I recently made the jump to LED after 20 years of growing and with the recommendation of one the members here decided to buy a Timber Redwood-VS. At $800 they are not the cheapest light but just on the reduced cost of electricity and bulb changes alone they should pay for themselves within 2 years. The reason I made the switch was because I don't cool my basement in the summer and my 1000HPS lights are always way too hot and I was hoping to reduce the heat and get better quality bud during the summer months.
The shopping experience was straight forward. They answered my questions quickly and the purchase went very smoothly. Their home page did mention that there was a month lead time on orders because of covid. After about a month, and right before I thought I might drop them a line to get an update, they reached out to me to tell me my lights were almost done and would be shipping soon. I thought it was very considerate of them to reach out to their customers like that, of course I was buying three lights and it is a small chunk of money so I would say the service matches the price.
They came very well packed. My son now has enough bubble wrap to last a few years. I was actually very surprised by the weight and quality of the lights. I just wasn't expecting them to be that heavy. A standard grow tent can certainly support the weight but I would make sure whatever you hang them on is well anchored.
I have now completed 1 grow with 2 more about 2 weeks off and I can say that they blow my 1000 HPS lights away. This has been a very hot, humid summer where I am and I made plenty of mistake my first time with these lights but I still managed to get 800 grams from my first round, or a simplified 1.3 gpw and it was easy. Just Lucas formula and minimal training. knowing what I know now about the lights I expect to increase that pretty easily. One of the biggest problems was the buds were getting so heavy the stalks all fell over and I am very allergic to "wet" weed and breakout in hives and blisters I pretty much have to let things be half way through flower. I am going to add another level to my scrog next round.
Things that I learned about the lights
1) They produced a lot of heat. They are not the magic solution to heat problems. They easily raised the temps in the tent by 10 degrees. The big difference is that although the temps were high, the useable space in the tent was more because there wasn't a death zone right under the lights like with a HPS. But you still have to have a basic control of your air-flow to deal with the heat.
2) Plants stretch like crazy. For some reason I had this idea that plants wouldn't stretch under LED as much. Whoops, they stretched more than I was used to. Next round I will top twice to deal with this issue. I did end up with a lot of smaller buds because of the stretch but they were all nice hard buds, just small.
3) Plants drink a lot more under these lights compared to HPS. I am used to having to feed every 3 days DTW in pro-mix but I found I had to do it every 2 days now. Of course a lot of this has to do with the amazing growth they showed.
4) Basic feeding works fine. I read a lot about the need for extra mg but I found that Lucas worked just fine. In fact other than the stretch I feel like there was no real big surprise.
Conclusion: I would recommend these lights to anybody. If you are using a normal HPS at the moment I dare say it would be stupid not to make the change now. I am sure that one can have the same results by DIY or any of the other quality lights out there, but if you want to spend your money in America for people who treat their customers with thought and don't put up BS photoshopped pictures I would suggest Timberland is a good place to spend it.
The shopping experience was straight forward. They answered my questions quickly and the purchase went very smoothly. Their home page did mention that there was a month lead time on orders because of covid. After about a month, and right before I thought I might drop them a line to get an update, they reached out to me to tell me my lights were almost done and would be shipping soon. I thought it was very considerate of them to reach out to their customers like that, of course I was buying three lights and it is a small chunk of money so I would say the service matches the price.
They came very well packed. My son now has enough bubble wrap to last a few years. I was actually very surprised by the weight and quality of the lights. I just wasn't expecting them to be that heavy. A standard grow tent can certainly support the weight but I would make sure whatever you hang them on is well anchored.
I have now completed 1 grow with 2 more about 2 weeks off and I can say that they blow my 1000 HPS lights away. This has been a very hot, humid summer where I am and I made plenty of mistake my first time with these lights but I still managed to get 800 grams from my first round, or a simplified 1.3 gpw and it was easy. Just Lucas formula and minimal training. knowing what I know now about the lights I expect to increase that pretty easily. One of the biggest problems was the buds were getting so heavy the stalks all fell over and I am very allergic to "wet" weed and breakout in hives and blisters I pretty much have to let things be half way through flower. I am going to add another level to my scrog next round.
Things that I learned about the lights
1) They produced a lot of heat. They are not the magic solution to heat problems. They easily raised the temps in the tent by 10 degrees. The big difference is that although the temps were high, the useable space in the tent was more because there wasn't a death zone right under the lights like with a HPS. But you still have to have a basic control of your air-flow to deal with the heat.
2) Plants stretch like crazy. For some reason I had this idea that plants wouldn't stretch under LED as much. Whoops, they stretched more than I was used to. Next round I will top twice to deal with this issue. I did end up with a lot of smaller buds because of the stretch but they were all nice hard buds, just small.
3) Plants drink a lot more under these lights compared to HPS. I am used to having to feed every 3 days DTW in pro-mix but I found I had to do it every 2 days now. Of course a lot of this has to do with the amazing growth they showed.
4) Basic feeding works fine. I read a lot about the need for extra mg but I found that Lucas worked just fine. In fact other than the stretch I feel like there was no real big surprise.
Conclusion: I would recommend these lights to anybody. If you are using a normal HPS at the moment I dare say it would be stupid not to make the change now. I am sure that one can have the same results by DIY or any of the other quality lights out there, but if you want to spend your money in America for people who treat their customers with thought and don't put up BS photoshopped pictures I would suggest Timberland is a good place to spend it.
