Cheap LEDS VS Expensive ones

Buying HLG quantum boards when you switch over to led will keep you from upgrading after 2 grows of running cheap crap from China.
Talk with and follow tbone about them.
https://forum.grasscity.com/members/tbone-shuffle.954499/

 

My California Light Works Solarstorms are made in USA with real customer service. My heatsink for a 400w weighs more than an entire 300w cheapo led.
In my grows, I actually use both, 3 cheapos for veg $89 galaxyhydros 300w, and 2 solarstorm 400w for flower that I picked up lightly used for $400 each. I have only flowered once on the cheapos,and they were not horrible, but lacked density and potency compared to the CLWs on same strain from clone. The CLWs have UV-B built in and I didn't run any UV-B on the cheapos, which could have been the major difference in potency.

The quantum stuff is supposed to be the next-generation of lights and when it is time for another upgrade that is probably the route I will go, or at least take a serious look at.

 

The big differences between cheaper and more expensive leds is the efficiency of output per watt of electricity and the spectrum. Most higher end leds are white light. They are made to replace fluorescent lighting or high bay lighting usually so they come in the perfect daylight K ranges for veg growing and some good flowering ranges.

The best leds on the market are approaching 180 lumens per watt or 2.6-2.8umol/j. Those are different measurements but cheaper leds can be much lower like 100 lumens per watt or 1.2umol/j. In simple terms it's more light for the same amount of power.

Cheaper leds are also more prone to thermal runaway and burnouts. Most cheap light fixtures that use cheap leds also use cheap drivers driving down reliability further.

This difference in efficiency of output makes it possible to cover larger areas with less power with the higher quality lights. I've grown with a range of led qualities. You need up to 45-50 watts per square foot to bloom well with the low end products out there. High end cobs and quantums can be ran well in the 28-35 watts per square foot range in flower. In veg you can get away with as low as 10-15 watts per square and have good growth with quantums. I use 240 watts in a 4x4 for veg.

Growmau5 has made 1.9g/watt with only about 26-27 watts per square foot in flower. That won't work that well with low end fixtures that aren't as efficient.

 

I've looked at those before and the efficiency of output was significantly lower then the qb's but still a very nice grow light. It's more rounded with the lenses and the reds/blues.

Price is not that bad anymore with that huge discount.
Only a little over $1 a watt. I swear I looked at those before and they used to have umol/j stats on the site for those lights. I don't see them now.

 

The par charts look pretty good for the watt range. Why not go with these?
Horticulture Lighting Group 320 Watt XL QB-324 Quantum Board LED Kit
$425 if you click on unassembled.

I've never seen those boards before. They're new qb324's. New series of high capacity just came out. It says equal to a 600 watt hps. 2850k for good flowering.

 

Lower K range is more red for larger flowers. Blue help in veg that's higher K range. With qb's 5k is veg only and 4k. 3k is for both and 2700k is for just flower.

 

Pretty sure you would be the first one to run one of those new board series. They're not even available for building with yet at their site. Only in that fixture right now.

 

I think two of those 600h's is overkill. For a 5x5 the alternative setup qb wise I would say is 3 x qb260xl's. That's about 850 watts. 600h's are 4 x qb288 boards. 3 qb260xl's would be 6 x qb288 boards.

Assembly of their kits is a cakewalk. You screw the board to the heatsink, bolt the driver to the top, run wires to both boards and put a wall cord splice kit on the driver input. There's instructional videos on youtube so you can see how easy it is.


I just helped another user build this for his 5x5. It's 12 x qb132 boards. About 900-1000 watts.

I don't think any of those other setups would have as even of coverage. This is approx $500-600 total depending on driver choice. The meanwell HLG480h-c2100a can run 6 of these boards.


That said I would go with the new light. HLG products have been amazing. They know what they're doing. Up until now they've pretty much only been using the Samsung LM561c diode in their boards. Those new boards are the first new product they've put out with a new brand of diode. They're Nichia diodes instead of samsung on the new boards. They're also blending two different outputs together now.

I would say they've probably learned something and incorporated that into the new product. Try the Nichia qb324 boards if you have the budget. Otherwise personally I would build one of those qb132 DIY's.

With 2400 watts are you honestly getting 1g/watt? What kind of yield are we talking that you're replacing? You can easily get 3-5 pounds out of that space with the qb's. Hitting 1g a watt or well over seems easy with these extremely efficient lights. It takes about 550 watts of qb's to match the par output of a 1000 watt hps. I cover a 4x4 with about 550 watts for flower. You should only need about 80%-100% more then that considering watts per square foot. 30-35 range is great for flower with qb's.

6 weeks since 12/12 flip. Single plant in a 4x4. Wonder Woman.

 

Don't get me wrong I still like my solarstorms, but the fact you can spread the qbs out to achieve total saturation is very appealing. Right now I have to plan ahead, these are 3 different strains the center plant should take a couple weeks longer and packs on most of the weight at the end, so after the outer 2 are gone I will tilt them inward and finally put good light on her. For what these two lights cost used I could cover three to four times the area with qbs. Day 35 since switching to 12/12

 

Check out the optic 6, have heard and seen really good things about this light and its not to expensive



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I will mention something now also that no one here has mentioned.

The cheap led are just red and blue.

The more expensive led have orange white and other leds included and the more expensive leds will have a switch to switch the led pattern from veg to flowering and some of the the more expensive ones let you customise the lights but I wouldn't want that I'd just be happy with the switch. Obviously vegging will look more blue and flowering will look more red.



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Cheap leds are alright if you have no money simple as that and they will get the job done. But I'd advise saving up for a more expensive panel. If you only have a small grow then a top range 300w panel wouldn't cost a lot anyway I assume????

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I have the platinum p600 i think it covers 5x2, i wish i wouldve went with the optic 6, here is the stats on the coverage for it, pretty close to what your looking for




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