LM301H vs LM301H-EVO

If shopping for a new light, would you rather a 3500K LM301H or an LM301H-EVO in 3000K/5000K mix?

  • LM301H 3500K

    Votes: 9 30.0%
  • LM301H-EVO 3000K/5000K Mix

    Votes: 21 70.0%

  • Total voters
    30

Rocket Soul

Well-Known Member
Define better and how much 660 :)

I think youre probably barking up the wrong tree here if youre doing a flower light. That much extra blue for how much extra efficiency? A couple of decimals?

Efficiency is great but all it does is give you more light of the same spectrum. In my thinking its better to do use your wattage (and have some spare wattage) in order to up intensity. I think youd be sacrifying too much in spectrum for just a little extra light. Also, if using 660 to balance out all that blue; what red to blue levels are you targeting and how much would that cost you? Youd be looking at using maybe 25% of your wattage for fairly expensive 660 diodes.

When people says the cct doesnt matter it doesnt mean that the spectrum doesnt matter. There are 1000s of ways to get to a cct nr. Cct is for the eyes not the plants and its not even a good reference between normal 301s and evos.
 
According to HLG their ratios are Red:Green:Blue ratio of 48:32:20. I know CCT is a value for eyes, but as discussed here there seems to be an overwhelming support for more phosphorous in the diodes. 50% 3000k and 50%5000k will give you roughly 4000k CCT?
 

Jonesfamily7715

Well-Known Member
I have tried 6500k with a lot of red diodes 630 and 660, and I wouldn't recommend it. I think I have a pic. I don't think 6500k diodes have any use in a grow light, it doesn't even veg well In my experience, nothing like a fluorescent. maybe someone else has had better experience than me I'm just fuckin around no science to back this up just my experience.
 

Rocket Soul

Well-Known Member
According to HLG their ratios are Red:Green:Blue ratio of 48:32:20. I know CCT is a value for eyes, but as discussed here there seems to be an overwhelming support for more phosphorous in the diodes. 50% 3000k and 50%5000k will give you roughly 4000k CCT?
If using the same photon pump, then 3k +5k is 4k.
 

Reekwind

Member
Interesting thread and discussion.

Personally, I have a feeling that both choices are lacking too much in the red spectrum but then again I've seen 2700K veg better than 4000K and 4000K flower better than 2700K, of course not reproduced +30 times with the same cut so not in any way representative, but at least it's a testament that a specific spectral distribution doesn't fit all plants optimally, or I just haven't hit the right combination that does fit all plants optimally yet :)

Over the years I've grown with HID, blurples, white light LEDs and mixed LEDs.
I've been building my own since 2017 and I've also built a whole lot of lights for friends over the years, read all the cannabis x light studies and cast them all aside as unrepresentative, inconclusive, or employing a plain wrong methodology.
The actual usable science that can be applied in real life in a consistent and profitable way I've seen is so far = none.
And the many grows I've done, seen, and overseen over the years, are not a very reliable data source.

HLG is a great company with great products and I still occasionally grow with my olde QB V1's, but what's the actual real life difference between QB V2 and whatever their newest board/light is now? And (when) does it make sense to upgrade if you already have working QB V2's?

I mainly grow using only 3000K 80CRI LM301b strips and it works extremely well using approx. 45w per sq. foot.
However, I'd like to optimize towards rosin yield, and would love to hear any real life experience people might have had with spectral tweaking or yield/intensity cutoff points comparing cuts run with light being the only differentiating parameter.
 
My bad, apparently the Diablo X is 5280K. Which means they would probably be using 5700K and 4000K to achieve this CCT. Now if you are going for a versatile light which will be good for VEG and Flower, then this makes good sense, considering the amount of red photons 660nm available. Apparently with the new photon pump, people are reporting higher cannabinoids, and HLG is often criticized for a 'bluer' spectrum. But in the end, I think the efficiency boost over a 3000K light is considerable when calculating long term electrical costs and price per watts, at least on a commercial scale. Again, I think the only argument for using 3000K would be less 660nm diodes, or no 660nm diodes. Then you have a spectrum which will take a plant from seed through to flower. I grew incredible bud with only 3000k, no reds. When you do add reds, there are 2 things HLG is doing right which is increasing the CCT of whites in combination with 660nm to reach a more natural sunlight spectrum which is 5500k-ish on a sunny day, thus increasing efficiency, and using a good concentration of 660 to mimic high sunlight. Red is the dominant light in this spectrum regardless of the CCT being 5200K.

I guess the only improvement over the HLG boards would be addition of far red in the spectrum to 5%. This could be done by either upping the CRI to 90 over 80, thus reducing efficiency, but I believe the tradeoff for far red is better than the tradeoff for lower CCT, or adding far red diodes. The diablo x has 28 red, so by adding 4 FR diodes, then that would reduce the below 680nm concentration. I'm not sure this would be ideal. Another idea would be to place far reds in the center of the board on its own channel so they could be operated separately from the rest.
 
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curious2garden

Well-Known Mod
Staff member
However, I'd like to optimize towards rosin yield, and would love to hear any real life experience people might have had with spectral tweaking or yield/intensity cutoff points comparing cuts run with light being the only differentiating parameter.
^^^ such is the stuff doctoral dissertations are made of :)

Currently in flower I'm running 2 HLG Diablo X's with the QB548 boards. I'm redoing my grow and setting up a live process.
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