Start led flower room or stay with hps? Insight on reputable led fixtures?

Should I stick with hps to flower or start an led flower room?

  • Total voters
    14
DekaBoS

DekaBoS

Member
Hey guys,

I have been looking around for led lights, I am currently using fluoros for veg and hps for flowering. I want to reduce my light bill and I am willing to invest in led fixtures to make this happen. I have been researching tirelessly and as with anything, some people LOVE this light and some people HATE the same light. I ended up here and checked out the sticky that is supposed to help people with direction on which led to buy. That post was mostly confusing, and when I skipped to the last page it has been closed due to people bitching at each other. So here I ask for some insight on the led world, I want to start a new flower room under leds and I need some guidance.

Any help on what led brands are tried and true? And also any that completely suck?

Links would be amazingly helpful!

I am open to any and all info on every aspect of growing. I am willing to learn everything I can from anyone I can. And also willing to share all the knowledge I have on any subject.

Oh and for the record, the confusion has almost brought me back to the idea of just continuing to use hps for the sake of understanding that beast.

Thanks in advance ✌
 
Olive Drab Green

Olive Drab Green

Well-Known Member
Go with COBs for efficiency's sake. 241w = ~1000 PPFD/PAR = 600w HPS. Why wouldn't you? If you veg'd 24/0 for 3 months and flowered at 10/15 for the rest of the cycle, you'd still be paying less than $100 for a pound of weed or more.
 
DekaBoS

DekaBoS

Member
Olive Drab Green said:
Go with COBs for efficiency's sake. 241w = ~1000 PPFD/PAR = 600w HPS. Why wouldn't you? If you veg'd 24/0 for 3 months and flowered at 10/15 for the rest of the cycle, you'd still be paying less than $100 for a pound of weed or more.
Click to expand...
I am leaning towards the leds for exactly that reason. Any insight on reputable brands? What experience you have with them and or what led lights are you using? All input is welcome on this one, from who ever stops by to read
 
Olive Drab Green

Olive Drab Green

Well-Known Member
DekaBoS said:
I am leaning towards the leds for exactly that reason. Any insight on reputable brands? What experience you have with them and or what led lights are you using? All input is welcome on this one, from who ever stops by to read
Click to expand...
Do not use LED panels. Use COBs.
I use 4 Tasty T1-2100s and 1 Tasty T1-V196.
http://www.tastyled.com/
http://www.northerngrowlights.com/
http://www.timbergrowlights.com/
http://www.johnsongrowlights.com/
http://www.cobkits.com/
@Rahz @CobKits
 
chemphlegm

chemphlegm

Well-Known Member
hid all the way.
In all my years I've never known an experienced hid grower that wasnt left wanting after making the the change to led.
My hid smoke has always been better than my led smoke. led simply do not provide the amount of photosynthesis that an hid does.
refractometer results are always different between the two. I dont think the led lights metabolize as efficiently as an hid. By the time you have enough of the led light to please you, start figuring out how to cool them, and check out how much power is being used after all. HID for the win!!!!!:bigjoint:
 
coreywebster

coreywebster

Well-Known Member
That's thread you mentioned was an embarrassment, I'm glad sunny shut it down.
Most people are using COBs from the companies listed by olivedrab , lots are switching Quantum Boards now too which are relatively new to us. You wont go far wrong with either.

Bottom line is the market is full of crap made with crap part aimed at people who don't know how to tell the difference between marketing spiel and genuine useful data. There are cheap crap lights at cheap prices but unfortunately there are cheap crap lights at stupidly high prices too.

There are a few good LED companies but all the companies olive listed are top people building top lights which really are worth changing to. You will get the best value from fixtures like them. They are all advertisers on here and can be trusted to provide relevant info, they are happy to answer questions and help a grower choose the right fixture for their situation.

Growmau5 has a bunch of videos on youtube which he test various cob lights, he mainly builds his own so the focus is on DIY builds but I would highly recommend watching his earlier vids, he does a side by side with hps and cobs which is interesting to see. All of his vids are worth a watch and hes not selling anything or affiliated with companies so unlike a lot of youtube vids you can actually take what he's saying seriously. He's a member on here too but I don't think he posts much these days.
 
Olive Drab Green

Olive Drab Green

Well-Known Member
chemphlegm said:
hid all the way.
In all my years I've never known an experienced hid grower that wasnt left wanting after making the the change to led.
My hid smoke has always been better than my led smoke. led simply do not provide the amount of photosynthesis that an hid does.
refractometer results are always different between the two. I dont think the led lights metabolize as efficiently as an hid. By the time you have enough of the led light to please you, start figuring out how to cool them, and check out how much power is being used after all. HID for the win!!!!!:bigjoint:
Click to expand...
LED isn't the same as COB. COBs were invented to replace HID in factory and highbay/lowbay applications. I guarantee you give any HID guy a proper COB setup, they'll wish they switched sooner.
 
chemphlegm

chemphlegm

Well-Known Member
Olive Drab Green said:
LED isn't the same as COB. COBs were invented to replace HID in factory and highbay/lowbay applications. I guarantee you give any HID guy a proper COB setup, they'll wish they switched sooner.
Click to expand...

understood, but op specifically asked about L.E.D. lights(isn't the same as cob) so I shared my experiences, like to see some cob refractometer results. I recall the silly UFO sellers here years ago, same success reports too, the buyers said they loved them, all the buyers urged the hid users to make the switch, because they did, they they turned on their hid's again and never looked back.
someday cobs may be a joke too, in similar fashion, we'll see.
 
Olive Drab Green

Olive Drab Green

Well-Known Member
chemphlegm said:
understood, but op specifically asked about L.E.D. lights(isn't the same as cob) so I shared my experiences, like to see some cob refractometer results. I recall the silly UFO sellers here years ago, same success reports too, the buyers said they loved them, all the buyers urged the hid users to make the switch, because they did, they they turned on their hid's again and never looked back.
someday cobs may be a joke too, in similar fashion, we'll see.
Click to expand...
Probably. I am sure you're right.
 
frica

frica

Well-Known Member
chemphlegm said:
I'm not sure of it though, I hear more positives about cobs these days, but time will tell.
why havent commercial growers switched to cobs yet?
Click to expand...
Reflow soldering is much easier on a mass scale than drilling+tapping+thermal pasting COBs to heatsinks.

COBs also require better heatsinks because for example 25w of heat power is concentrated on 1 square cm as opposed to 5cm^2 for SMDs.

SMDs also offer a more even spread. (depending on the LED and COB though, but more often than not it's true)

And because previous grow panels were using diodes and the consumers now associate grow lights with multiple diodes and not a few cobs.

COBs are just really simple for diy, and on a smaller scale are cheaper than normal LEDs (as long as economy of scale doesn't take over)
Though reflow soldering isn't very hard to diy too.

But unless you buy thousands of mid-power/high-power LEDs, they're unlikely to be cheaper than COBs.
 
chemphlegm

chemphlegm

Well-Known Member
Olive Drab Green said:
Because they probably haven't heard of it yet. It's pretty new to the horticulture world as a concept.
Click to expand...

you dont truly believe this do you? cobs been growing for years now.

some pr0of (for me) will be in the PAR meter result. Do you have a pic of the par lighting result under a cob?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top