Hey everyone, I began a growin project with cfl's and was never able to complete the grow. Since then I have been reasearching a lot more but there is one thing that I cant seem to find and that information on LED's. When I begin growing again in Jan I want to do it through LED but have no idea where to begin. Questions Im looking to get answered: -variations of Lighting for veg and flowering (Schedule and types of light i.e. MH vs HPS) -what the diffrent colors mean -what does tri band vs 5 band vs 2 duo band (i think) -Does LED work with soil? Please help...I want to avoid dealing with heat issues when i restart growing
1. MH are best suited for vegging (18+ hours of light per day), HPS are best for flowering (12 hours light and 12 hour uninterupted darkness) 2. The sun hits our atmosphere at different angles at different times of the year, producing different colours with each angle. In winter and spring the suns spectrum is in the blue range, in summer and autumn it's in the orangey red spectrum. 3. Don't know what you mean, do you mean dual spectrum bulb? 4. LEDs are good at Christmas time, they brighten up my Christmas tree.
LED's only work for Photo ops. You can save yourself a lot of money and headache and buy some HID lighting. The technology is just not there yet. But i bet you will have a lot of people telling you otherwise. Just do your own research and decide for yourself don't just believe any joe schmo like me.
Thanks for the attempt to answer the question but my questions are not in reference to cfls...THEY ARE IN REFERENCE TO USING LED's AS GROW LIGHTS. A picture is below
Kinda sounds like you don't want to hear this, but based on the testing that people have been doing here and elsewhere, LED grow lights just don't work well for this application. Yes, LED lights can grow marijuana, but the don't do it well, and you would be far better served by other alternatives.
leds will work, they have the right light spectrum but the technology is just not there yet, leds with cfls work great i have 50 w led panel and 4 23w cfl i have 2 plants and there are 18days and are looking pretty good.
That sounds like a good idea....do u get stable temperatures using the 4 cfls? Also i found what I was looking for....a basic introduction to LED's, very basic and very beginningers....If anyone is interested here is the link L.E.D. GROW LIGHTS
You'll get "stable" temps with all the lights. What you won't get with led's is results. You can invest your $$ in much more efficient tools. Is it heat you are worried about? Hps lights come in a few forms, one being "air cooled". You hook up a small fan to exhaust all that heat outside the room. My neighbor just replaced his cfl's (4x 125 for flowering) with an air cooled 600w hps and the temps in the closet dropped a few degrees. My turn, lights are on order,lol. I'll stick with the cfl's for veg though, you can get the flouro MUCH closer which prevents stretching. Perfect application for a cfl. The light, fan and ducting together will still cost you a lot less than LED's and your harvest will be far superior.
The problem is the people who responded to you, probably never tried LEDs, and yet, post negative comments. I have grown both ways. If LEDS are wrong, I don't want to be right! The only light problem I had was following the manufactures recommendation of 18"-24" above the canopy. Once I repositioned to 12" for veg, my plants doubled in size from 11" to 21" in just 3 weeks. For bloom 4-6 inches, or as I just found out move the light horizontal to flood the lower branches/buds. Go into the hydroponic section and look at the photos. The defense rests
I've heard the same good things. Here's a link to one company Go Green Grow Lights ...More than hps/mh lights with no heat and a fraction of the power use... has anyone else tried them? I'd really like to know, I have a tiny stealth box with fluros now and eventually I think I want it to be a little veg box and I'll get a bigger flowering tent eventually that will need some lighting!! I'm very new so low heat sounded good to me...a problem to avoid I thought. Thanks
Yea this is something that I am going to try to look into as well but I have to research how to make a cooltube so I can utilize it for a MH and HPS bulb. I also need to find out if this same fan is used for exhaust and if it would fit well with a stealth grow due to the fact it might be loud. Thanks for this response...I have been tryin to search for a positive response because I really want to learn about people who have had good experiences. Definetly agree with you...the more problems you can avoid due to heat the better...thanks for the site definetly going to check it out