LED light saturation nation

Invest in a digital LUX meter for $15. Takes all the guesstimates out and gives you an objective take. Seedlings should be under 10,000 lux, young plants 12-15k lux, vegging up to 25-30k lux, and flowering 40- 50k lux.

Medskunk said:

Dude noway. I have my optic 2 cobs @120w, 4 feet from the seedlings and thats as high as it can get, no more room. If i lower it a little, they get weird. I let them grow into the light, no moving up n down but thats cobs for you. Just keep lifting the light and let it grow towards it.

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Wait a sec... how many seedlings are we talking about here?
240w 4 feet away sounds nuts to me...

I had mine under 60-70w like a foot and a half away.

yummy fur said:

Invest in a digital LUX meter for $15. Takes all the guesstimates out and gives you an objective take. Seedlings should be under 10,000 lux, young plants 12-15k lux, vegging up to 25-30k lux, and flowering 40- 50k lux.

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Photone app works pretty well if you calibrate it to your lights, btw.
But lux to ppfd converter works ok too I've been working with it in my early days.

sh0wtime said:

Wait a sec... how many seedlings are we talking about here?
240w 4 feet away sounds nuts to me...

I had mine under 60-70w like a foot and a half away.

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Yeah you re right.... Optic 2 is the model and its both cobs @120w, 4 feet away.

that does make sense now that the 240w in 2x2 is oversized considering my situation and also that 420mag thread i linked to on the last page someone says:

"I checked the intensity of led lights with a lux light meter and the led had twice the intensity of the 250w mh at 25% power."

apparently i can disconnect the bar(s) from the light also which is nice

also, since starting this thread i realized the seeds i was growing were too old as they were growing at stunted pace so scrapped them and got another bag of promix moisture mix and have started some newer seeds and they are coming up larger and noticeably faster and healthier

i swear i bumped the light up to 40% with them and noticed a reaction the next day and am going to remember this thread and tell myself that it's ok not to keep the light at max. will keep them at 30%

and maybe will get a lux meter as suggested by yummy fur thank you

canadian tire saves the day eh! 150w hps for 129.99 (click link). my only climate control is to grow my two crops per year at favourable seasonal times (spring and fall) so it's back to hid for now

new plants are much healthier with the hps than the led wow

the ambient light when looking from outside the grow is noticeably brighter than when the led was set at <20% (the highest the plants would allow). also it looks more like a mini sun is hiding in the closet as opposed to some lights

i'm glad there are inlet ceiling leds in the apartment so i can photograph the radical improvement in plant health since switching from led to hps : )

leds really are good for something eh!?

dank'd said:

i'm glad there are inlet ceiling leds in the apartment so i can photograph the radical improvement in plant health since switching from led to hps : )

leds really are good for something eh!?

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Yep and one day you may learn to grow with them... making them good for even more.

dank'd said:

leds really are good for something eh!?

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They've always worked real well for me. SF4000 3" from canopy, with absolutely no burn/adverse effects :

Charles U Farley said:

They've always worked real well for me. SF4000 3" from canopy, with absolutely no burn/adverse effects :

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yep, my kingbrite is garbage compared to the hps i got at crappy tire : )

and sunblaster cfl bulbs apparently lol


happy growing

some very interesting discussion about led and hid here at 1:05:57

and here's one month of hps growth compared to almost two months of led growth

notice how the hps plants are way bigger and not all f'd up lookin : )

all i did was swap lights, that's it

happy hps plants @ 1 month



struggling led plants @ 2 months

May be temps? LED you should run at 80f. Which is hard cuz they don’t put out much heat. HPS make a lot more heat.

Turpman said:

May be temps? LED you should run at 80f. Which is hard cuz they don’t put out much heat. HPS make a lot more heat.

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i would imagine to run the led and get good plants i would have to go well into the 80f range and boost humidity way up, all to just see if i can get the plants up to a baseline of health, which is ridiculous when i can just plug in a cfl/hid or grow in the sun instead and get perfectly healthy and vigorous plants every time

and because thc/cbd production starts a steep decline at ambient 27C and up in enclosed grow spaces there is just no way i would even take a chance at it. and i have seen tents with led and vigorous plants (while showing major signs of heat stress), the heat and humidity were almost unbearable and the tent reeked of mildew so...

it is just a shame how the hps plants effortlessly are super healthy and the led plants just get fried time and time again by this kingbrite led

i guess in the rush to make a quick buck they sold leds without the very clear need to educate the users of what in fact they are in for if they do not meet the very particular and delicate environmental conditions needed to run them with good results

of course, since other crops besides cannabis might be ok with this led they can lie to us all day about how good (not) they can grow cannabis

It’s all on the environment you make. I find if you blast too much led and have cool temps the plants can’t move enough nutrients up to the leaves that are getting blasted and they stall out.
I run a diy bridgelux 3500k everywhere. I actually run a 4x4’ array with a light mover. Kinda old school +new school. In about an 8’ space.
Pre 98babba likes it.

Turpman said:

It’s all on the environment you make. I find if you blast too much led and have cool temps the plants can’t move enough nutrients up to the leaves that are getting blasted and they stall out.
I run a diy bridgelux 3500k everywhere. I actually run a 4x4’ array with a light mover. Kinda old school +new school. In about an 8’ space.
Pre 98babba likes it.
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i've never had a light source demand an extreme augmentation to the environment just to get plants up to health though

it would take extreme augmentation just to get the plants healthy for the most part of the year when the environment won't support it. i did get very healthy growth in spring and summer with the led in veg though but they lose steam and chlorophyll in flowering again so it is just not realistic for me to use this particular led where i live

it was the bugbee research team that did a video showing how in enclosed grow spaces using hid, thc and cbd makes a sharp decline at ambient 27C and up, the minimum temps that leds purport to require to sustain healthy cannabis

and powdery mildew is real where i live so that's another reason why i wouldn't dare growing indoors at such high temps and humidity

Keeping a correct vpd is not extreme augmentation. That 2month old LED pic are way under feed. You should forget about that sharp decline in THC over 27c. Bugbee doesnt know shit about good cannabis.

Roguedawg said:

Keeping a correct vpd is not extreme augmentation. That 2month old LED pic are way under feed. You should forget about that sharp decline in THC over 27c. Bugbee doesnt know shit about good cannabis.

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hid, cfl and sun have none of these problems so yes, it absolutely needs extreme augmentation. i'm only good 4 months out of the year with this light where i live, ain't no science degree needed with any other light source

and yes, they did side by side university level tests and compared the results so i think i'll believe them before i believe you. and i also have personal experience losing almost all thc in a blazing hot flower tent so...

and why that same soil/feed has no problems growing healthy plants under cfl/hid and sun? so you're saying that, when i do the ridiculous task of blasting my grow space with heat and humidity (so the plants don't get fried from led), i will then have to increase the feed?

yes well as i said before, cfl/hid and sun all grow great plants any time of year with my soil/feed of choice. so i am supposed to expect quality to magically appear with led if i do all of the above stupidity?

how am i supposed to believe that when all i did was switch lights and the plants are healthy again. led sucks in my environment and will (hopefully) be sold it's quite simple