Lighting questions.. Considering LED over hps/mh combo

monkeychief

monkeychief

Well-Known Member
monkeychief said:
Can't we all get along now? lol. :joint::weed::hump: K let's get back into more useful topics. I did a lot of research and testing regarding the wattage needed to get the yield/quality comparable to HPS as this is our common goal so correct me if I'm wrong. I've been studying that Rocky Mt. High and the Illumitex light bars used in this Danny Danko vid. I posted earlier. If u want high-end quality that works, here it is and it's also american made with an american price-tag. It's a 48" dual-bar light that consists of 24 x 11actual using a cob -type 16 1w chip pushing .68w each for a total of 11w actual per chip. These are what the commercial big commercial veg. farm operations use. If my calculations after studying that vid. frame by frame to calculate the exact number of panels used and it's as follows. They used (6) dueal-bars x running 24 x 11W actual = a total of yikes 1584w in a 4x4'. He also mentioned in the that they were pushing up to 30% more than the HID's in terms of par with up to 30% better yield. This is why I say u need at at least 70%+ actual vs. HID's to just be happy with the yield and quality and more like 80+ to even consider and HID alternative, and way beyond like this system suggests to meet and beat the current king, 1k HPS. The savings will be in the cooling due to leds inherent heat dissipation ability that allows it to operate on average only 15 degress above ambient room temp from what I understand. The savings in power need for cooling such as fans, ac's, etc. average another 30%. So this basically demonstrates with the current tech, the ratio wattage needed for comparable yields is at 1.1 ratio. The advantage in total power consumption is the 30% savings in the additional cooling needed by the HPS. So we can conclude the safest guestimation that by using the same amount of wattage vs. HID's we can gain up to 30% in power consumption along with the additional costs of hardware for the HID's such as replacement bulbs, equip. failures, etc.. These are real life examples not bs claims and myths perpetrated by the industry to rip-off the consumers. This is keeping in spirit this thread's title. This is just my observations from my research and actual hands-on trials and errors thru the yrs. as I'm always welcome and open to corrections and suggestions as we're all still trying to master this new thing.
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Forgot to repost the vid.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVNxNVnkBPE

http://www.illumitex.com/illumitex-led-products/eclipse/

At 700-800 bucks a dual-bar and u need 6 for a 4x4' , you can do the math yourself. If u want to spend money on the best american make and assure u of running with the HPS, here your golden boy.
 
monkeychief

monkeychief

Well-Known Member
Shaded420 said:
Where's da proof?

I bought $1000 worth of Chinese LED's 2 years ago and they all failed within 3 months, their customer service reps took over 2 months to get back to me and then said I would have to buy new panels(even though they were under warranty) because it was my environment that caused water damage to the PSU.

See how that works?
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As i said before "caveat emptor" applies to all makes from all places. Greed has no ethnic preferences. This is just the inconvenient truth of being a consumer. Hey listen, I also said I ate some of the chinese snake oils and it didn't taste any better than the american shit I can attest to you as I've tried both as a fool once. I've done just as bad with htg tri-band ufo's. lol. monkey caught on to their crap. As I said, I'm not pro-chinese cheap panels or american, especially they're for most part just american resellers of these cheap chinese panels at 4x times price making them a very poor value. Like I said, if Apple offered an american-made Iphone made in Cuperinto, California on the corner of Stevens Creek and Wolfe/Miller where the shopping center use to sit for $1200. Would u buy it?
 
monkeychief

monkeychief

Well-Known Member
Shaded420 said:
Where's da proof?

I bought $1000 worth of Chinese LED's 2 years ago and they all failed within 3 months, their customer service reps took over 2 months to get back to me and then said I would have to buy new panels(even though they were under warranty) because it was my environment that caused water damage to the PSU.

See how that works?
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So you post a random review of some guy making claims with no pics or no e-mail chains?

Okay then


Thank you for your very (mis)informative post...

Also, by skimming over that review I can already tell you that the "reviewer" is/was using an older Hans panel which used manual jumpers to change the panel modes - which is not the case anymore. This is without getting into the topic of customer service accusations.

Come on, bud. What's up with the double standards?


 
monkeychief

monkeychief

Well-Known Member
monkeychief said:
So you post a random review of some guy making claims with no pics or no e-mail chains?

Okay then


Thank you for your very (mis)informative post...

Also, by skimming over that review I can already tell you that the "reviewer" is/was using an older Hans panel which used manual jumpers to change the panel modes - which is not the case anymore. This is without getting into the topic of customer service accusations.

Come on, bud. What's up with the double standards?
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Well I was dong some research and found this:

Hi All,

I am by no means an experienced grower, but I thought I'd start a journal to help those considering growing with led and also seek advice.

First a few things about the Hans led panels.
I did not want to over spend on leds, so I decided to dish out 360 euros on 2 Hans panels. I went with Hans panels because they were relatively cheap and I was impressed with his results on Growing Marijuana with LED, Growshow
Furthermore, reviews on his panels are few and far between, however, they are mostly positive.
Unfortunately, up until now (Oct 12th) I am very disappointed with the panels.
First of all, you would expect to receive fully functional panels, but out friend Hans has quality issues with his manufacturing because one of the panels I received was two solder points short of perfect. This meant, I was able to use it in "flowering" mode, but not "seedling" and "mother" mode.
When I notified Hans my panel wasn't working properly, I did not yet know that it was due to those 2 solder points. Instead of offering to replace it, he told me to disassemble the unit.
Now this already was a major pain in the arse, as it's not the customer service that one would expect for 360 euros, but nevermind...
I proceeded to disassemble the unit and immediately realized it was the soldering causing the malfunction. I told Hans I can repair it, but I want a partial refund to cover my costs. Of course he said no and offered to send me a soldering wand instead.
Rubbish customer service so if anyone out there is considering buying his panels then do so at your own risk.
To add insult to injury, you will soon see in the pictures below how "quickly" my girls are growing.

Don't know bout u since you always mentioned how well Hans documents his journals so in that spirit I think this carries a lot more credibility than the above example u provided. Like I said, we've beaten this dog to shreads already let it die and have some mercy, bro. You're happy with your Hans and we're happy with our cheap chinese panels pulling buckets load of buds while you can can manage to get a few handfuls for the same money. And god forbids if they break, not a problem since I can afford up to 4 more from the savings of buying them over the higher quality american ones.
 
W

Where am I

Well-Known Member
Shaded420 said:
So you post a random review of some guy making claims with no pics or no e-mail chains?

Okay then :)

Thank you for your very (mis)informative post...

Also, by skimming over that review I can already tell you that the "reviewer" is/was using an older Hans panel which used manual jumpers to change the panel modes - which is not the case anymore. This is without getting into the topic of customer service accusations.
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Excuse me, I was merely following the forum rules and not linking to another forum website. Anyone can google search this and find it.... I read all reviews before I make a purchase good and bad. My goal was not to misinform anyone. Being in the manufacturing world for 25+ years I know that all products at one time or another will have "quality" issues. Monkey has been quite clear and like him we are sharing our information / experiences to fellow growers. My post was meant to inform not attack or point a finger. My previous post have clearly shown that there were issues with a product I owned. Yet the "warranty" / customer service of the company was honored and my issues were resolved quickly. Yet I have had other companies just flat out ignore or blame the customer, hang up or not answer the phone. My passion has been to grow this medicine to help people not make a profit. Now please except my apology if I have offended you was not my intent.
 
W

Where am I

Well-Known Member
W

Where am I

Well-Known Member
I never stated they were junk... A statement was made and links were posted with pictures of what those particular lights could do. I posted a picture of my current grow including detailed information. My evaluation has been based strictly on my experience with LED's and simple understanding of the laws of physics. (inverse square law). MC has posted at length on what you would need to match the yield of a 1K HID system. My experience has shown this to be spot on... It would be no different than stating how many HID watts I would need to really simulate the sun in power, intensity, lumen and spectrum... Yeah this is dumb... Let's move forward
 
monkeychief

monkeychief

Well-Known Member
Where am I said:
Thanks for the info MC.... I can buy a nice size greenhouse for that kind of $$ and lighting is free :hump:
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Precisely my point. The savings can be substantial between a so-called brand-name and factory-directs. I can beat that kind of wattage for $1600, but then again nothing wrong with Illumitex if u have the means and can justify it. It doesn't matter what kind of lighting system u have, the spec. is a given but more important is u must have enough intensity to power everything. As with any powered device, the amount of performance is directly related to the amount of power applied. I have the luxury of outdoors also as that my favorite anyways. I also have T-8's running along with 5 different led spec. now so I have wide variety of lighting systems to compare to instead of running a single unit which will limit the accuracy and scope of the experiment since there's nothing to compare the results to with so the info. gathered tends to be more speculations rather than accurate comparisons and observations.
 
monkeychief

monkeychief

Well-Known Member
Where am I said:
Excuse me, I was merely following the forum rules and not linking to another forum website. Anyone can google search this and find it.... I read all reviews before I make a purchase good and bad. My goal was not to misinform anyone. Being in the manufacturing world for 25+ years I know that all products at one time or another will have "quality" issues. Monkey has been quite clear and like him we are sharing our information / experiences to fellow growers. My post was meant to inform not attack or point a finger. My previous post have clearly shown that there were issues with a product I owned. Yet the "warranty" / customer service of the company was honored and my issues were resolved quickly. Yet I have had other companies just flat out ignore or blame the customer, hang up or not answer the phone. My passion has been to grow this medicine to help people not make a profit. Now please except my apology if I have offended you was not my intent.
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You did nothing wrong except shared another person's frustration that was meant to warn people of their bad experience. This is call voluntary amnesia or double-standards. lol.
 
D

Don Styln

Member
Where am I said:
Excuse me, I was merely following the forum rules and not linking to another forum website. Anyone can google search this and find it.... I read all reviews before I make a purchase good and bad. My goal was not to misinform anyone. Being in the manufacturing world for 25+ years I know that all products at one time or another will have "quality" issues. Monkey has been quite clear and like him we are sharing our information / experiences to fellow growers. My post was meant to inform not attack or point a finger. My previous post have clearly shown that there were issues with a product I owned. Yet the "warranty" / customer service of the company was honored and my issues were resolved quickly. Yet I have had other companies just flat out ignore or blame the customer, hang up or not answer the phone. My passion has been to grow this medicine to help people not make a profit. Now please except my apology if I have offended you was not my intent.
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monkeychief said:
You did nothing wrong except shared another person's frustration that was meant to warn people of their bad experience. This is call voluntary amnesia or double-standards. lol.
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I think there's also something really positive about pointing out the negatives. It keeps companies honest. If they think they can produce crap and nobody will say anything about it, then they just keep doing it. When enough people point out what's happening, sales drop and customer service gets better or the company goes out of business.

I also think that we have to be reasonable as consumers. Every company will have a quality issue once in a while. It's how they handle it that will make them winners or losers in the marketplace.

As I pointed out in the previous post, when I had a problem, it was resolved amicably and quickly. However, I had to be open to a less traditional way of solving it. And I know a guy who had a problem with the same company. He opened his lights and resolved it. Then he tried to get the company to refund 100% of his money and send him new lights. Personally, I found that repulsive. He was no better than what he was accusing the company of being.

Not all companies, regardless of what country they're located in, are equal. Here is where we can help each other by telling of our experiences so that we can choose the best possible lights for our application.

On another note, I'm salivating over those light bars that you pointed out, MonkeyChief. But to fill my new flowering space, I'd be looking at spending more than $27,000. If I were selling, I might be able to justify it - but I doubt it.

For around $6000 I can get the job done and about the equivalent of HPS. That should hold me for a few years. :-).
 
monkeychief

monkeychief

Well-Known Member
Don Styln said:
Your info has been exceptionally helpful, MonkeyChief.

As I expand my flower space by about five times or more, I will definitely be going with your recommendations. I am not trying to see how little watts I can use - but instead trying to see if I can keep all of the quality of LED and bring up the quantity to that of HPS.

I like the idea of approximately 800 W per 4' x 4' space. :-)


Just sayin'.

Btw, check your email.
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Thanks for the kind words and trust as it makes it all worthwhile as it's my intention to share and learn on this topic. I think all of us should always keep an open mind as we are all in this together and for this reason, stick together so we can help each other avoid the pitfalls together. Besides, I don't think anyone here enjoys the idea of being taken after they made a purchase. Buyer's remorse a damn female dog.

U can have both but it's not going to be no 65w, no pun intended. Seriously. I'm not lol. Like I said, anything less than 700w will enable your HID buddy to start talkin crap and the worst part is you'll agree and I also told u so.... I can tell u I retired at 26 exactly 20yrs. ago legit. I assure u I've had a lotta time and resources invested into my love for our little girls. Trust me when I tell u budget is not an issue with my favorite project cause I'm the CFO and CEO of MonkeyCorp. so the budgets for my favorite projects will always be approved.:hump: By the way, I also oversea my VP's budget, too.:hump: lol. The reason I say this not to smoke my own bong, but to make clear that I've had plenty of time to experiment, can't say all cause that'll be bs, but a poo-poo-load of lighting, hydro, soil-hydro hybrid, etc., but am still interested in learning as no one knows everything. Like all humans, I will make mistakes so by all means, correct if u think I'm spitting bs. We can do better than 800W, more like 1K+ for bout 1k with PAR that will match most current lights at 36".. It should meet or beat the Illumitex pretty bad as the Illumitex are a cob-type running 16 1w chips running .68w or 68%efficiency which is no better than the current 3watters. I think the direction we should be heading into is spec. tuning which consists of actual blending of bands but that's another topic for another day cause my apeshit's starting to whip monkey's ass.
 
DCobeen

DCobeen

Well-Known Member
50 watt per square ft should be sweet with led. im at 30 watt. and i do think ill still do decent yield but not huge yeild.
 
Shaded420

Shaded420

Well-Known Member
I made up that story about the Chinese panels I bought, which was exactly my point...this is the internet, anyone can say anything and expect people to take it as a truth.

If you're going to be making claims like that reviewer was, then at the VERY least you should be backing it up with pictures or a link to a well documented article.

Anyway, jartlow made up his mind, he's purchased his lights....move along and watch his grow.
 
D

Don Styln

Member
monkeychief said:
Thanks for the kind words and trust as it makes it all worthwhile as it's my intention to share and learn on this topic. I think all of us should always keep an open mind as we are all in this together and for this reason, stick together so we can help each other avoid the pitfalls together. Besides, I don't think anyone here enjoys the idea of being taken after they made a purchase. Buyer's remorse a damn female dog.

U can have both but it's not going to be no 65w, no pun intended. Seriously. I'm not lol. Like I said, anything less than 700w will enable your HID buddy to start talkin crap and the worst part is you'll agree and I also told u so.... I can tell u I retired at 26 exactly 20yrs. ago legit. I assure u I've had a lotta time and resources invested into my love for our little girls. Trust me when I tell u budget is not an issue with my favorite project cause I'm the CFO and CEO of MonkeyCorp. so the budgets for my favorite projects will always be approved.:hump: By the way, I also oversea my VP's budget, too.:hump: lol. The reason I say this not to smoke my own bong, but to make clear that I've had plenty of time to experiment, can't say all cause that'll be bs, but a poo-poo-load of lighting, hydro, soil-hydro hybrid, etc., but am still interested in learning as no one knows everything. Like all humans, I will make mistakes so by all means, correct if u think I'm spitting bs. We can do better than 800W, more like 1K+ for bout 1k with PAR that will match most current lights at 36".. It should meet or beat the Illumitex pretty bad as the Illumitex are a cob-type running 16 1w chips running .68w or 68%efficiency which is no better than the current 3watters. I think the direction we should be heading into is spec. tuning which consists of actual blending of bands but that's another topic for another day cause my apeshit's starting to whip monkey's ass.
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Like pretty much everything, doing things well costs. I'm not one to feel the need to buy a Bentley just to say that I have one of the most expensive cars possible. But a Mercedes or even a Land Rover are very nice. :-).

Lately I keep reading about so many people trying to grow in a 4 x 4 or 5 x 5 area - and trying to do it with just one light and 500 or 600 W. Then they report their results, And they are disappointed. I know, I'm one of them. (although, I started off with double that amount of space.) It still was nowhere near enough light.

As to COB lights, I tried those a while back and they were terrible. The plants looked visibly wrong - like they were missing something terribly. Super low yields. I know the technology is improving for those kind of lights, but I'm still wary.


Oooo, I'm liking the idea of 1k per 4' x 4' area. Would love to hear more about that. Have you sourced anything specific that would do it?
 
jartlow

jartlow

Well-Known Member
Thanks.. one light should be enough for now. If I end up being successful I'll be buying 2-3 more.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N900A using Rollitup mobile app
 
D

Don Styln

Member
jartlow said:
Thanks.. one light should be enough for now. If I end up being successful I'll be buying 2-3 more.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N900A using Rollitup mobile app
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That's what I did too. Started small and then was in a position to really understand what my next step would be.
 
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