The age old question HPS, MH vs LED

gwheels

Well-Known Member
I went backwards. My whole setup is cobs boards and strips and i won a 1000HPS so i put it in the bloom room. Winter sucks for subterrenean bloom rooms because its cold. The HPS is my new winter warmer light.

And the girls love it. LOVE it. I will see what it is like at harvest. I always wanted to compare bud density and how they grow LED vs HPS.

I dont care about yield per watt. Its about the quality of the buds when its on the other side. And how much further does that HPS penetrate compared to the boards.

If you are on a budget. Its pretty hard to beat HPS and CMH. But boards and strips have come down quite a bit.

I will never stick to one. I love variety !
 

althor

Well-Known Member
I replaced a 8 x 20 room that had 6-1000 hps, I packed it full of 6000 watts of 280 quantum boards with a 315 cmh in between each double panel. So where I had 6 lights before I know have 10, with 5 being double panels. Same wattage from the wall. Its fucking lit up, very bright. I grow SOG with a couple toppings early in veg, I shave her legs before flower and again after 2 weeks when most the stretch is mostly gone. So to answer your question about penetration, I cant judge. All tops over here, brother. But the few sights that are lower seem to be very hard and dense just like the tops.

One thing to note is that my feedings had to change, I was seeing cal-mag deficiency at about 30 days using the same feeding program I have used for years with no such deficiency in sight. So I do know they need more cal-mag with LED and CMH.

Another, which is purely cosmetic, is the beautiful fall colors without even flushing, reds, oranges, and purples on almost every strain I have put in the room. With HPS they would remain dark green and slight yellow after a week or so of flush but nothing like this.

Here is a pic of one of the lowest flower sights of the bunch, this is lava cake and she is rock hard.

View attachment 4443564
Yep, I bought quantum about a year ago, I still have HID going as well, but I am overall satisfied with the quantum. I got the same calcium problems. Now I just add quite a bit of bone meal when I am making up the pots. That has taken care of it.
 

Hust17

Well-Known Member
How much is a bulb for these HPS/MH lights and how often do you have to replace them? Never factored that in..
 

kgp

Well-Known Member
Is it possible that heat is under control giving denser flowers and better aroma?
Hot rooms create airy buds and loss of terpenes


Edit
Cool nights definitely produce denser flowers but my room temps are exactly the same. 68 off, 78 is the max lights on. I had to change the exhaust but the temps are the same.
 

hillbill

Well-Known Member
How much is a bulb for these HPS/MH lights and how often do you have to replace them? Never factored that in..
Haven’t bought a bulb in 7 years lighting 12 sf. I would have bought 4 a year for the 2 lights. Even with standard name brand bulbs at say $15, that alone is $420. Horti bulbs at $50 would be $1400. Add another 40% to electric and LEDs are really inexpensive these days.
 

Hust17

Well-Known Member
Haven’t bought a bulb in 7 years lighting 12 sf. I would have bought 4 a year for the 2 lights. Even with standard name brand bulbs at say $15, that alone is $420. Horti bulbs at $50 would be $1400. Add another 40% to electric and LEDs are really inexpensive these days.
Holy poop! I mean the initial investment hurts but damn so many positive factors. I can’t wait to see how far this tech can go...
 

gwheels

Well-Known Member
Cobs and boards and strips grow big fat buds too. But this is about the limit of penetration. Beneath these they were very light green and not formed (the buds)...i could have cleaned them up but i just like seeing what happens.

These are skunky VA colas grown under a 3k board with 660nm and spill over from 3k 97CRI citi cobs.

20191213_043910.jpg
 

Kushash

Well-Known Member
I think LED grown plants would look way better if HID never existed.
If there was no HID then LED growers would not be constantly trying to compete with it and frying their plants pushing for the max gram per watt and would instead focus on growing healthy plants with beautiful leaves that will reward the grower with great buds.
I'm sure there are LED growers who are only focusing on quality but their gram per watt and bud size would not be well accepted by those that are constantly battling for more weight.
 

bk78

Well-Known Member
I think LED grown plants would look way better if HID never existed.
If there was no HID then LED growers would not be constantly trying to compete with it and frying their plants pushing for the max gram per watt and would instead focus on growing healthy plants with beautiful leaves that will reward the grower with great buds.
I'm sure there are LED growers who are only focusing on quality but their gram per watt and bud size would not be well accepted by those that are constantly battling for more weight.
The reason in my opinion why people are frying their plants is due to shitty ass blurples that needed to be 10” away to work. Then these guys got quantum boards and put them 10” away too resulting in cooked leaves from intensity.
 

booms111

Well-Known Member
The Bud shot is Acid by Paradise Seeds (NYCD hydbrid). The first room is full of a Chimera strain called Mental Floss (Blueberry x mystery indica). The 4x4 tent that's full of buds is a strain called Amnesia OG (Amnesia Haze x OG).

LEDs come in all shapes and sizes but the one thing they all have in common is that the good ones work just as advertised.

Here's another tent full of skunk/afghan crosses. These are a couple of different grows in the same tent. I'm sure the growers don't mind me posting these.
View attachment 4443876

View attachment 4443878

View attachment 4443879
That bottom picture has a few tops full of budrot.
 

bk78

Well-Known Member
Unless you're rocking a $14,000 Spyder setup, your LEDs will not come close to a generic $600 1000w HPS setup. Facts.
Show me these facts you speak of? Because my Meijiu boards kill any 1k hps I’ve ever grown with. Oh and they cost around the same as your $600 hps set up.
 

m99smith

Well-Known Member
240 watts of Samsung 35k, plus tons of far red if you want it = 180 bucks on amazon. Plus you'd get a really huge discount spending $14k worth. Led deniers are like flat earthers.
Can you post a link to it I wanna see how good it is and don't worry I know how good leds can be Ive been growing under 6 of them
 
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