Mixing Lights: HPS, MH, and.... LED?

Hi all,

Just harvested and thinking about some changes. Right now it's 3 x 1000w in an 8x8 flower room, sealed w/co2. I replaced one HPS with a MH in a magnum-ocho hood (huge throw to the edges of the 60 site aeroponic setup). The results were awesome! Super thick colas on 3 foot plants, some with 2-3 headies. We did NO VEG on these girls; just left them in an easy-cloner for an extra week in the veg room (a 4th 1000w MH). The veg light is way overkill, but we raised it to the ceiling on a light mover, and cloning under a canopy of massive mothers it worked.

So with that in mind I'm plotting the next set up:

1) knock down the wall to the veg room and use the entire 12x8 space for flower. We'd use a closet for cloning and mom's under h/o fluorescent. I was skeptical of the no veg thing, but it turned out well. I'll put the reservoir in the middle of the room and swap every other site tube to go off in the other direction; 3x3. Way more space for the girls to breathe.
2) SCROG it. Should've done it last time. We made a bad decision to flower 3 overgrown potted mothers around the edges of the last crop , and despite training the hell out of those trees, we could never get the lights as close to the hydro as we should have. Really hurt yield but quality was still .
3) add light

So the light... We have the extra 1000w MH from the veg room. It's switchable to HPS. I have some other old HID stuff laying around too. The obvious solution would be to add one more HPS for a total of 5000w. 2000 MH; going from 33% to 40% MH.

BUT!!!! My friend is an engineer for a commercial LED manufacturer and they'll give me anything at cost. The price will be around the same as an HID upgrade if you figure 250w HID ~ 90w LED, so all of a sudden LED cost is not an issue. Not only that, but I can spec my order however I want. Spectrum, Wavelength, Band, etc.. are entirely up to my preference.

How would I set that up? All HPS overhead and bluer LED panels facing in from the side? Mix all 3 types of lights somehow? Experiment with an array of overheads that would allow me to really compare the results? I could even bring in more red LED wattage, and remove one of the HID lights. Anybody have opinions on LED spectrum?

Any ideas on the lighting project would be greatly appreciated! Also, any thoughts on the no veg cycle and other stuff I tried are welcome.

Cheers!

my Tilt effect. No LEDs but im going MH/HPS rotating.. To be honest.. i only read your 1st paragraph but would love to see your setup

love the tilt! lol, ya sorry to blab, i didnt realize that post got so long! my setup is stupid complicated... I'm basically looking for some advice on pushing some LED's into a mixed environment. spectrum, band, angle, etc... You wont regret the MH in flower BTW, good luck! I'll get some pics of last harvest up and journal my next one in a couple weeks

I don't think there is any reason to mix in LED because it isn't as if they put out lights your MH and HPS don't already. The MH and HPS put out different wavelengths and a decent LED should put out the same wavelengths as a MH and an HPS. The only reason to throw in LED is if you don't want to bother setting up another MH/HPS light and want to use it to reach parts of the room the MH and HPS lights might not reach as well. Good LED lights grow more high quality marijuana than MH/HPS actual watt for watt. I think its best to either go completely MH/HPS or completely LED, although there is nothing wrong with getting some LED to hit parts of the room your HID systems don't.