Hps vs New L.E.D.s

I am sure this has been covered before but I set my room up with a 600w hps. I have been thinking about getting an led to cut down on electricity and heat. My main concern is plant production. So to the vetters out there who have tried both, what are my realistic expectations?
How to they really compare in plant productivity?
How much can I honestly save in electricity?
How much temp do they cut out?
Is there any drawbacks of using them that I am not thinking about?
I just have 4 babies in a little Nft system, any help will be appreciated.
Productivity is my main focus but don't care to invest the money for a better future.

For me, I went from HPS and MH 600W, to Chinese 900W LED first off.
Veg growth was slower, And had cal+mag def which I had never had before. Flowering was about the same.
That was before I knew anything about LEDs, Once I knew a bit more and to really measure there power from the wall it was only 400W from the wall. Heat wasnt much better.

Then I went the CREE 3070 cobs (4 of them driven at 50W each). (200W from the wall)
Basically couldnt tell the difference growth wise from the HPS and MH, Just had to run the LED quite close (1-2 feet from tops)
Same feeding worked perfectly again and didnt have a cal+mag def. Temp was way down to the point where I had to decrease watering to 1 and a half to 2 weeks instead of weekly.

Cant really compare the next upgrades I did since I switched to DWC.
But added 2 more 3070 at 50W each and id never go back to HPS or MH.
Find my self running out of space easily now and 3 plants can fill my 1.8X2.5M space with 4 weeks veg.

At the moment im collecting parts for my next upgrade which will be CitiLED 1825 COBs water cooled.


But if you want to look at it from the numbers.
HPS only 30% of the power goes into light.
The 3070 driven at 50W each 42% goes into light.
And the 1825 at 120W each your around 50% into light.

I'm gonna have to research that a little more, I am afraid I'm kinda old school and haven't even heard of some of those. I just keep hearing LEDs are the future. I have ventilation and odor control with dehumidifcation. I just am looking for less electricity and heat without loosing yeild of my Nft, pulled over an lb of lemon og last grow. I want to improve and try to cut variable costs at the same time.

I just did the change for the same reasons as you..I cooked some plants when a fan failed...
Look into DIY cob leds.. they are the way to go.. I went with a kit from Timder.. very easy to build..
Temps are down from hi 80s to 74.. I added a bigger dehumidifier and got it to 80.. I was running
close to 1k watts now I'm at 460.. check this out..
https://www.rollitup.org/t/sixstrings-cob-build.903026/

LEDS > HPS. But you're paying for it, up front.

Thanks hydrodan that showed me a lot, now to find a thread cobs for dummies.

You tube vids by growmau5... there are 7+ vids

J. Killroy13 said:

I set my room up with a 600w hps.

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maybe don't change your light but change your growing style. what if you did like 4 or 6 plants in a circle around the 600 hung vertically? check out heath robinson stadium grows on youtube and that will give you inspiration. he blows a grow up with a 600.

J. Killroy13 said:

Thanks hydrodan that showed me a lot, now to find a thread cobs for dummies.

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Take your time learning about this shit bro. The more you know the more you grow.

I can never thank supra &co enough for the abundance that grew from their sharing.

Gnotobiotic trying to rush anything, with changing the lights and I will research everything before any changes. I just have heat issues and would like to be more stealthy on energy consumption. What I got works well but there is always room for improvement.

With leds, there are literally billions of options, but here are two main routes you can go, monos(only emit one wavelength of light and are rated in nanometers) and whites (they will be rated by kelvin temperature). Monos are good but only if you are using the absolute best led diodes available right now. And next year they will make better ones. Red and white combos work great. Reds are the most efficient emmiters, right now cree xpe-2 or oslon 120 i think. Problem with most led companies, they wont evem tell you what leds they are using (these lights suck and are what give leds a bad name, much worse than hps for sure).
The other option, full spectrum whites work great. The light is full spectrum similiar to hps except much higher cri, 70,80,and 90 cri. Where hps is somewhere in the 30s. Before cobs they just had 1w 3w and 5w chips, which are a pain to solder 50+ together to make a decent size light, not to mention the cost. Cobs changed all that, now you have a single diode that when run between 50-75ws gives you hetween 160-200 lumens per watt. Also our plants grow better under full spectrum than under blurple light. So right now cobs are the bees neees in terms of most light output in the best spectrum and virtually no heat. I am now checking my grow to make sure temps are high enough. And you should get same yield results or better (less heat) with about 300-400ws of cree cxb3590 cobs. You could also make a far red, flower initiator light to cut down flowering time.

^nice post

i agree, cobs are the way to go, more light for less energy, less heat, so you can do away with the huge inline fans and just use a small fan to run a filter for odor control. that means you can water less because your plants aren't sitting in a huge wind tunnel being constantly desiccated.
the only drawback is cost. i started with hps, and as soon as i can afford to im replacing it with cobs. use the hps to make the money to buy the cobs...then you can use the money to buy a boat and go fishin

HydoDan said:

I just did the change for the same reasons as you..I cooked some plants when a fan failed...
Look into DIY cob leds.. they are the way to go.. I went with a kit from Timder.. very easy to build..
Temps are down from hi 80s to 74.. I added a bigger dehumidifier and got it to 80.. I was running
close to 1k watts now I'm at 460.. check this out..
https://www.rollitup.org/t/sixstrings-cob-build.903026/

Click to expand...

How can you really say they are the way to go ??? people are getting decent results with cob' tech its not going to stop there look at the stocks ? Cree has leveled off and is dropping could 2018 bring out a better lighting technology ??
Well if we look at our advancements from 10 years ago YES Cree cobs will be the HPS of the led industry

With all the fairy tales and lies we see and here daily Yes even from growers on here claiming unreal yields specially with cobs soon anyone can really say yes its better efficient.. But it lacks in penetration and with that yield more efficient less yield ???

Kinda sounds like a moot point but is it ??? Lets have a look HPS you need AC units cause of the heat ??? well i have grown now for over 35 years consistently and only start indoor growing in end of oct with fresh air in 6 - 8 k rooms no AC needed actually use the heat for my benefit

Point being is claims you need to cool down your room and ventilation there for operating costs are more ???
Well when we look at normal grow room design ventilation / Fresh air is one of the most important parts of any design or properly built grow rooms and even tents have i vents

i can post millions of pictures of heat stressed Cob grows so again another well orchestrated lie
that LED or cob does not produce heat truth is all power sources produce heat if that wast not the case WTF would a person need a heat sink for ??

And last is how tight has a person gone worrying about 1 - 3 dollar savings a month on power cause that is what it really comes down to pennies
From the moment you took your first breath was the moment sometime in the future you will take your last breath

Same thing applies with everything including lights from the moment its turned on its slow path to death is going to happen sooner or later

So which is better well it comes down to what are you growing in a bread box or a green house or a regular room ..
work with what you got learn try new things which means yes even new lighting

But truth is there is really no better LED Cob or HPS find the one that suits you and that is it

Makes me sick when i here Hid destroyer or cob,
is so much better .. its not it never has been its just another light source an what may work good for your situation here one plant grow 1000 watts over 8 pound what is that for GPW anyone ??? you know anyone with them Einstein skills lol

Yup cob destroyer lol

Have a great day

Twilightbud said:

How can you really say they are the way to go ??? people are getting decent results with cob' tech its not going to stop there look at the stocks ? Cree has leveled off and is dropping could 2018 bring out a better lighting technology ??
Well if we look at our advancements from 10 years ago YES Cree cobs will be the HPS of the led industry

With all the fairy tales and lies we see and here daily Yes even from growers on here claiming unreal yields specially with cobs soon anyone can really say yes its better efficient.. But it lacks in penetration and with that yield more efficient less yield ???

Kinda sounds like a moot point but is it ??? Lets have a look HPS you need AC units cause of the heat ??? well i have grown now for over 35 years consistently and only start indoor growing in end of oct with fresh air in 6 - 8 k rooms no AC needed actually use the heat for my benefit

Point being is claims you need to cool down your room and ventilation there for operating costs are more ???
Well when we look at normal grow room design ventilation / Fresh air is one of the most important parts of any design or properly built grow rooms and even tents have i vents

i can post millions of pictures of heat stressed Cob grows so again another well orchestrated lie
that LED or cob does not produce heat truth is all power sources produce heat if that wast not the case WTF would a person need a heat sink for ??

And last is how tight has a person gone worrying about 1 - 3 dollar savings a month on power cause that is what it really comes down to pennies
From the moment you took your first breath was the moment sometime in the future you will take your last breath

Same thing applies with everything including lights from the moment its turned on its slow path to death is going to happen sooner or later

So which is better well it comes down to what are you growing in a bread box or a green house or a regular room ..
work with what you got learn try new things which means yes even new lighting

But truth is there is really no better LED Cob or HPS find the one that suits you and that is it

Makes me sick when i here Hid destroyer or cob,
is so much better .. its not it never has been its just another light source an what may work good for your situation here one plant grow 1000 watts over 8 pound what is that for GPW anyone ??? you know anyone with them Einstein skills lol

Have a great day

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I bought my first hid in 1972 ....fluors before that ...So I have some experience with old technology...
I ran our co-op from 96-2015.. All with hid.. well over a thousand plants a year..
I've had my COBs for roughly 2 months..I don't need Einstein
to tell me which is superior... Experience tells me. Oh yeah, light bill is down over $20 per month.. not $3..
Have you run cobs?? Where are the millions of pics of heat stressed plants under cobs? How many heat stress pics under hid can you find? Show me.. convince me..I've run both!! Have you??

i can say they're the way to go because i live now, not ten years from now. it doesn't matter what we'll call them in ten years, because its not ten years from now.
when did the hid industry get to you? what did they promise you? you've changed man, you've changed....
i say things because thats what i think, i've looked at peoples results growing under them. if you're getting heat stress, its because you're fucking stupid and not placing them right.
they work, and they use less electricity and produce less heat than a mh or a hps while they're doing it. period. why the fuck wouldn't you use a light that produces a better spectrum, more of it, for less energy and heat?
hid works, but its old tech, tex, so get the fuck off that high horse and open your eyes

There's not a huge power saving, if any. Main benefit is less heat inside the chamber due to lack of infrared and you don't have to change bulbs every few months due to the output dropping off. I don't particularly like cob LEDs on their own, but they work well in combination with other types of lights. I like to put a few warm white CFLs in with them, and CFL reptile lights near the end of flowering. Without the UV it's not quite as good but still about the same as with HPS, which also has no significant UV. One particular advantage of LED is that you don't need much in the way of reflectors, because they're built in. The back of the LED is a reflector.

BobCajun said:

There's not a huge power saving, if any. Main benefit is less heat inside the chamber due to lack of infrared and you don't have to change bulbs every few months due to the output dropping off. I don't particularly like cob LEDs on their own, but they work well in combination with other types of lights. I like to put a few warm white CFLs in with them, and CFL reptile lights near the end of flowering. Without the UV it's not quite as good but still about the same as with HPS, which also has no significant UV. One particular advantage of LED is that you don't need much in the way of reflectors, because they're built in. The back of the LED is a reflector.

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Exactly 1500 watts coming out of a wall with a hair dryer or 1500 watts coming out of the wall from a cob is still 1500 watts of electricity no matter how you shake it right ???

Hydro Dan perfect return answer yup everyone has been growing for decades is another moot point you say you been using it now for 2 months and claim its by far out performing is again another brain wash religious saying ..
you should be unbiased and wait till a few grows have been done then mention your opinion ..

I read this somewhere so average cob builder runs his unit at 52 percent efficient can i ask you What on gods earth is the other 48 percent ???

I am not here to start some pissing match, over new LED or cob units there the ones or companies claiming this 300 watt led or cob is better then 600 or 1000 watt hid ...
I am to old to really give a shit either way honestly but if it was true then we would see it consistently ?? and if we did there be no DEBATE
Maybe just maybe a person could not grow with a hid light and is having better success with LED or cob . or maybe there just became better growers overall and bolster that Cob lighting or LED got them there ..

But for your answer as in heat stress you do not think Cobs produce heat stress here lets look at a picture of what heat stress , looks like.
And a picture i pulled from this site 400 watt Cob grow or is it thirsty ?? no harm intended to the original grower just making a point

LOL, OP just ignore the people going on about HPS, clearly they havnt used LED.
People get too tired up with comparing Watts,
Sure when your running both HPS and LED at 600W there isnt going to be a power saving. But if you compare the light output the LED is going to be atleast 20% more for a CREE 3590 if your running a balanced string of them and not just 1 massively over driven one. Also that heat is going to be down 20% at the same wattage.
How can you just shrug off a 20% improvement and say its a waste of time, You could run the LED at 480W and it would be good replacement for 600W HPS.
I remember when digital ballasts just became a thing and people were saying they were a god send for a 2% improvement and every one was jumping on them except the old guys which this thread reminds me of, Going on about how there old school one gives the best light.

The light penetration is also a moot point. You dont just run 1 COB LED. You run a few of them so you place them around the room giving better light spread, And you run them closer since there is less heat.
The only down side of LED at the moment is the buy in price.

Twilightbud said:

or maybe there just became better growers overall

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No it cant be. Its the cobs. Doesn't matter.