cannabis; each of them requires they're own specific wavelength of light in order to photosynthesize efficiently.

I don't claim to be a Botanist - So I sure don't have all the answers. But something is deffinately missing!
Yeah. HPS will flower fine, and it costs less to buy - it just uses about four times as many watts of electricty during the flowering cycle; compared to LED's in the vegging cycle.
 
T

T.H.Cammo

Well-Known Member
shonuff said:
Leds are far superior as far as energy consumption goes those ufos you were talking about supposidly give the same light as a 600 hps. If flowering can be done well with em there would be no reason not to use them and I would definetly use them for veg just to keep things low key with the energy company.
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I agree 110%!!! But let's wait untill we see a bumper crop brought in with just LED's before we freak out! Whether they are UFO's, or somebody elses make and model - the more of us who are experimenting, the sooner we will get to bottom of this delima!
 
T

T.H.Cammo

Well-Known Member
grower1991 said:
But do we have leds yet with the right spectrum? That seems to be the issue here.
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LED's seem to work just fine for several other plants that I have seen articles about. I believe a little "Tweeking" with the spectrum is all we need to make them work just fine for flowering cannabis too. Untill then - they'll pay for themselves in the vegging room.
 
T

T.H.Cammo

Well-Known Member
Sublime757 said:
They have flowering specific spetrums, but the LED grows I've seen didn't do shit for yield. They work much better for lettuce and crap like that
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Maybe we'll never get cannabis to flower really well with LED's! After all it is a "High Energy" plant. But if I can veg on LED's for a lot cheaper - I'll take it!
 
T

T.H.Cammo

Well-Known Member
Fake Plastic Trees said:
There's another guy got an LED grow on here now, I think he's going to use an hps for flowering too, here's his thread https://www.rollitup.org/indoor-growing/40849-36-watts-led-grow-action.html?highlight=LEDs

Actually running a search on LEDs there's a few people giving them a try now. As for flowering with them I reckon people aren't using the proper mix of spectrums but I am not that knowlegable and its not based on fact, its just an I reckon....
Click to expand...
There are different types of LED grow lights available. Some, like this guy is using, use seperate "screw-in bulbs" for red and blue. I believe it is really difficult to distribute the light evenly, and well mixed, using this method. The lights I will be using mix the reds and blues (something like a Checker board) on a flat panel. I just have to make a frame that will hold several panels together.
 
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