LD25Delta9
Active Member
I've been rockin' Advanced for a while now and already have them and I've already got the mover, too. I'm stoked to see your results! It'll kinda be like a lookin' into a crystal ball for me!
Hempstar 3 Stage LED Grow
- Thread starter dunit
- Start date
rasputin71
Well-Known Member
How tall are the plants currently (above the soil) and how far above the tops are the lights now? Do you recall how tall they were on Day 1 of flower? What strain(s)?
medicine21
Active Member
I've been doing Ebb n Flow, flood and drain with rockwool cubes, 4x1000w HPS with two 4x8' tables. Doing SOG with 36 plants under each 1000w in a 4x4' area for a total of 144 plants. Best harvest was 0.9g/W, Jack Herrer, 1 week veg, 11 week flower.
Looking to reduce power and switch to LED. It is indeed hard to weed through all the sales pitches of LED. Have a couple of questions I hope you can help me with.
1. I notice you are not covering much area with each 357. Looks like a 2x4' by each light?
2. Which LED light I can realistically use to replace each of my 1000W HPS covered 4x4' 36 plant area?
3. Rockwool cubes have been tough NOT to overwater as they hold a lot. I imagine for LED this would be worse as cubes would not dry out as fast due to light heat. Any advice here?
Looking to reduce power and switch to LED. It is indeed hard to weed through all the sales pitches of LED. Have a couple of questions I hope you can help me with.
1. I notice you are not covering much area with each 357. Looks like a 2x4' by each light?
2. Which LED light I can realistically use to replace each of my 1000W HPS covered 4x4' 36 plant area?
3. Rockwool cubes have been tough NOT to overwater as they hold a lot. I imagine for LED this would be worse as cubes would not dry out as fast due to light heat. Any advice here?
dunit
Active Member
Couple questions:
1. Are you using co2?
2. How tall are your plants finnishing?
One of my good friends rocked tables for years and still swears by it. Seen two different systems that both dealt with the overwatering issue which can lead to crown rot.
One used rockwool starter cubes and then put them in net pots filled with hydroton or clay pellets. These were then placed in a table of hydroton covered in coroplast with holes to hold the net pots.
The other involved using starter cubes which were then put in 4" cubes, but leave the starter cube sticking up about half way to maximize the drainage around the crown. The 4" cubes were put ON TOP of rockwool slab. This set up keeps the crown of the plant up well above the flood line and never seen that set up have crown rot.
So back to your questions.
I have my lights only 12" off the plants but they can easily be placed at 18" and still get great penetration. I only have to cover a small area until my girls get big and I'll expand the light coverage as I need. These lights will easily get great penetration over a 4 by 3 area with decent sized plants.
I want to run a table with 3 357's over it. I figure that would actually over-light the area but I bet the cross lighting would give wicked penetration and production and for sure wouldn't have any heat issues. Just watched a grow in a 4' high crawl space that was 4' wide and 12 feet long. 850watts of LED and his temps never got above 85F with no cooling.
If you are running shorter plants, looking at the results LedBudGuy got with those ISIS 170's those might be the ticket as they seem to penetrate 18" plants quite effectively.
1. Are you using co2?
2. How tall are your plants finnishing?
One of my good friends rocked tables for years and still swears by it. Seen two different systems that both dealt with the overwatering issue which can lead to crown rot.
One used rockwool starter cubes and then put them in net pots filled with hydroton or clay pellets. These were then placed in a table of hydroton covered in coroplast with holes to hold the net pots.
The other involved using starter cubes which were then put in 4" cubes, but leave the starter cube sticking up about half way to maximize the drainage around the crown. The 4" cubes were put ON TOP of rockwool slab. This set up keeps the crown of the plant up well above the flood line and never seen that set up have crown rot.
So back to your questions.
I have my lights only 12" off the plants but they can easily be placed at 18" and still get great penetration. I only have to cover a small area until my girls get big and I'll expand the light coverage as I need. These lights will easily get great penetration over a 4 by 3 area with decent sized plants.
I want to run a table with 3 357's over it. I figure that would actually over-light the area but I bet the cross lighting would give wicked penetration and production and for sure wouldn't have any heat issues. Just watched a grow in a 4' high crawl space that was 4' wide and 12 feet long. 850watts of LED and his temps never got above 85F with no cooling.
If you are running shorter plants, looking at the results LedBudGuy got with those ISIS 170's those might be the ticket as they seem to penetrate 18" plants quite effectively.
dunit
Active Member
So they averaged 13" on trigger day. They are now averaging 18" and the lights are 12" off the top of the plants
medicine21
Active Member
Thanks for the info, dunit.
I run CO2 propane burner at 1200ppm and plants finish around 3' tall.
I also contacted the 357Mag guys and was recommended to cover a 4'x8' table with three of them. I was told this would outperform my 2x1000W which cover this area currently. That would be 2000W reduced to 1071, almost half.
As for the medium I am thinking replacing the rockwool cubes with Fytocell in pots, flood and draining, like Al B Fuct.
I run CO2 propane burner at 1200ppm and plants finish around 3' tall.
I also contacted the 357Mag guys and was recommended to cover a 4'x8' table with three of them. I was told this would outperform my 2x1000W which cover this area currently. That would be 2000W reduced to 1071, almost half.
As for the medium I am thinking replacing the rockwool cubes with Fytocell in pots, flood and draining, like Al B Fuct.
dunit
Active Member
Something to keep in mind also is that LED's don't actually draw the rated wattage. Has something to do with as you approach the wattage threshold for an individual LED it gets less efficient at producing light so they basically underdrive them. For example Stealth Grow's 602 actually draws 350Watts. If I had to hazzard a guess I'd say the 357 probably draws 200watts so in actuality you would only be using 600W to replace 2000. The only drawback of LED's, if you can call it that, is that they hardly produce any heat. I am using two 357 over a 4 by 4 area (which is definately overkill and I'm gonna expand to at leat 4 by 6 next grow) and a propane burner for CO2 in a fully sealed and insulated room and I have to use a small space heater to keep the temps up. I am on a concrete floor and if I threw down a sub-floor I could probably lose the space heater. Sure is different from the old days runnign 4 1000w HPS's and needed 12,000 btu's of air conditioning 
If I was growing in a cooler climate and heat was an issue I might look at running one 1000wHPS in the center of the table and a 357 on either side which would still be a power savings of about 600W and would probably keep the room a balmy temp. Just an idea if you are looking to expand in stages.
If I was growing in a cooler climate and heat was an issue I might look at running one 1000wHPS in the center of the table and a 357 on either side which would still be a power savings of about 600W and would probably keep the room a balmy temp. Just an idea if you are looking to expand in stages.
dunit
Active Member
Forgot to ask, your 3ft plants, are they foliage and bud to the bottom or do you train or trim them to keep the production focused near the top?
kush groove
Active Member
looks nice dunit......I am impressed
medicine21
Active Member
I trim the bottom 3rd of the plant, but I still get a thick canopy with a bit of lower branches in each 4x4 36 plant area.
Interesting, I will ask the 357mag guys what is the actual average wattage draw on this light and post here. Keeping the HPS idea is good, but I do want to cut wattage as much as possible. My electricity company now offers a "service" of checking annual consumption of ANY address online.Something to keep in mind also is that LED's don't actually draw the rated wattage. Has something to do with as you approach the wattage threshold for an individual LED it gets less efficient at producing light so they basically underdrive them. For example Stealth Grow's 602 actually draws 350Watts. If I had to hazzard a guess I'd say the 357 probably draws 200watts so in actuality you would only be using 600W to replace 2000. The only drawback of LED's, if you can call it that, is that they hardly produce any heat. I am using two 357 over a 4 by 4 area (which is definately overkill and I'm gonna expand to at leat 4 by 6 next grow) and a propane burner for CO2 in a fully sealed and insulated room and I have to use a small space heater to keep the temps up. I am on a concrete floor and if I threw down a sub-floor I could probably lose the space heater. Sure is different from the old days runnign 4 1000w HPS's and needed 12,000 btu's of air conditioning
If I was growing in a cooler climate and heat was an issue I might look at running one 1000wHPS in the center of the table and a 357 on either side which would still be a power savings of about 600W and would probably keep the room a balmy temp. Just an idea if you are looking to expand in stages.
dunit
Active Member
Thanks bro
dunit
Active Member
Wow that's quite the service....so much for privacy! I'm all over the full convert to LED's but if you get stuck looking to add a heater and waste power then why not stick with the good old heater that actually throws some light aka 1000W HPS..lol.
So your 3 ft plants actually have about 2 ft of foliage/production height and these 357's will blast through that. LedBudGuy ran with ISIS 170's and got great results from plants that were only about 18" tall but all the way to the bottom so those lights might work too if you are looking at all the options.
medicine21
Active Member
That does make sense, however it would not resolve my night time temp being too low, if that should happen. Although I guess that can come down to 18-20 Celcius at night without issues.
Got a response from 357Mag guys. The actual draw of the Magnum is 180W, so you were pretty close in your estimate. That is pretty incredible when compared to 1000W HPS lights and if claims are correct 3x357Mag > 2x1000W, or 540W LED outperform 2000W HPS.
Devilspawn
Well-Known Member
Did u look at the Blackstar 3w leds that they put out for 2011? Looks like they may be competitive and cheaper that the 357. My 2 90W ufo are vegging the hell out of my grow but all these posts have me convinced they will not do it for flower. Looks like I will end of with 6 strong plants in this grow, maybe 7- 4 widows ( fem), 2 carmelicious( yet to be sexed) and one wild card- maybe- may not be big enough when I go to flower in a week or two. Need to get cracking on figuring it out and orderin the light-its only in a grow cab-planst may get to 3-4 feet in there 36 x 18- says can grow to 56" with my leds and cloner on shelf above
rasputin71
Well-Known Member
I hope I get a BIG tax refund......
dunit
Active Member
Well from a light spectrum scale those ratios make sense. If you look at the output of a 1000w hps the peak, and something like 75% of their output, is in the yellow/orange spectrum that the plants can't use. If you could eliminate that waste then you could accomplish the same thing on 25% of the power. That is supposed to be LED's claim to fame and I guess I'll find out in about 6 weeks