This will be my 1st harvest... several of the lower branches are real weak, but the UFO's directional lighting causes most of that. This is a taste of what the UFO produces for those that have been wondering.
not too shabby definitely alot better than most people would lead you to believe, looks like a nice CFL or flouro nugs. Definitely not as developed at 5 weeks as it might be with a HID but LED is definitely promising and will eventually take its place as the best light suited for indoor growing. FOr now I will stick with my old skool magnetic coil ballasts and HPS bulbs.
What happen to all the leaves in the middle of the plant? Is it just me or does every LED grow look like there is ZERO penetration past the canopy? I had a CFL flower run start to finish ages ago and it just looked, well a lot more like marijuana. I bet you get some pretty airy buds to say the least. I just googled UFO, did you pay $500.00 for that thing? Surely you can put a stack of bills totaling $500.00 on the left and that plant on the right and see something wrong... Regardless of what the future holds and even though I am from the past, I have yet to be convinced LED's can even hold their own next to CFL's.
What Mr BUbbles said. No offense to you Skronix, I definitely appreciate what you've done here, and PLEASE keep posting cuz I'd love to see how it works out. I almost spent the 600 bucks on the UFO whe I first heard about it and saw it on the cover of high times. I did a little reasearch and went CFL instead. LED just sounded too good to be true, too expensive, too new and unresearched, also not yet used or widely recommended etc The end result? Here we are about 3 years later. That UFO I almost spent 600 bucks on is now like $250 and the manufacturer is backpeddaling on their propoganda, saying that they didn't get the flowering results they were expecting with the first one, so now they're recommending that the first gen be used for VEG, and to go but the 2nd edition for "better flowering." How do I interpret that? They're basically saying: Hey we're sorry all you guys who got hosed on the first edition... You'll have to go and buy another one now because the first time we just stuffed a bunch of 1watt red and blue LED's into a cheap plastic enclosure with a few current limiting resistors, a cheap PCB board, and no friggin' research. We basically saw the shit NASA was doing and went to radio shack. We fixed that by doing a little research and swapping those cheap-tastic chinese LEDs out with some other cheap ones, except this time they're supposed to be in the right spectrum! That'll be another half a month's rent please... Don't get me wrong. Props to you for being able to afford one, and like I said, please, please, post more pics as time goes on. I just remember how it seemed like the perfect solution when I first started looking for a system that was "just enough" for a stash, and I remember how disappointed I was when a bunch of people told me it didn't work...
Since I bad mouthed the led ufo a wee bit, I figured I'd share this link I came across in my travels. They say it's the second gen... I've never bought anything at this store, it's probably just a drop shipper... http://www.thelashop.com/home.php?cat=46&sort=orderby&sort_direction=0&page=2 http://www.thelashop.com/product.php?productid=391&cat=46&page=2
I'm not bombing on your grow but I'm so not going to get a UFO anymore I just don't see the value, my CFL grow looks better I think. Thanks for posting the pics you saved me $500.
The 3 and 5, and 10 watt led emitters have better penetrating properties than say the 90x 1 watt ufo's. Also, the arrays with a couple of white led's (especially warm white) will cover the most all of the spectrum. The fact is, red and blue are the primary colors for plant response, but for the entire plant mechanism to work efficiently, you will need at least some "white light" which includes green, amber and some farrred. A cfl or Incan will suppliment most of this needed light at the cost to of some heat and wattage. Again, I think the lux/luminous intensity, along with some white light and farred is what is lacking with most led systems. For vegging however, a blue led array with 1-3 watt emitters will absolutley outperform a MH. Note: Look how similar Led buds are compared to buds flowered under MH exclusively. They are very similar because of more blue light than efective red light. Yet, both MH and Led buds will most likely be higher in THC than compared to HPS. 150w led > 150wHPS
Man, just get a tent and a 400. Seriously I thought of leds but went with a 4oo watt and since growing requires some space use for the plants and some going out if your way anyway it is a small change to throw in a 400 and a fan. The results will get you something you can actually brag about! That is a far cry from something ok. trying to help here. I hate the thought of all that money and time wasted for something you have to apologise for. I am medical but Ishowed my weed off to a few pot snobs and they took a deep breath, Under a 400! lol. by the way I thought this was a chance to post on the progress of leds. Sorry if it is a hijack. The plants look nice for the light source. Sugary as hell I noticed. Just eh size of man when buds first started to show. Good luck!
Yea, everyone knows you can grow great weed with a 400 watt hps, thats not disputed, and many of us have experience with HID. This is the proggression and education of LED lights.
My comments may have been a little harsh. I hope you smoke that mother in a few weeks and get insanely high
They are on the 3rd generation of UFO lights now. To Orignal poster of topic, Nice looking plants though. If the stalks are weak use a small piece of 1/16in round stock of metal or wood to help support your stalks. Especially once you start flowering.
DAMN !!! dude what a bummer . i suggest , stick with what we already know will grow marijuana the best way possible ( HID ) and ( cfl ) all this other shit is just gimmick's fair enough it still grows but are you satisfied of the result's well cheers for posting you thread , i hope no one buys this shit to keep these thieving manufacturers in business sell it before the world finds out its just a gimmick look at my grow room setup i spent $900 AUD so roughly $680 US with 400watt HPS air ventilation wood for frame panda film carpenters film ( windows ) pots nutes hormone juice 100 litres medium coco fibre 100 litres perlite fans small aircon etc... with my setup i can grow up to around 50 plants at 1 time but with another 2 more HPS lights the size if my grow room is 2400 x 1200 x 2800 well mate its a thought , good luck for the future grow
The city of LA is changing out their street lights for LEDs. I suspect that will make large scale LED flood lights more common in all applications. The number of manufactures will be greater, and more research will be done to tune them best for us as well as prices will be go down. I'm grateful to the LED grow pioneers including skronix.
and another thing is that,yeah, i might not get a really big yield BUT,just by using my led i save an estimated 4 to 500$ a month right off the back!you figure two months of flowering i just saved a grand on electricity!cause electricity aint that cheap down south! so how much more weed do you think would grow if i was using a 1000 watt hps light compared to using my led light????and if i was to flower with my led light for 6 weeks and then switch to a 1000 watt hps for the last twoo weeks, would that be ok???either way this widow looks amazing!!
have you thought of adding a few of the single t5 bulbs?that would give you full spectrum and help get bigger yield for minimal power.i only use my ufo for veg chamber
Those that seem to believe LED is a waste. First off, we said that about Fluros/T5, they said it about Hydro in the 70s. No, I do not believe LED lighting is ready for prime time, but let someone who has grown with LED for about 20 months now. Key: Cost - give me a break. You can get the GOOD UFO quality now for under $350, some specials now at 299. Everything on ebay is not created equal just because they look alike. you want 660 namometer Red, 460s blue and 612s orange. Good ballast 400W switchable $170, middle road HPS if you want to just use it start to finish $55-65 for not junk. Cheap Lumewing aliuminum reflector 50. Savings in electricity each month one 90W replaces a 400W HPS $27-32 each month in use at 12/12, at 18/6 or 20/0 veg, saves more (A 1000W costs about $80 a month in electricity) So cost is made up well within 4 months at the longest. Light lasts 8 year (50,000 hours) if you do it right, you replace your HPS bulb once a year or you are wasting even more electricity because the light after two full cycles 30% or more of its proper lumens of the specific colors you shoot for, some blue, some orange and mostly red. take the LED, in this case UFO out of the box, plug into any normal receptable, its on,, walk away. Sure the weight is about 15, say it is even 20% less, but there is no IR, perfect for small grow spaces, NO HEAT at all to speak off, so you need nothing more than a standard cheap fan just to blow over your plant(s) to make more nature as wind, strengthen the stem and branches as well. Done with it, unplug it, wipe with a damp cloth, put it in the box until you want to plug it in again. Takes up less space than a SMALL pizza. So there are many reasons to grow with LED. 1. Pioneer who loves a challenge 2. eliminates heat problems, no need for ducting, expensive tubed air cooled expensive reflector. 3. No IR for the Helicopters So, for those that like new things or want to be as incognito as possible, Fluros and LED are the right choice. The poster about putting your bills to one side $500 and that expensive UFO on the other. Bills will not grow you smoke my friend, the light does, so your scenario is invalid. If you want to smoke grass, you buy it or you grow it. Or you have a great god father that has warehouses full of it (I wish). So there is more, the sense that it is LED vs HID is such a wrong way to look at it. I am growing now all LED. (see grow journal from me). I have an older grow going that is looking great, I started the journal but never kept it up to date due issues with life. They are just 10-18 days away and at about 3 weeks out, I kept the LEDs above them TWO UFO 90W side by side spread apart about 12 inches. Three mature 3.5 foot plants. I do not worry about heat of a light for 5 hours a day, so to beef up the bugs and they look and stink WW not a burnt leave on the plant until I added the 400 HPS 5 hours a day. I have it coming in from the side and move it around the plants once each day. Meaning 5 hours one day it is on one side, then the next day it is on the next side. 4 days to go all the way around. So I will end up pretty close to HID all the way through, saved in excess of $300 from start to finish in just using two UFOs (a 300W LED for like 8 days before I took it down) and now this 400 to help beef up the mid to top of plants. HID lighting, even 18 inches away, has already burnt leaves. SO, yes, the yield at this time is less, but for those that like LED, even if you do not supplement the last 3 weeks to beef it all up, you are so green, lean and doing your thing.
Wow I thought the LED UFO was a scam but, if you are saying you grew that plant with the UFO then it is not too bad considering. Look we are not going to see heavy yielders like we see with HID but they obviously do work. I know, because I have grown with LED's for well over 18 months now [not the UFO's in yours.]