i have grown a few times (outdoors only), and never had any issues (i was growing 6'+ plants with almost a pound per plant), but for some reason this year i ended up killing all 3 of my plants (first time killing any plants, and i felt pretty bad). my old house had amazing soil, but this new house i am in has all clay, and no matter how hard i tried, i couldnt get the clay to loosen (spent 100's on soils, cocoas, nutrience, vermiculite, and perlite), and i think i over watered them because the water wouldn't pass through the clay properly. anyway, enough of my background. the outdoor season is coming to an end here in Colorado, and since i killed all my plants, i have to try again indoors, that's where this post comes in. i know most of the basics of indoor grow (helped a friend with his SOG, but he went hydro in a 6x6 bed, and used a giant HPS light system), and i have decided to go Soil with an LED lights (or cfl if you think that is better). Now what i need help with is, are all LED lights the same? i have found a few LED's for under $50, and i have found 100's over $50, but i am looking for one that screws into a normal light socket (growing in my giant walk in closet), and doesn't use a ton of electricity (i am not a wealthy man). i did some research on LED lighting, and it seems they can take better advantage of the light spectrum for growing than CFL\HPS, and they use less electricity. So what do you guys think my best bet is for under $50, with the highest yield potential? i only plan on just trying 1 plant for now, and seeing how it goes from there.
anything but a mars 2, read my posts and others to see how that works... If your growing indoors and aiming for low wattage your best bet would to be to wire in a couple 120 sockets , low wattage means you want those lights as absolutley close as possible. Indoor growing light intensity is an inverse square so a few inches is a real noticeable difference. Throw down panda film or a fresh white coat of paint (and let it air out) to recoup your light loss. Look for a HID system that suits your requirements, any low cost LED is vastly inferior. I can't stress this enough, you pay substantially more for the same amount of light and generally the same amount of heat. They don't use modern LEDs , dont use constant current drivers, and it's a huge gamble if they will survive. Craigslist is your friend here, you can go T5 (out of budget? Check craigslist, you want maybe 2 2ft HO bulbs at a minimum, 6500k for veg and 2700-3500k for flower. You can build this yourself for well under $50... Probably a 3 or 4 bulb even), T8 is now DIRT cheap, or CFL but the HID systems are really time tested and can be found cheap in the lower 50-300watt ranges. (300 is massive ammount of light for a single plant) /Rant/ Those mono color LEDs are dead. No brand name company has invested money in them recently, and none of them are researching it either. The 100% for sure future is WHITE COBs. Something you can't get for $50. The mars lights are literally less efficient than even a budget HID. They have inefficient bottom quality drivers (~15-20% loss from wall), high iron glass (-10%+ loss of emitted light), have to manually isolate each diode because they cheaped out on a proper driver (~5%+ loss from driver), run the LEDs at relatively high wattage/current (-20 to -50% overall efficiency) and run LEDs that are multiple generations behind (-50% total system efficiency compared to modern LEDs). Literally they throw away efficiency so fast, you do end up with LESS. HID systems can run around 25-35% efficient, and vent heat from the space. A mars light runs at the low end of that, costs 5x more, and intakes hot air from the top and recirculates it out the side and back into the top... Whatever you end up doing, know that adjusting a light from ceiling level to 18 inches above the plants is an unbelievable increase in light. Please don't plug something in a socket on the ceiling (did I misunderstand)
i am talking growing 1 plant in my closet, and you are talking about rewiring stuff. i don't own this house, and don't plan on changing anything, i just simply wanted the most bang for my buck with a regular screw in bulb. either CFL or LED.
If your only growing 1 plant get a cheap LED off ebay or amazon. I have had good results with the cheap LEDs
If you only want to spend $50 on an LED then you are wasting your time. If you want to grow with a $50 light you have to go with HPS. What are the dimensions of the space you are going to use? Btw, LEDs don't use less electricity than HPS. They use whatever they use. A 600w LED uses more electricity than a 250w HPS. 350w more in fact. Don't worry about colour spectrum, all light bar green will get used. Although blue light helps keep the stems from stretching so LED has its advantages when vegging. While flowering it's not important
I always find hps lamps give you most bang for your buck. But a small closet grow i would use t5's if your closet it big enough and cfls if it is not. They work well and from what i have seen you will get a similar yield out of t5's as you do out of LED's for the same wattage. The cfl's will give slightly less yield per same wattage and HPS slightly more for the same wattage.