Putting it to the test

Well I see everyone going back and forth about led and hps growing.
I have about 700 watts of cob lighting. There are 9 cobs hooked up to 3 mean Well drivers built on a frame 3 feet by 3 feet (I know should have been little bigger but where I got my aluminum didn't have much to choose from so got what I got). I built it for only flower room.
I had a few plants vegging under some mars hydro blurples. (All plants were vegged with these lights) however with a 12 plant count and the ones in flower having some time to go yet I decided to hang up my hps and flower the ones vegging under my hps.
An ipower 1000 watt hps with batwing hood. Bulb was only used for 2 months prior to today. It's dimmable so I have it turned down to 75 percent power to equal the cob watts.
The strains I'll be comparing are mango puff (1 under led 2 under hps)
Hammerhead og (2 under led 2 under hps)
All in 5 gallon smart pots in coco with perlite added.
All plants are top fed by mixing individual gallons for each plant and they get 1 gallon (usually alot of run off from each but I just use the shop vac and suck up all the extra so nothing sits in the water)
Feed every day once a day every now and again I will skip a day and not feed them usually due to working late hours.
All fed MEGA CROP the ones already flower are getting 4 grams the ones vegging 3 grams and in 2 weeks I'll bump them up to 4 grams as well.
Also getting calmag at 2.5 ml and sweet candy at .9 gram per feeding.
Everything is PHed to 5.9 using PH down.

I'll be the first to admit I'm not a great grower hell probably not even a good grower but I try. My room does not have perfect conditions but good conditions. I don't run co2 but pull fresh air from outside.
My goal is to see which light produces a better product with a better yield. This will not be updated as often as some but I'll do a weekly update with some pictures as well.

If I missed anything or you would like to know more just ask.
This is my first time building and using leds so I don't really know much about them other then it was a recommendation on what to get and that's what I did.

I run the same nute wise, minus the sweetcandy.

running cocloco medium

good luck man,

Thanks alot it should be a interesting ride.

As of now not seeing much going on yet. Hps has a little more stretch but not much more then the leds.

Temps might effect it a little since leds I guess are supposed to run warmer and hps cooler since it's all in one tent i been running around 81-83

hey man, thats a good temp.

the reason for higher temp is because they dont transpire at the same rate of HPS. They also stretch more because of the Far-red waves, but more stretch equals better penetration, lol.. Way i look at it man..

Gorillaglue4u said:

Well I see everyone going back and forth about led and hps growing.
I have about 700 watts of cob lighting. There are 9 cobs hooked up to 3 mean Well drivers built on a frame 3 feet by 3 feet (I know should have been little bigger but where I got my aluminum didn't have much to choose from so got what I got). I built it for only flower room.
I had a few plants vegging under some mars hydro blurples. (All plants were vegged with these lights) however with a 12 plant count and the ones in flower having some time to go yet I decided to hang up my hps and flower the ones vegging under my hps.
An ipower 1000 watt hps with batwing hood. Bulb was only used for 2 months prior to today. It's dimmable so I have it turned down to 75 percent power to equal the cob watts.
The strains I'll be comparing are mango puff (1 under led 2 under hps)
Hammerhead og (2 under led 2 under hps)
All in 5 gallon smart pots in coco with perlite added.
All plants are top fed by mixing individual gallons for each plant and they get 1 gallon (usually alot of run off from each but I just use the shop vac and suck up all the extra so nothing sits in the water)
Feed every day once a day every now and again I will skip a day and not feed them usually due to working late hours.
All fed MEGA CROP the ones already flower are getting 4 grams the ones vegging 3 grams and in 2 weeks I'll bump them up to 4 grams as well.
Also getting calmag at 2.5 ml and sweet candy at .9 gram per feeding.
Everything is PHed to 5.9 using PH down.

I'll be the first to admit I'm not a great grower hell probably not even a good grower but I try. My room does not have perfect conditions but good conditions. I don't run co2 but pull fresh air from outside.
My goal is to see which light produces a better product with a better yield. This will not be updated as often as some but I'll do a weekly update with some pictures as well.

If I missed anything or you would like to know more just ask.
This is my first time building and using leds so I don't really know much about them other then it was a recommendation on what to get and that's what I did.
View attachment 4111733

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why not use white vinegar for ph down.....?

Subbed. 700w of cobs should definitely beat the cheap ipower with a batwing and a used bulb, especially if you have it dimmed to 750w, but only time will tell I guess!!!

Are those 4x4 spaces or 5x5? If each space is 4x4, id dim the cobs down a bit to 600ish as 750w will rape the space and could reduce yields actually.

2 x 320W should do well or maybe 1x600W

Dave455 said:

why not use white vinegar for ph down.....?

Click to expand...

Just always used ph down. Is there something negitave from using it? I never thought anything of it.

Gorillaglue4u said:

Just always used ph down. Is there something negitave from using it? I never thought anything of it.

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Nah you're good using ph down. Vinegar isnt stable and the ph will go right back up in hours to a day. Plus it isnt nearly as potent as PH down (phosphoric acid) and it stinks. I think it even attracts flies as well lol.

Citric acid is the only other thing id use for ph down.

skoomd said:

Subbed. 700w of cobs should definitely beat the cheap ipower with a batwing and a used bulb, especially if you have it dimmed to 750w, but only time will tell I guess!!!

Are those 4x4 spaces or 5x5? If each space is 4x4, id dim the cobs down a bit to 600ish as 750w will rape the space and could reduce yields actually.

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It's in a 4x8 tent with a light on each side. The cobs are dimmed down a little bit already so they are not running at full power. So the hps is actually running more watts then the cobs.

Gorillaglue4u said:

It's in a 4x8 tent with a light on each side. The cobs are dimmed down a little bit already so they are not running at full power. So the hps is actually running more watts then the cobs.

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Solid. I'd run the cobs 24" away personally, especially at this wattage and on that size frame.

skoomd said:

Solid. I'd run the cobs 24" away personally, especially at this wattage and on that size frame.

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I was going to move it down a bit today since I chopped one of my taller plants last night and the rest are not as tall. But maybe I'll leave them where they are then. They seem to be doing great and giving great penetration to the bottoms even with the light a little higher then I'd normally run it

Ive found a good way to hone in the LEDs is look for the height by the leafs praying. adjust till you see them happy, and take notes of it.

im using 4 luminus Cobs, and ive found 15,000 lux is nice for Veg and 30,000 flower. Get the correct spectrum wavelengths, and intensity isnt such a big deal somewhat. Still getting used to them..

You can't handicap the hps lamp by dimming it. They were not designed to be dimmed.
Everyone is claiming 60% of the Hps wattage in LED and you are well over that at 700W of cob. So, Turn that HPS up to 1K and on with the show

OneHitDone said:

You can't handicap the hps lamp by dimming it. They were not designed to be dimmed.
Everyone is claiming 60% of the Hps wattage in LED and you are well over that at 700W of cob. So, Turn that HPS up to 1K and on with the show

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I agree. I think we all already know that watt for watt, the COBs will beat the cheap HPS setup, so might as well make it interesting and bump the HPS to 1k watts for comparison's sake.

Now you might not be able to do the same with the COBs though. your plants might be okay with 750w now but give them a couple of days under that and you'll wanna dim it down some.

OneHitDone said:

You can't handicap the hps lamp by dimming it. They were not designed to be dimmed.
Everyone is claiming 60% of the Hps wattage in LED and you are well over that at 700W of cob. So, Turn that HPS up to 1K and on with the show

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OP stated that the COBs are dimmed, but didn't clarify if that's dimmed from 700w or to 700w.

The cobs are dimmed to 600 watts and the hps is running at 750 watts. So if I can pull more off the 600 watts of leds over the 750 watts of hps then that's enough proof for me to run more leds. That's a no brainer less watts=less money on light bill which in my eyes would make it better then my hps. Maybe not for everyone but for me if I can lower my electric bill and pull more bud it wouldn't be wise to run hps.

If I was in a really cold climate like I used to be having my grow in a cold ass garage it would make more sense to run hps for the heat factor. But my room stays the same year round now.

OneHitDone said:

You can't handicap the hps lamp by dimming it. They were not designed to be dimmed.
Everyone is claiming 60% of the Hps wattage in LED and you are well over that at 700W of cob. So, Turn that HPS up to 1K and on with the show

Click to expand...

Trust me if I had more amps I could load on my cricut I would gladly bump it up to 1k. But 750 watts is what I can run safe and allow me to sleep at night. So that's what it has to be